We’ve been trying to keep up with all of the new spending programs Senator Barack Obama promises to implement if he is elected president and, well, it hasn’t been easy. Because there are so many of them.
Here’s some of them, taken from his campaign material:
1. “Obama will provide a $500 ‘Making Work Pay’ tax credit to almost every worker in America . . .”
Of course, the government doesn’t make money, it only transfers it. So before you can “give” the vast majority of Americans a $500 tax credit, you have to take it from them first.
2. “The Obama middle class tax plan will also provide 10 million homeowners a new mortgage interest credit that directly lowers the interest rate homeowners pay on their mortgages . . .”
3. “[E]liminate federal income taxes for all seniors making under $50,000 per year.”
Actually, this proposal may not cost the federal government that much since households in the bottom 50 percent of income only pay 3 to 4 percent of all income taxes anyway.
4. Obama plans to create a voluntary opt-out pension plan for all workers. “The Obama plan will also match 50 percent of the first $1,000 of savings for families that earn under $75,000.”
5. “Barack Obama will address the infrastructure challenge by National Infrastructure Reinvestment Bank to expand and enhance existing federal transportation investments.”
No word yet on how much the Bank will cost, but the Obama campaign suggests it will “create two million direct and indirect jobs per year and stimulate approximately $35 billion per year in new economic activity.”
6. And then there is education: The fully refundable American Opportunity Tax Credit will “ensure that the first $4,000 of a college education is completely free for most Americans . . .”
Of course, there’s a trade off: to get the credit you have to do “100 hours of public service a year,” in organizations like the Peace Corps (Boy, is that a four-decade-old throw-back!). But hey, that breaks out to about $40 an hour. Not bad work (or subsidy) if you can get it.
7. And then on health care, he says he will spend $10 billion a year over five years to get the health care system switched over to electronic health records. Plus he estimates we will have to spend upwards of $50 billion to $65 billion each year to get the uninsured covered—and you can bet that’s just the starting point!
America’s current love affair with Barack Obama may come to an end quickly when they find out this guy is no cheap date.