A listener asked me this question last week. Fair enough. If (and God help you if it ever happens) I was the one making the decision, what would I do to stimulate our economy? Well .. here would be some of my first steps:

• Say something positive about the power of the free market system
• Call for immediate passage of the FairTax
• Lower the top tax rate to 20% while waiting for the FairTax to pass
• Immediately eliminate capital gains taxes
• Declare a tax amnesty to allow all American funds invested abroad to come to work in our economy with no tax consequences
• Cut the corporate tax rate significantly. Having the world's second-highest corporate tax rate doesn't exactly make us a magnet for new businesses and jobs.
• Repeal Sarbanes-Oxley
• Declare a tax holiday of from four to six months where the federal government forgives all individual income and payroll taxes.

There's more to be done for sure ... but the goal here is to get the economy moving NOW, not two years from now. The big problem with all of the steps outlined above, of course, is that they empower the private sector and individuals, not government and politicians. The goal here is to grow our economy, not our government.

Now ... aren't you glad I'm not up there making any decisions?