Sure, business stinks right now. But does it really have to?

We’re not just talking about drop in sales across the retail spectrum. Some businesses – from foot-odor plagued shoe stores to noxious nail salons  – just smell bad. And that’s bad for business.

Researchers at the Smell & Taste Research and Research Foundation (www.scienceofsmell.com) in Chicago have found that enhancing scents can also enhance our spending. One study found that people are 84 percent more likely to spend an extra $10 on sneakers in a shoe store with a mixed floral smell. Another study found that people will spend 45 percent more in a casino filled with a pleasant odor (like lavender) than a casino with no odor at all. So let’s get Congress to institute the State and National Infusion of Fragrance Fund (SNIFF), which doles out dollars for businesses to enhance the aromas of their establishments.

Imagine the possibilities: Chocolate scented car washes. Vanilla launderettes. Lavender landfills where people picnic on Sundays. Musty bookstores infused with a sweet barbecue bouquet.  Even scratch and sniff movie posters outside the theater, where you can get a whiff of Angelina Jolie or Brad Pitt in their latest roles.

At last you could know what sexy really smells like.

Taxpayer cost:  A decent sense of smell
Economic Stimulus: Nothing to sneeze at

If humans only use about 10 percent of our potential brainpower, that’s an awful waste of real estate.

We’ve got 90 percent of our brains free for rental space.

Just imagine renting a few hundred neurons in the minds of today’s most creative, talented and intelligent people: Physicist Stephen Hawking. Director Stephen Spielberg. Cellist Yo-Yo Ma. Writer Toni Morrison. Comedian Robin Williams. Coach John Wooden. You could even sublet the space and rent it out (plus a little extra for utilities and maintenance).

The Neuron Rush of 2009 would be the greatest boost to the economy since California’s Gold Rush, instantly benefiting realtors, banks and other credit institutions who finance the mental mortgages.  And there would be no shortage of money-making ventures from the ideas siphoned off of today’s geniuses – movies Spielberg never had time to make, jokes Williams lost in the back of his brain (prime real estate, believe me).

Cost to Taxpayer: nada
Economic Stimulus:  $200 billion, minus the losses from people tapping into Rush Limbaugh’s noggin.

Now that President Obama and Congress have passed the Economic Stimulus Plan, it’s time for Americans to plan ahead on their big purchases. With the $400 individual tax cut being deducted from our paychecks, that’s an average of a whopping eight dollars a week in our pocket. That’s equal to:

• Two Six Dollar Burgers From Carl’s Jr. (trust me, the math adds up)
• 16 items from the half off rack at the 99 cent store
• Three quarters of a movie ticket in Los Angeles

So what do you plan to spend your newfound wealth on? Take our poll below (or create your own answer). It’s the first step in recovery, baby.

In honor of Friday the 13th, lets raise money by taxing superstitions.

1) Throw salt over your shoulder because you spilled it, pay a tax.

2) Owners of black cats pay a tax (unless you have a tax-deferred lucky rabbit’s foot)

3) Build a building without a 13th floor, pay a tax.

4) Walk under a ladder on Wall Street, pay a tax.

5) Knock on wood, pay a tax.

6) Step on a crack, pay a tax. Show your plumber’s crack, apologize profusely and pay double taxes.

7) If you throw a suspected witch into the water and she sinks, she’s a witch. If she floats, she’s not a witch, but she still has to pay a tax for polluting the water supply.

All the money we raise would go to education to teach kids not to listen to silly superstitions.

Why even today is Friday the 13th and I know nothing bad will hap d bvijdeqvghlivdebhpi

Today’s post includes contributions from guest bloggers Ed Bond and Martha Mejia.  Feel free to leave a comment below or add your own Friday the 13th ideas!

Let’s just face the fact that our credit-engorged economy has come to its natural death. That living off of plastic instead of income could not sustain us. Let’s put this economy to rest with a funeral procession down Wall Street, beneath a blizzard of cut up credit cards. In it’s place we can build a leaner, more sustainable economy. Where profit is not measured by stockholders’ yearly meetings, but by the people who profit from jobs that last decades. Where service to your country as a soldier doesn’t include a trip to the homeless shelter as a veteran. Where our thirst for energy does not create waste that needs to be buried in mountainsides, endangering our water. Where economists compete to come up with the best business model based on the principals of the book Small Is Beautiful. Where college students must pass a test in ethics before they can get a degree in business. And where every member of Congress must paint a tree before they can cut funding for the arts or parklands. No, this idea is not funny, but then again the situation we are in is no joke, either.  (You can thank Martha Mejia for this idea.)

Total Economic Stimulus: A priceless amount of perspective

Cost To Taxpayer:  Say good-bye to the free tote bag with your new credit card purchase

Everybody agrees we’re going to need some time to get out of this recession. So why not go all the way – and get a new calendar? By adding an extra day to each month, we can add 12 days a year. Or better yet, add an extra day to the week. That’s 52 extra days, for a total of 416 days a year. We’ll need to hire millions of people to work those extra days, plus millions more to cook burgers for their lunches, serve beers after quitting time and operate gyms to work off the burgers and beer. And everyone will need new calendars, boosting modeling gigs for half-naked girls, barechested firefighters and unemployed Pekapoo puppies. Best of all, the government can hold an auction where the richest people in the world can bid to have the new day named after themselves. Just imagine the whole family getting together for a picnic in the park on . . . Oprahday.
Taxpayer cost: zilch.
Estimated economic stimulus: 1/7th the current gross national product, which is almost as much as Oprah makes in half an hour.

Instead of giving us $1,000 tax cuts – doled out in miserly portions each paycheck – let’s give every working adult $1,000 to invest in any company they see fit. Just imagine the competition to get your investment. Credit card companies would swap their harassing calls for invitations to their spa retreats in Sedona. Pharmaceutical companies would have to woo senior citizens with lower monthly bills for their expensive pills. And CEOs would offer peanut vendors their box seats to the Lakers game. Sure, some of us would invest that grand in companies that manufacture Chia Pets and glow-in-the-dark underwear, but there would be enough of us with brains to make the worn out statement, “investing taxpayer dollars” mean something. Anyway, our investments can’t be any worse than Congress – or has everybody forgotten the $595 billion already spent on the war in Iraq (see the National Priorities Project for more up to date numbers – http://www.nationalpriorities.org/costofwar_home).
Total Economic Stimulus: With 145 million adults investing a grand each, this will add up to $145 billion. Whatever is made on top of that is profit. And isn’t that the American way?
Total Cost To Taxpayer: $145 billion. But when have we ever noticed?

If we’ve got to cut back, let’s get rid of those extra digits. Let’s figure out what numbers we really need – terrible 2s, voting age of 18, Keifer Sutherland’s 24, Denny’s senior discount age of 55, 99 cent stores, etc. Plus a few lucky numbers – 7 and 21. After all, we can use letters to write out most numbers – from one to a trillion. We can dump the numbers only mathematicians and scientists use – like pi and google and the circumference of a rat’s ass. Plus every number ever promised by a politician or a sticker price on a new car.
Total Economic Stimulus – Not using numbers saves time. And time is money. So multiply the amount of unused numbers by the time you won’t be using them and you get – uh, does anybody have a calculator?
Total Cost to Taxpayer: Anybody? Calculator? … What about a slide rule?

Celebrities are always looking for a safe haven from prying eyes – so why not build one and charge ‘em through the nose? Imagine a fortress of egotistical solitude, complete with a moat of toxic nail polish and with vats of boiling bikini wax on the parapets to pour on the papparazzi. Inside, Britney, Lindsay, Paris and pals can party and pass out to their hearts’ content, so long as they pay $100,000 a day. Alcatraz in the San Francisco Bay would be perfect – many celebs are already used to being in jail.
Total Economic Impact: With the capacity for 336 prisoners – er, VIPs – Alcatraz could generate $12.2 billion annually, not counting leap year.
Total Taxpayer Cost: A little over $3.3 million – $2.3 million for 152,487 three ounce bottles of nail polish. $48,000 in bikini wax, and $1 million for 500,000 bottles of Thunderbird or other cheap wine under 5 bucks that makes Alcatraz look like a luxury resort to whomever drinks it.

Let’s face it: your dog Fluffy is a lot cuter than the dead presidents we see every day on our currency. Even your Aunt Gertrude’s pet Iguana is better looking than Ben Franklin’s mug on the Hundie.  So give pets a chance, won’t you? For less money than a veterinary visit in Beverly Hills, the government can host a website contest to put the images of America’s favorite kitty cat, tarantula, et al  on the greenbacks. Entry fees: 1 cent to put your pet’s face on a penny, 5 cents for a nickel, 10 cents for a dime, etc. – all the way up to a $1,000 entry fee to put your pooch’s face on a sawbuck. Slobber and all.
Cost to Taxpayer: out-of-pocket contest entry fees, plus $180 for the complete Battlestar Galactica DVD collection (the new one) to a website building intern at Cal Poly Pomona
Estimated Economic Stimulus – With more than 115 million pet dogs and cats alone in America, the number could be $100 billion. Higher, if we bring back the buffalo nickel and sell the rights to buffalo rancher Ted Turner.