July 4, 2011

Stimulus numbers

From The Weekly Standard:
Obama�s Economists: �Stimulus� Has Cost $278,000 per Job
When the Obama administration releases a report on the Friday before a long weekend, it�s clearly not trying to draw attention to the report�s contents. Sure enough, the �Seventh Quarterly Report� on the economic impact of the �stimulus,� released on Friday, July 1, provides further evidence that President Obama�s economic �stimulus� did very little, if anything, to stimulate the economy, and a whole lot to stimulate the debt.

The report was written by the White House�s Council of Economic Advisors, a group of three economists who were all handpicked by Obama, and it chronicles the alleged success of the �stimulus� in adding or saving jobs. The council reports that, using �mainstream estimates of economic multipliers for the effects of fiscal stimulus� (which it describes as a �natural way to estimate the effects of� the legislation), the �stimulus� has added or saved just under 2.4 million jobs � whether private or public � at a cost (to date) of $666 billion. That�s a cost to taxpayers of $278,000 per job.

In other words, the government could simply have cut a $100,000 check to everyone whose employment was allegedly made possible by the �stimulus,� and taxpayers would have come out $427 billion ahead.

Furthermore, the council reports that, as of two quarters ago, the �stimulus� had added or saved just under 2.7 million jobs � or 288,000 more than it has now. In other words, over the past six months, the economy would have added or saved more jobs without the �stimulus� than it has with it. In comparison to how things would otherwise have been, the �stimulus� has been working in reverse over the past six months, causing the economy to shed jobs.
Emphasis mine -- and these numbers are from the President's own Council of Economic Advisors and not some 'independent' agency. Posted by DaveH at July 4, 2011 2:03 PM
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