Here’s a book that any of you out there can read that will teach you most of what you need to know about economics in simple form http://www.amazon.com/How-Economy-Grows-Why-Crashes/dp/047052670X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1291158778&sr=1-1

right now we are having a problem even keeping some government functions which nobody but anarchists would argue SHOULD be abandoned funded. SO if this kid’s dad is NOT an anarchist, shouldn’t we – in the light of laying off teachers and cops and such – raise taxes on some people who can afford to pay to keep the ship afloat?

right now wages have been stagnant for many workers for long enough that they don’t have disposable income that entrepreneurs can go after by new business ventures. consumer spending for the past few decades was based on spending on credit at an unsustainable rate.

public infrastructure and many necessary public functions are suffering right now. if we took some tax money from the wealthy to keep them afloat and functioning this would put more middle class people (like school employees) to work with money they coudl spend in the economy.

i mean, right now schools and not just public k-12 but universities are hurting for money. give the rich tax breaks and they aren’t going to fill that hole and we certainly can’t afford to let that slide if the US is goign to be compettive in the future.

entrepreneurs, businesses etc. probably don’t see any point then in using their existing capital to increase levels of production or start new business ventures since there is less spending going on. this means that unemployment and underemployment is not likely to decrease.

i guess what i would say is outside of the government then raising taxes on the wealthy (who currently don’t have a lot of incentive to use their wealth to create new jobs since people aren’t spending and aren’t likely to return to prior levels of spending) and then using that revenue to say, pay workers to do useful jobs (like all the hundreds of thousands of teachers who have been laid off) i don’t see a way that unemployment is going to decrease.

this isn’t exactly Keynesian or anything, just the notion that if we leave things as they are we won’t put a dent in unemployment nor do we do anything about the fact that yes, the government does do some important things like provide education, law enforcement and road maintenance. all of those have been cut in many areas at present which isn’t going to help the present or the future be any brighter.