[clue-talk] The stimulus bill

[Collins Richey]

On Mon, Feb 2, 2009 at 7:33 AM, David Rudder
<david.rudder at reliableresponse.net> wrote:
> This is how I understand the stimulus bill.

{ excellent comments snipped ]


> But, when businesses have full warehouses and no one's buying product,
> you give money to the consumers.  This could be called "consumption-side
> economics".  Find needed improvements, places where we can get real
> value for our money.  And then pay a crap-ton of people to work on that.
>  Gets money into the hands of the consumers, creates jobs, and gets the
> improvements fixed.
>
> This is the situation we're in now.  Businesses have been making capital
> improvements for a decade now, starting with the rush to replace
> computers for Y2K and continued by the Bush tax cuts.  But, warehouses
> are full and no one's buying. Houses are empty, fiber is dark, cars are
> sitting on their lots, unsold.  Before the economy improves, people need
> to start spending again.  Before people start spending, they need jobs.
>
> But, it's worse.  Right now, we also have real infrastructure problems.
>  Bridges are falling, levees are failing, the electrical grid is
> overloaded and roads are crumbling.  If the government pays American
> companies to fix all this stuff, then people get jobs and companies
> survive.  Plus, we get fixed bridges and levees, etc.
>
> It's not government jobs.  We're not hiring bureaucrats.  The government
> is paying private companies to do the work that government needs done.
>
> It's like Obama said.  "We have so much to do, while so many are in need
> of a job".

Thanks for the anti-inflammatory reply. My limited understanding of
the stimulus bill is that it does little or nothing to give money to
consumers and not even enough of infrastructure improvements. It's
congress-as-usual (Republicans or Democrats), pork-filled pandering to
all sorts of special interests. If it flies through the senate in this
form, it will be worse than doing nothing, and our grandchildren will
be paying for it.

-- 
Collins Richey
     If you fill your heart with regrets of yesterday and the worries
     of tomorrow, you have no today to be thankful for.