Obama's economic backwardness

So Obama has got an economic policy. Well I'm not impressed, it is a leftwing programme. It will hurt New Zealand, and will hurt the economic growth of the USA. It is beholden to protectionism of industry and unions, and indicates that when Obama says the word change he really means to "turn the clock back". Obama is about going to the tired old solutions of the 1960s and 1970s of spending money on pet projects, instead of setting people free to innovate with their own money.

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Here are some of his policies:

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Fair trade: Yes a favourite of environmentalists, the Green Party and others. Fair trade is a euphemism for tariffs, quotas and bans of imports, because after all who decides what is "fair"? He wants to spread "good labor and environmental standards", which presumably means pricing businesses out of developing countries, but also doesn't mean spreading private property rights which COULD address environmental standards. Perhaps he means paying more for commodities than the market price, increasing their overproduction. All that is clear is that he doesn't believe that people should be able to exchange goods and services freely.

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Subsidise inefficient industries: He wants to prop up the US automotive industry to make fuel efficient vehicles in the USA, he wants to "invest in America's highly-skilled manufacturing workforce and manufacturing centers", invest with money taken from businesses and individuals through taxes. How does he know best how to "invest" money taken from others? Back to the tired old policies of the 1970s.

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Create jobs through destroying other ones: He goes on about creating jobs, mainly by using money taken from businesses and individuals through taxes that THEY could have created jobs through their own investment and consumption. It is sleight of hand and old fashioned childlike socialist economics. Policies like "create a federal Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) that will require 25 percent of American electricity be derived from renewable sources by 2025" could cost the USA a fortune, diverting investment on cheaper energy into more expensive options, reducing the competitiveness of businesses either through utility fees or taxes. It is easy to point to jobs socialists create, but harder to point to the many they destroy by eating away at spending of others. He will "will invest in rural small businesses" I only wish he would do it with his own money, why take it from others?

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Price more unskilled jobs out of the market: He does this by wanting to "raise the minimum wage, index it to inflation and increase the Earned Income Tax Credit to make sure that full-time workers earn a living wage that allows them to raise their families and pay for basic needs". Tiring indeed, and he wonders why unskilled manufacturing jobs move south.

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On top of that he wants to regulate and subsidise housing lending, and heavily regulate credit cards and the like, because he thinks Americans are too stupid to look after themselves.

Do you want "real change" which is about going back to big government knows best?