The stimulus package better work, or we’ll all be thrown under the bus

Seven-hundred eighty-seven billion is an unfathomable number. For most of us, it’s impossible to try to picture that kind of money, much less spend it.
But for an entire country, and an entire government system from the federal level right down to local cities, it appears to be a necessary amount; an amount that will supposedly put the defibrillator on the heart of our economy and jump start it back to prosperity.

How exactly is this money going to be spent though? Many cities and organizations are jockeying for position trying to get a piece of the pie, but when everyone is in dire straits financially, believe it or not, $787 billion is not nearly enough to go around.
According to a Time article, ultimately about 61percent is due to go to individuals/states with the remaining 39 percent going to federal agencies and programs.

Sixty-one percent equates to about $479 billion, and that money is broken down into tax provisions, state funding, unemployment assistance, health insurance assistance, and medical record modernization.
Most of us should notice the $288 billion going towards tax relief. That money is broken down to provide relief in a variety of ways including tax benefits and a smaller chunk taken out of our paychecks.

It is unknown how much, if any of the $90 billion going to the states Michigan will receive, but there is little doubt in the minds of anyone who lives here that we could use the whole chunk if we could get it. We can only hope that the state government spends whatever money we receive wisely and effectively.

Health insurance assistance is pretty straight forward, and modernization of medical files is something that’s been talked about for quite a while; going from paper records to digital files is something that could supposedly save millions upon millions of dollars a year, which makes that provision a definite long term money saver.

As for the 39 percent or $308 billion staying with the feds to fill their agendas, the money is due to be spent in a variety of ways ranging from $25 million, going towards the legislative branch, to a little over $71 billion for health, labor, and education programs.

In between includes housing and transportation ($61.2 billion), education grants to states ($53.6 billion), energy ($50.8 billion), agriculture, commerce, environmental aid, government buildings/services, the Defense Department, Military and Veterans Affairs, Homeland Security, and the State Department. They all receive smaller and smaller chunks of the remaining money.
But will this work?

It only took the Obama administration 28 days in office to get this bill signed into law and it was done almost solely without support from the Republicans, of which a grand total of three voted in favor of the package. This stimulus is also projected to add nearly $185 billion to the national deficit just in 2009, so if this doesn’t work, we may very well be a lot worse off than we are now.
Edward Van Wesep, Ph.D., an economics professor here at Western, refused to comment on whether or not he thought the stimulus package would work.

Are the details of the stimulus largely unknown by the general public? Or, is there doubt among economists who have studied the package as to whether it will be effective?
Other professors were unavailable for comment, but it would certainly be interesting to see what they have to think on the subject. Both the Republicans and the Democrats had economists on their side that said what their respective parties wanted to hear: either that the package would work wonderfully or that it would do nothing for the economy.
Surely there must be a straight shooter or two out there who is willing to cut through the crap and let us know what exactly it is we’re getting in to.

Whatever the case, what’s done is done and the stimulus package is now law. Many of its included provisions look very appealing and it seems as though it covers the spectrum and will allow everyone to feel some of the benefit.

Around this time next year the Obama administration and Congress will either be hailed as heroes or thrown under the bus. Hopefully it will be the first of those two options, or else we’ll probably be dragging under the bus right along with them.

Andrew Mell, a Western Herald opinion columnist, is a senior majoring in aviation, and can be reached via e-mail at melltimejr@hotmail.com.

Short URL: http://www.westernherald.com/?p=4379

Posted by HeraldAdmin on Feb 26 2009. Filed under Opinion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

Cody Kimball
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