I've been doing some figuring.

Now, this is almost never a good thing, since for most of my adult life, I have been a journalist. Journalists, by and large, are people who, when you ask them to add 2 and 2, reply "about 4, sources said." Still, I have detected a need for some computational analysis because of two recent developments.

One is a recent report by two lefty-leaning outfits: Citizens for Tax Justice, and the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. More on that in a minute.

The second development is the recent departure from the Republican presidential derby by Herman Cain. As you recall, the former pizza maven quit the GOP race after his somewhat unorthodox methods of employee outreach raised vexing questions.

Cain's withdrawal meant the demise of his "9-9-9" plan, which called for the abolition of all current taxes, to be replaced by a 9 percent personal income tax, a 9 percent business transfer tax, and a 9-topping Cheesy-Crust Supreme.

The death of the 9-9-9 plan, in turn, left a vacancy in the arena of political discourse for an economic proposal that is both elegant in its simplicity and profound in its stupidity.

I therefore give you, as my Christmas present to America, the "6.2-3-0" plan.

First, some background. The two liberal organizations previously mentioned released a study earlier this month on the state corporate taxpaying habits of 265 major corporations.

The study concluded that, taking advantage of various legal loopholes, the companies paid state income taxes at an average rate of 3.0 percent from 2008 to 2010, which was less than half the average state corporate tax rate of 6.2 percent.

In California, where corporate rates range from 8.84 percent to 10.84 percent, the 10 largest companies with their headquarters in the state paid an average over the three years of 3.2 percent. The Big 10 – Wells Fargo, Intel, Chevron, Disney, Apple, Oracle, Occidental Petroleum, Visa, Hewlett-Packard and Amgen – paid a total of $5.56 billion on profits of $175.4 billion, according to the study.

Now, here's where I did some figuring of my own. By looking at the 10 companies' annual reports and other documents, I found that from 2008 through 2010, the firms created a total of 26,597 new jobs, increasing their cumulative payroll from 1,053,499 to 1,080,096. That figures to raising their workforces by about 2.5 percent, or 0.8 percent a year.

Why is this important? Because, as nearly every single Republican presidential candidate has pointed out – and as the above figures vividly demonstrate – when you cut taxes on American businesses, they invariably plow that money right back into expanding their companies, thus creating more jobs.

"We should have a job-creating machine in America," said former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney in September, as he unveiled his plan to cut federal corporate tax rates by 29 percent.

"It starts very simple – lower taxes. Those steps would begin to dramatically create jobs," said former House Speaker Newt Gingrich two weeks ago, while pushing a plan that features a 64 percent cut in federal business tax rates.

"Taxes lead to jobs leaving the country," said Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann in October, while calling for sharply reducing business taxes, and burning all the "Harry Potter" books.

Now, let us nudge this analysis toward its logical conclusion. The aforementioned Big 10 companies headquartered in California saved at least $5.5 billion in state income taxes from 2008 to 2010 because of fair and legal deductions and exemptions.

Instead of having that money wasted by state government on services such as schools, courts, public safety and aid to the poor, elderly and disabled, the companies kept it and doubtlessly used it to create the 26,597 jobs that their cumulative workforce grew between 2008 and 2010.

It's crystal clear, therefore, that the next step is to go from the 6.2 percent average state business rate around the country, past the 3.0 percent rate corporations actually pay, to no state business taxes at all: 6.2/3/0!

Imagine: California's Big 10 companies alone would churn out at least 26,597 more jobs each year. Let's say 66 percent of those would actually be located in the state. That would be 17,554 more Californians working each year. Given that there were 2,123,310 unemployed Californians as of October, it would take only 121 years to bring the jobless rate to virtually nothing.

Without the additional tax break I'm espousing, it could take twice as long.

Ask yourself: Can we afford to wait?

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