America is a dependent nation. Our current economic system is sustained by cheap imports, loans and skyrocketing debts. At the same time, the nation’s industrial base has been decimated, losing more than 3 million jobs in the past decade.
EconomyInCrisis.org recommends the following steps be implemented immediately in order to reinvigorate our economy and country:
- Energize America: Leaders seeking elected office, most notably the field of 2008 Presidential candidates, must develop a sound economic platform. The platform should include solutions to end U.S. deficits, energize the American manufacturing base and retain ownership of our best domestic companies and industries.
- Reindustrialize: Develop industrial strategy to reindustrialize America to the levels of production achieved during and after World War II.
- Subsidize Industry: The government should create incentives for industry. American manufacturing companies were the source of our nation’s wealth. We should encourage their success with subsides, tax changes and research grants. A tit-for-tat system of tariffs should be implemented to give our companies a chance against predatory trade practices masquerading as free trade.
- Limit Foreign Leverage: Control the trade deficit and place limits on the amount of American debt a foreign nation can possess. This minimizes the threat of a lending nation liquidating their loans, which could sink the U.S. dollar’s value and the American economy. Restrict imports on non-essential high-priced items that contribute to foreign nation's balance of trade surpluses, and America's $1.6 milion per minute BOT deficit. This money is used by foreign nations to buy our major companies and accumulate mass holdings of national debt, becoming our defacto national bankers.
- Retain Ownership of Companies: Guard American companies from predatory foreign acquisitions. Domestic companies are the means through which America gained wealth and became a superpower, yet since 1978, 14,833 companies and entire industries have been bought by foreign nations.
- Develop An American MITI: Create a government agency similar to Japan’s Ministry of International Trade and Industry, which establishes guidelines to determine needs, priorities and industrial growth.
- Learn from other Prosperous Nations: Develop capital and knowledge intensive industries and model America after Japan’s successful industrial infrastructure.
- End Foreign Subsidies: No longer subsidize foreign companies for domestic jobs. These jobs destroy American companies. Take a look at the auto industry: GM lost $10.6 billion in 2005, Ford lost $12.7 billion in 2006; Toyota had an $11.8 billion profit in 2006. Toyota's profit is due in part to America's assistance in building their plants domestically and allowing them to operate outside higher-priced union agreement parameters that U.S. automakers adhere to.
Click
here
to contact your Representative in Congress.
Unless the above article is already copyrighted, this article is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License,
EIC grants permission to use this article in whole or in part provided attribution is given,
preferably in the form of a link back to EconomyInCrisis.org.
