Jeremy Baker: Please Just Send My Tax Rebate To Mastercard And Save Me The 41 Cents...

[marmar]

from OurFuture.org:



Please Just Send My Tax Rebate To Mastercard And Save Me The 41 Cents...
By Jeremy Baker

January 18th, 2008 - 12:06am ET


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As my fellow coworkers know, 2007 was a year of change for me. I moved to Washington, D.C., bought a house, married a fantastic woman, adopted a great dog and started a new job at Campaign for America’s Future.

On Tuesday I received my W-2 from our Operations Manager with great delight. Since we had bought a house, we are primed for a big tax return! While visions of a new truck or boat have danced through my head like a 4-year-old on Christmas Eve, I know exactly where our tax return is going. A large chunk will go into a savings account and the rest will pay off wedding debt. And you know what, I am pretty happy about that.

Today, I hear that President Bush is advocating for up to an $800 tax rebate per taxpayer as the main thrust of an economic stimulus package. So again, slightly modified visions of new parts for my truck or a much smaller boat begin to do the Electric Slide in my dreams. Then I remember that my little Ford Ranger is close to being paid off. $800 would pay it off and leave enough money to buy a new timing belt to put on it.

I applaud Washington for working together quickly to find a short-term fix to the looming recession. However, I worry that it is a fix designed to infuse the finance industry with cash, not jump-start a stalled economy or provide real economic relief to the middle class.

Couple the huge loss of home equity in the last two years with credit card debt, inflation, and economic uncertainty and I don’t think these rebates ever leave the bank. I’m betting most households use the rebate to pay down debt or boost savings. Everyone is planning for the looming recession that the middle class saw on the horizon and felt in their belly before anybody on K Street or Wall Street decided they should hold off on buying that new Porsche.

So, President Bush is going to send my tax return, hopefully a few thousand dollars, along with my $800 rebate to my Bank of America account. Then I’ll log on to my account the next day, transfer half of it to savings, then use electronic bill pay to send $748.00 to Suntrust to pay off my truck and the rest to Mastercard to pay down our wedding debt.

The net economic stimulus: I’ll give Napa Auto parts about $30.00 for a timing belt that I’ll put on my truck myself. .....(more)

The complete piece is at: http://ourfuture.org/blog-entry/please-just-send-my-tax-rebate-mastercard-and-save-me-41-cents