Ross Perot was right. The giant sucking sound. The free trade agreements implemented by both Dems and Rep in the 1990's caused our manufacturing to move overseas. Free trade is fine between between like countries already industrialised, like Canada or some European countries, but with former 3rd world countries like China, Mexico, Central American Countries, or Asian countries, no. Not without some type of parity, like child labor, minimum workweeks, EPA regulations, etc.
If we got our industry back, people would have jobs providing at worse a lower middle class wage, with health care for themselves and their families.
Dems and Reps allowed the Banking Industry to create substitute jobs for manufacturing in home building, thus the housing bubble. Without any manufacturing to fall back on, we are in a mess.
1) Abolish the free trade laws, bring our industry back.
2) All governments from Feds to local should switch to natural gas vehicles to cut 40% of imported oil, thus creating jobs here.
3) Switch other vehicles to diesel to increase mileage per gallon to further cut imported oil.
4) The 1% national sales tax would include ANY purchase by individuals, corporations, or investments, only groceries and medical expenses would not be taxed.
Simple, it would take some guts by anyone to make these changes.
In the meantime, Feds should cut out EVERYTHING in the budget not absolute necessary. Only social security, military pay, veterans benefits, and the bottom 10% of total population on welfare. Anything else, vote on a tax specifically for funding it and it alone, can't borrow from it. Feds have borrowed from social security for years, and have spent about 50% of gasoline tax money on other things than what they were set aside for.