Harry Reid's Jobs Bill (yawn)

Scott Brown is a dirty traitor. (Yawn.) He voted for Harry Reid’s (yawn) jobs bill. Oh, I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be rude (yawn), I just find it hard to care about this bill.

Once upon a time, Democrat Max Baucus and Republican Charles Grassley worked together in harmony, hand-in-hand, as lovers, to craft a truly bipartisanship way to throw away $85 billion. Ostensibly, their plan would have created more than one job. . . though I doubt that. Still, they did center justify the text of their bill, and it looked very pretty.

But then Senatorial Rogue Dingy Harry Reid, aka The Dinge, jammed a knife in their backs within about an hour of the unveiling. Indeed, Reid decided that he wasn’t even going to allow that $85 billion dollar bill to come to the Senate floor for consideration because. . . and I kid you not. . . it included things the Republicans liked. So much for focusing on the American people instead of partisan politics.

As a result of Reid’s crapulence, this $85 billion bipartisan bill vanished in a huff of smoke, and Baucus was. . . well, I don’t know if there’s a Senatorial term for what I’m thinking, it’s like “pistol-whipped” only less cool. . . maybe “gavel-slapped”? Yes, that works: This bill vanished in a huff of smoke, and Baucus was gavel-slapped.

In place of the $85 billion bill, Reid produced a “$15 billion” bill. Here is what it does:

• It provides $20 billion to fund highway and transit programs through 2010.

Boy does this sound good, until you realize two things. First, these projects are already underway and have hired all they’re going to hire. So don’t look for new jobs. Secondly, this only spends $20 billion on these projects, which is less than 10% of what the vaunted stimulus bill spent on roads. . . and you know how well that turned out.

• It provides a $1,000 exemption from social security payroll taxes for employers who hire unemployed people.

Now you may recall that I have advocated cutting the payroll tax to provide an incentive for companies to hire new workers. But this ain’t that. First, this is only for one year, meaning there is no incentive to hire anything other than temporary workers. It also appears that you only get the $1,000 credit if the employee stays the entire year, i.e. it’s risky. And it only applies to currently unemployed workers, which means there will be a mismatch between available labor and needed labor. Nice work Harry. Maybe next time, you can limit the tax cut to one-legged men with hunchbacks and an aversion to clowns. Not to mention, if this is a $15 billion bill and it’s already spent $20 billion on roads, that doesn’t really leave much for these tax cuts, does it?

• It extends a tax break for businesses that spend money on capital investments like equipment purchases.

Ah ha! This is the cut in capital gains that I advocated. . . only, it isn’t. This isn’t a cut in the capital gains tax rate. Thus, it doesn’t change business behavior by encouraging businesses to sell their old equipment and replace it with new equipment. This is just a one-time discount on new equipment, which you don’t need if you’re still depreciating the old stuff. And even then, it’s so targeted that even our one-legged man with the hunchback and the aversion to clowns probably won’t qualify.

• It expands the use of Build America Bonds to put states further into debt on capital construction projects.

As I discussed the other day, sometimes infrastructure spending can be a good idea. But this sounds like a gimmick. First, we’re talking about only a couple billion dollars, in an economy that rates in the tens of trillions. Think of it like getting a $20 raise. Woo hoo! No more dog food for you! Secondly, state budgets are so bad at the moment that adding debt is about as wise as telling a junkie where to buy discount crack (Sam's Discount Crack Club. . . on Third and Main).

All in all, these are sort of the right ideas, but done wrong. It's like boiling a steak. Typical Democratic SNAFU. All told, Lawrence Mischel, president of the Economic Policy Institute, thinks this bill will “create no more than a couple hundred thousand jobs.” I think he’s certifiable for even giving it that much credit.

But frankly, at this point, what’s another $15 billion tossed down Harry Reid’s crapper? Thus, I don’t care at all that Scott Brown voted for this. This was hardly an earth shattering vote. Indeed, even Mitch McConnell couldn’t bring himself to care.

But wait, you say, can’t Dingy Harry trumpet this bill as a massive senate success and thereby achieve his re-election? Are you serious? This bill does nothing. It achieves nothing. Moreover, here is what the bill specifically does not do, which the prior version did: it does not help people or states. . . the two groups you’d think it should help.

Indeed, unlike the $154 billion House version, Reid provides no additional funds for state budgets. . . because he hates them. That means that all those state employees who were kept on the job by the stimulus bill will now lose their jobs. It also does not include an extension for unemployment benefits or a subsidy for COBRA health insurance. . . because he hates the unemployed too.

So yeah, let the Dinge trumpet this achievement, if he's stupid enough to try.