how to fix the US economy: several simple steps (and alliterative awesomeness)

the economy is in the toilet. that much is pretty damn certain. there are a lot of problems, but i think that this plan would take care of many of them. there are a lot of steps, not all of which must be taken, but all of which would help. these are (not in order of importance):

1. fix social security. not in Bush's manner of reducing benefits at the same time as cutting taxes, but actually fix it. set social security up as a need-based system with a sliding scale that is also based on whether someone's financial situation is their fault. if someone bought a ferrari with money they should have been put into their retirement fund, bully for them! that doesn't mean that the state should have to cover for people's bad decisions. my proposal ensures that the government spends less money overall and that the people who need it get more money than they get right now.
2. stop outsourcing. there are two ways to do this:
1. tax companies that outsource jobs ridiculously
2. provide tax breaks for bringing already-outsourced jobs back to the United States.
3. hike taxes a lot, especially for the rich. they've already got money enough, which is why they're called the RICH
4. cut defense spending. if we just pulled out of Iraq, we'd stop spending a ridiculous amount of money, which could really help us to balance out the budget.