Buried in Republican golden child congressman Paul Ryan's ambitious unworkable 2012 budget plan are a couple of [impossible] statistical assumptions regarding "job creation" that really ought to make any serious person do a spit take and laugh out loud.
The first is that this proposed Republican plan, which cuts $5.8-trillion from the federal budget over the next 10 years, will manage to reduce the national unemployment rate (currently sitting at 8.8%) to 4% by 2015. Now, I realize time flies, and 2015 still sounds like a far off number, but January 2015 is in fact a scant 44 months away. The notion that we're going to turn this economy that far around in that space of time is sheer folly.
The second assumption is that over time the GOP plan will reduce unemployment even further -- to 2.8%! -- in just ten years. This forecast is preposterous. The last time unemployment was that low was in 1953. Truman was just handing over the presidency to Eisenhower...and the highest marginal tax rate, by the way, was 92% on income over $400,000 (in 1953 dollars).
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