Economist David Malpass, president of Encima Global LLC: "Washington's excess spending is now running $1.5 trillion annually, and both the Treasury and the Fed are relying heavily on short-term credits for funding. The marketable national debt has ballooned to more than $8 trillion, but wait -- the Obama administration has budgeted an increase to $20 trillion over the next few years, bringing it to more than 90 percent of GDP. Even that huge sum -- $100,000 thousand for every working-age American -- doesn't include the rapidly escalating debts of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac or the government's unfunded liabilities for Social Security and Medicare. And to keep the debt estimate down the budgeteers are making wishful assumptions that millions of high-paying jobs will reappear and health care reform will pay for itself."
Michael Fleischer, president of Bogen Communications in New Jersey, in a Wall Street Journal op/ed headlined, "Why I'm Not Hiring": "When you add it all up, it costs $74,000 to put $44,000 in (employee) Sally's pocket and to give her $12,000 in benefits. Bottom line: Governments impose a 33 percent surtax on Sally's job each year....A life in business is filled with uncertainties, but I can be quite sure that every time I hire someone my obligations to the government go up. From where I sit, the government's message is unmistakable: Creating a new job carries a punishing price."
