SEATTLE NEWS ARCHIVES & FEATURES

Dori: Gov. Inslee has no plan for our state economy

Apr 7, 2020, 10:19 PM | Updated: Apr 8, 2020, 5:07 am

small businesses, inslee, reopen...

Gov. Jay Inslee. (Facebook)

(Facebook)

My jaw dropped as I listened to Gov. Inslee’s press conference during my show Tuesday.

The federal government last week announced the $2.2 trillion stimulus for unemployed workers and businesses that are in danger of failing. It was a bipartisan vote that delivered that package. Since then, I’ve been wondering what Jay Inslee is going to do economically for our state.

Dori: Hey Dow, how is this essential?

We got the answer this afternoon. Nothing.

Well, to be precise, almost nothing. The governor announced a bizarre $5 million fund for small businesses with fewer than 10 employees.

Let me put that in perspective. According to Business News Daily, Washington state has roughly 609,000 small businesses that employ about 1.4 million people. So, what Inslee proposed Tuesday works out to about $8 per small business. It works out to about $3.50 per employee. Oh yeah, that’ll get the economy rolling again.

Put another way, with a state budget of $52 billion, Inslee is proposing to give 9/1000th of one percent to the unemployed and struggling businesses.

There are credible projections that our state GDP of $114 billion could take a 30% hit. Governor Inslee should be looking at ways to cut the state budget a corresponding $10-15 billion dollars. But Democrats never cut spending, they never cut taxes. In fact, their solution to this crisis is going to be looking for ways to tax us more (like the Sawant/Morales business tax).

But hey, if you’re unemployed, Jay has $3.50 for you.

Will the Trump haters at least acknowledge that the feds, in a bipartisan way, are doing a billion times more for our struggling economy than Governor Jay is doing?

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Dori: Gov. Inslee has no plan for our state economy