President Obama Signs the HIRE Act Today

The bill signed today by the President is a very sound, first step towards restoring job creation. The provision to spur employers to bring on workers who have been jobless for some time by exempting those employers from payroll taxes on such new hires, is a particularly valuable policy innovation which NDN has championed for some time. But no one should tell themselves that these measures can undo the damage from the long period of economic errors and neglect before the President took office, and the consequent damage to our economy and tens of millions of families. We should carefully monitor how this measure works; and if it does help spur job creation, Congress should extend and expand the approach. Congress should also take additional steps to support working families, including universal access to instruction in using information technologies through the community college system, and temporary tax benefits for multinational companies that repatriate foreign earnings and use them to create new jobs.