by Geoffrey Maney
This country is currently dealing with massive debts, an unemployment rate above 8 percent and an unstable Middle East. This country is bound by a dependence on foreign oil.
The tax code is bloated and confusing, offering some of the wealthy to escape paying their full share through loopholes.
Manufacturing jobs leaving this nation, high debt both on a national level and also on a personal level are crippling this nation. Student debt is at an all-time high.
We are faced with a Medicare system, a Social Security system, and numerous entitlement benefits that are on the road to insolvency.
On top of that, the federal government is now going to mandate that everyone buy health insurance and will provide that insurance for those who cannot afford it.
This country’s debt is up to 16 trillion dollars and is held by many foreign countries. The issues facing us in this election are pressing and everyone needs to get involved. There are only five days left until this election.
If you do not know who you are going to vote for, you need to figure it out. I am sick of hearing from people that they “don’t care,” or that politics is boring and it “doesn’t affect me.”
Everything that happens in Washington, DC directly affects all of us. Why is it so hard to find a job after college? The president and the leaders in congress set the economic policy of this country, and it is the economy that produces the skilled jobs that we are trying so hard to find.
As a senior, I can tell you it is not easy to find entry-level jobs that don’t involve flipping burgers or filling soft drinks and saying, “here ya go, have a nice day.”
Not to knock the fast food industry, but, after paying thousands of dollars to go to college, you would expect to find a nice decent-paying skilled job out there for you.
Not to say that everyone is owed a job, but in a good economy, where the businesses do well, there are more jobs. The economy is only one issue. Do not be a one-issue voter. Look at the positives and the negatives of all the candidates, their plans for the economy.
Look at what they say through the prism of history: is it better to ensure the wealthy “pay their fair share” and accept more spending to ensure that we all have access to health care, benefits, and jobs through the government as seen in the term of FRD?
Or is it better to give tax cuts to people regardless of social class and maintain that when the wealthy do well there are more jobs and a better economy as seen under Reagan?
There is a choice between accepting the possibility of more debt with the promise of a cut or a promise to cut the debt but no real specifics.
I have made up my mind. I know what I believe; I have tested it against the lens of logic. I have viewed my choice through the prism of history, and, through this, I am certain it is right.
I encourage everyone to do the same because this is our country. In the next 10-30 years we will be the shapers and movers of this economy and, for some of us, this government.
We will be the ones paying these taxes, paying off this debt, and working these jobs.
gmaney@capital.edu
