The State of the Economy, Part 2 - A New Hampshire Look

Please address the chasms between the internat'l, nat'l, & and the local. The interconnections are real & failure to look at them will be disastrous. For ex., increase ed.funding & student loans & grants. Fine. Doesn't help my student who dropped when his home was foreclosed leaving him without an in-state address & ineligible for in-state tuition(in MA). How will nat'l approaches be tailored to NH where gov. services & budgets are county, town (with many tax caps), & state (no broad-based taxes). How will NH balance its budget--cut gov't jobs and you cut JOBS. Raise tolls--conflict of interest. NH state legislators go through for free. Jan Alberghene

I called in Tuesday (Mike from Concord – around 9:40 AM) but lost my cell phone connection.

I would like to elaborate my thoughts on the so-called “Stimulus Package”.

Comparing our “sick” economy to a “sick” person, we need to cure the reasons our economy is “sick”. To just do CPR, feeding tubes, etc. does nothing to make the person well.

To offer tax cuts on jobs we don’t have is ridiculous. To extend unemployment benefits does not help either (after another few weeks – we still have no “real” jobs).

We (all of us – I blame our government for allowing us to get into this mess – These people are paid by use to do their jobs to monitor and adjust situations as needed) need to work together to get all of us fully employed with benefits to raise our families to build things America (and the World) needs. Once we are all employed doing “real work”, our economy problems are solved.

Very simply, anything short of bring our jobs back from “outsourcing” countries will fail.

Your guest this AM, while discussing NH's budget shortfall discussed the possible need to "slash services". He could have said reduce, limit,decrease, shrink, trim, moderate, restrain, lessen or even cut back; but he apparently felt the need to use the most emotionally loaded word possible. That strikes me as liberal bias disguised as economic opinion. This kind of thing devalues your show.

Laura, with all due respect, if you're going to hot a show on the future of the economy, you might want to invite guests whose prognostications are based upon data and math, rather than upon parroting the latest sillyness from Bloomberg TV. It was a bit embarassing listening to those guys, and I must admit that I was embarassed for you.

Isn't it time that Gov. Lynch, our elected officials and our news reporters and commentators admitted that NH DOES HAVE AN INCOME TAX it aggressively collects, especially from retirees who do not have good pensions and were unAmerican enough to forego spending to save for retirement? It is called the dividends and interest tax but is on the books as an income tax.
If an elderly woman who has lost her husband and his social security and pension sells her home and invests the proceeds to supplement her social security she will pay NH Income tax on all dividends and interest over $3600 per year while someone earning $250,000 or even a million dollars a year in wages pays nothing. The senior citizen exemption is only $1200 and our legislators refuse to raise it. I have spoken to Sen. Lou D'Allessandro about this and his response was that it is legal and most seniors in NH are "too poor" to pay anything. Not true because NH does not tax pensions, just punishes those of us who gave up new cars and other luxuries to save.Social Security benefits of $14-$18,000 plus $5,000 in dividends and interest does not make one wealthy.
By the way, AARP believes all NH citizens should pay income tax and has no problem with only seniors paying.