Can President Obama's Job Plan Work?

Image by jamesomalley via FlickrThe new Jobs plan. Can it actually work?

If you've paid attention to the news at all lately, I'm sure that you've heard about President Obama's new American Jobs Plan. Earlier this month, the President outlined his proposal to create more jobs.There is so much information about the plan, and so many differing opinions. My question was, and still is for that matter, will it actually help the 14 million unemployed Americans find new jobs?

The answer isn't clear, and the Jobs Program is still being heavily debated. By the time it passes, and I'm sure that it will, it will probably look very different than the proposal President Obama presented.

Right now, many economists are giving the programs positive reviews and are estimating that the plan would create at least 1 million new jobs over the next year.

The first part of the plan is a payroll tax holiday. This break in taxes could be good for employees and small businesses. It would give the employees and businesses some additional spending power, which could increase consumers spending, product demand which would, in turn, allow companies to hire more workers and create new jobs. In addition, this new spending and hiring would boot our nation's gross domestic product by as much as 1.5 percent.

The payroll tax has received a lot of support from both sides of Congress. All things considered, it is the most popular part of the program and the one most likely to pass.

Of course, there is no debate about how important it is to our country's overall well being to get unemployed people back to work. As a nation, we can't afford to have so many able-bodied people out of work and letting their skills go to waste. The longer that people are out of work, the less likely it is that they will be able to return to their industry at the same level as they were before they lost their job. Our society is only as strong as it's weakest members and we can't let so many people drop out of the workforce.

As unemployment grows, companies and workers become worried. Investors become more hesitant to spend money and consumer confidence goes down. The cycle almost becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Still, there are naysayers. Some economists are expecting a much smaller impact. David Wyss, an economists at Brown University says that he thinks the plan would create only that 600,000 jobs. Others are concerned that even if the plan creates new jobs, it can't be looked at as the solution for our economic problem. They say that at best, it is a short term fix for the weak economy and struggling job market.

Whether the job plan passes or not, the best way to create new jobs is to create a real demand for products and services. Hopefully, this plan will be able to create some additional money in the hands of consumers who can put it back into the economy.

What do you think about the Jobs Plan? Let me know in the comments.

By Melissa Kennedy- Melissa is a 9 year blog veteran and a freelance writer for LogisticsJobsiteBlog and Nexxt, along with helping others find the job of their dreams, she enjoys computer geekery, raising a teenager, supporting her local library, writing about herself in the third person and working on her next novel.