Unemployment benefits cost: $520 billion
http://money.cnn.com/2012/11/29/news/economy/unemployment-benefits-cost/index.html?source=cnn_bin
The headline is clearly intended to fire up conservative blowhards who are convinced that poor people are stealing their money. Note that this figure is for the entire 5 year period of the Great Recession (which would absolutely be another Great Depression if not for these dribs and drabs of social safety net!), so the annual cost is a bit over $100 billion, or a bit less than 15% of the money we spend on our military industrial complex _each year_ (not including the wars or the intelligence community, at least another $300 billion!). Also, it is a small fraction (a bit more than 3%) of what we have spent on bailing out the banks where we are lucky to get our money back with interest (note that the CBO thinks we will get a 10% return on investment for every buck we spend on ‘these leeching, good for nothing layabouts’, so in reality, IT DOESN’T COST THE COUNTRY A DAMN THING!).
So, instead of printing the following, vastly more honest headline:
An investment of $30 billion in extending unemployment next year would net the country a 10% ROI
we have a headline specifically exaggerated to inflame the minds of conservative population.
Man I wish I could get my wife to consider emigration!
Boosting the economy is not the same as ROI.
It seems to me it is, for tax payers.
Taking one taxpayer’s $100 and giving it to another taxpayer will only add to the economy if taxpayer #1 wouldn’t have spent it and taxpayer #2 will. Given the reduction in wealth of the majority of taxpayers, I find it difficult to believe that taxpayer #1 wouldn’t have spent it.
Borrowing $100 (increasing the debt) to give to taxpayer #2 is obviously not a winning proposition, either, except in the very short-term limited view of taxpayer #2.
As a social move it may very well be good; as a rational move for fixing the economy it is not. This doesn’t mean giving it to the banks is good, of course. It’s VERY bad.
I know some unemployed people. Half of them are gaming the system. They can do it without reducing their lifestyle because of other resources (e.g. a working spouse). It’s a viable proposition because they can’t make as much with the available jobs as they did before their jobs disappeared. It makes a mockery of the safety net.
No one wants to raise taxes except in a selective way that doesn’t affect them. No one wants to cut spending except in a selective way that doesn’t affect them. The result is that we are all negatively affected by doing nothing.