Climate change and dependence on foreign oil are problems that won't go away on their own. Tabling plans to deal with them doesn't make it easier for companies to plan and invest; it makes it harder.

Making labor less expensive helps firms hire people.

If increasing income equality is the goal, it might be wiser to put money into infrastructure than to subsidize manufacturing. Construction also pays good wages, but with lower educational requirements. And America's infrastructure needs are enormous.

If you think about it, candidate Obama, Sen. Obama, was running on sort of long-run economic issues, like restoring prosperity to the middle class, dealing with the perennial problem of health care in the United States. He talked a lot about the budget deficit, about the need to transition to clean energy.

The very first email I got [was] from a women's group saying 'We don't want this stimulus package to just create jobs for burly men.'

Fewer people working means permanently lower tax revenues.

Our estimates suggest that a tax increase of 1 percent of GDP reduces output over the next three years by nearly 3 percent. The effect is highly significant.