CREDIT AMNESTY NEEDED TO AID RECOVERY
By Roger Fredinburg
February
12, 2010
NewsWithViews.com
The news is filled with stories related to the unemployment rate these days. The media, Congress and President Obama speak endlessly about the "problem."
The real problem not being discussed is that of the "risk takers" having lost their ability to return to the "risk taking" they were so adept at prior to the economic tsunami.
While the media and Politico's blab themselves half to death worrying about the poor workers who lost their jobs, they seem completely oblivious as to the fact that the folks who used to employ these people have been flattened by the economic downturn.
Their credit is destroyed, and their ability to borrow start up or recovery capital has been terminated. And they don't receive unemployment benefits nor do they count as unemployed in the statistics.
The "workers" collecting those welfare checks that ceased being unemployment checks after 13 weeks, are not the sorts of people who will risk it all and start revamping the economy through their own ambitions.
The fact is, the majority of them will lie about and absorb as much welfare as we can send their way.
One of the cultural realities of our time is that most people on unemployment (welfare) .. Fully intend to collect it as long as we keep sending the checks. And the fact that jobs are scarce gives them a sense of entitlement about the benefit that is a dangerous threat to any possible recovery.
I am constantly exposed to employers stories about supposed job seekers who visit businesses and actually tell them they aren't really looking to find work but are there for the purposes of reporting job searches to keep the Unemployment checks (welfare) flowing.
Across this great land are literally millions of entrepreneurial spirited people who not so long ago worked as small business owners. Realtors, Insurance brokers, Loan Officers and Mortgage company owners, contractors and millions of independent contractors.
They are never part of the national discourse. It's as though they don't exist?
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These were the business men and women with small offices, who had a few employees, and took the risk and invested in small businesses, real estate, people and community.
These are the unsung hero's of America who are cast aside and left without any entitlements or recourse when the forces of economic destruction come raining down.
The irony is, these are the very people who would say to the world they don't want any hand outs. They don't need any government gimmies,
All they need is a level playing field and a little running room. They will carry the ball, push the limits of human endurance and bring home the bacon.
Sadly, through no fault of their own, as a result of abhorrent monetary policies, poor banking practices, big government spending and an archaic and in-humane tax code, these best of the best producers and risk takers have been sidelined and made impotent at a time when the country needs them most.
So, while the politicians, pundits, media mavens, bankers and bureaucracy toil about wondering where the recovery is ...? Maybe they ought to start worrying about the millions of unemployed risk takers who want to, but can't lift a finger to help because they have been artificially cast into the dungeon of credit unworthiness by forces beyond their control.
Today, I call upon Congress, the media and President Obama to consider a form of credit amnesty that would free these great Americans from the chains of credit ruin and allow them to get into the game, once again, so they can help put America back to work.
Give them a tax free status for a few years so they can get in and build the infrastructure of a lasting recovery and restore their good names and return to them their dignity of which they were robbed.
I call it Credit Amnesty.
Maybe we should pick a date, and everyone's credit rating is reset to that date?
Something must be done. No insult intended, but the people collecting unemployment from one extension to the next are not the people who are capable of solving our crisis.
I find it interesting that the phones are ringing into the homes of these fine people from credit collectors based outside America, from places like India, the Philippines etc.
In the words of the Russian comic Yakov Schmirnov .. "What a Country"
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We can do better, and I hope we will start by offering our best and brightest an opportunity to put America back to work.
Please join me in calling for credit amnesty for those who deserve it. I am not talking about bailing out reckless speculators, but authentic hard working men and women who were forced into economic ruin by the wrongful negligence of big Government, big money and failed policy.
� 2010 Roger Fredinburg - All Rights Reserved
