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The stimulus added how many jobs?
The Congressional Budget Office logo.
This final note today, in which the economic stimulus package of 2009 returns.
The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office said today the tail end of the $800 billion Congress authorized two-and-a-half years ago added three-tenths of a percent to the third quarter GDP number that came out this morning.
As these things tend to go, though, it was vague in a couple of key areas.
How many jobs the stimulus package added: anywhere from 500,000 to 3.3 million. Which is a margin of error of, yeah, I dunno.
The Obama Administration and Democrats need to do a better job of branding. In today's economy, they need to shout "It's the DEMAND, stupid!" to the rafters, and stop calling it "stimulus" but "demand creation". Every credible economist agrees, it indeed is the demand that is the problem, not, say, high taxes or regulation.
While my current position is funded by ARRA dollars, for the most part, the jobs with which we are working are being reinforced by the stimulus dollars, as opposed to being further at risk.
To be specific, I am working on a DOE grant (BetterBuildings) which is employing local contractors to perform energy efficiency upgrades to private low-to-middle income homes. The contractors are using employees (yes, there have been a handful of new hires) who otherwise would not be very busy and at risk of being laid off in this lousy economy.
I'm not sure how anyone can count that phenomenon, but that is what is happening in our neck of the woods! We are reducing energy consumption, making homes more comfortable, and keeping people employed. That's a triple bottom line that is good. I say thumbs up for the ARRA!
