Fund Medicare with More Jobs

Jobs are good for the economy. This fundamental tenant is so basic, that it is beyond my comprehension that anyone could think otherwise. Sadly, many people do, and some of them are in positions of power. In the midst of an election for the Office of President, now would be a good time to state the obvious in hopes we can get our country on the right track.

A job creates many jobs. That is the reality of the marketplace. We are all based on a system of interdependence. Working together to solve problems creates prosperity. One such system that we have is Medicare.

Jobs are a good thing. Let's not lose sight of this.

Medicare works on the same tenant as Social Security: younger workers pay into a general fund, and that fund becomes available to them once they retire. Various cost-saving measure, some prudent (Obama's), some nefarious (Ryan) are the topic of discussion right now, but a policy that would be both a necessity to the viability of Medicare would be to simply add more people to the workforce.

The premise is simple. Right now, the unemployment rate is 8.3 percent. By most accounts, approximately 14 million Americans are looking for work. If the Federal Government were to seriously make an effort providing jobs, such an effort would not be onerously difficult.

Our highways are literally falling apart. Our mass transit is dysfunctional in most of our major cities--if a city even has any form of mass transit at all. Even in New York City, home to its iconic subway system, is not without its flaws.

Take construction of the Second Avenue Subway. Not only is this project a full seven decades behind schedule, but once complete, it will provide a lower level of service than the elevated train lines it was meant to replace! Not only are we plagues with high unemployment now, but simply getting to and from work in this country is a disaster!

This is a problem of which we, as a society, have direct control over. We can increase our budget allocation to hire workers to fix bridges, plug potholes, and yes, update our crumbling mass transit system to something that was at least good as what we had at the turn of last century.

14 million jobs should be a major campaign issue. The median annual income for the American worker currently stands at $26,363. If 14 million people were to be added to the workforce, it would add an extra $369 billion into workers pockets. At current tax rates, these new workers would increase Medicare receipts by over $10.7 billion annually. Projected over 10 years, this would over $100 billion to Medicare.

With more workers, we could actually build this stinkin' thing!

And that's merely projecting the median salary. Most jobs created by government pay substantially more than that, much to the ire of today's modern conservative. Most workers employed in such a massive, large scale jobs program would make more than a paltry $26k per year. If we project the same number of jobs with a salary that is typical for said job, amount of money earned would likely to double, to nearly $540 billion in salary, and an extra $22 billion into Medicare per year.

How would the Feds finance such a program? Well, we may have to raise taxes on job creators like Lindsay Lohan and Alex Rodriguez, but I'm sure they will find it in their infinite wisdom to deal with it. And in the meantime, the rest of us can enjoy getting to work on fixing America.

As Michael Jordan would say, Just Do It!