President Barack Obama took office in January 2009 after having campaigned on the broad promise of "hope" and "change." However, to stay in office, there is one thing President Obama should hope for: an improvement in the employment picture before the 2012 elections.

The idea that China is practicing a new form of capitalism, and may even be “doing capitalism better than America,” is reaching a fever pitch in policy and business circles.

A January 2012 report by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) shows that federal government employees receive substantially higher compensation than similarly skilled workers in the private sector. The report’s methodology and conclusions are broadly similar to previous studies from both The Heritage Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute.

Several studies have shown that public-sector workers receive higher compensation than their counterparts in the private sector. Although, federal contractors have some of the advantages of private sector workers, in that poor performers can be dismissed and the composition of the contractor workforce altered, it is possible that they are overcompensated just as federal employees are right now.

An ever-increasing number of individuals are turning to community college for their higher education. Online delivery of classes and competency-based models of higher learning should be employed and innovations from for-profit schools should be borrowed to increase the number of Americans completing their associate’s degrees.

According to recently released data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, medical and dental professions now account for 14 of the 15 highest paid occupations in the United States (measured in terms of annual income). Put another way, of nearly 800 occupations surveyed, doctors and dentists were at the top of the list.

We estimate that public-school teachers receive total compensation roughly 50 percent higher than they would likely receive in the private sector.

Research suggests that on average-counting salaries, benefits, and job security-teachers receive about 52 percent more than they could in private business.