American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 / Act should be passed

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Position: Act should be passed

This position addresses the topic American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.


For this position


Quotes-start.png "Mainstream economists in both parties believe that tax cuts in the stimulus package will deliver far less bang for the buck than, say, infrastructure spending. The tax-cut stimulus embraced a year ago by the G.O.P. induced next-to-no consumer spending as Americans merely banked the savings or paid down debt." Quotes-end.png
From Herbert Hoover Lives, by Frank Rich (The New York Times, January 31, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "how did the Great Depression end? It didn't stop with the conservative suggestion: slashed spending, slashed debt and slashed government activity. It ended with precisely the opposite: the vast fiscal stimulus of the Second World War. The government sent debt soaring to its highest levels in US history (until today) in order to spend more than ever before. It set up the longest boom in US history." Quotes-end.png
From The Republicans' Fatal Misreading of FDR -- and How It Would Worsen The Depression, by Johann Hari (The Huffington Post, January 30, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Contrary to the claims of Republican opponents that the bill indiscriminately rains money down, the amounts and categories of spending have, for the most part, been calculated carefully and chosen well. Nearly 30 percent is devoted to unemployment benefits, food stamps and fiscal aid to states so that they don’t have to cut services, raise taxes and lay off employees and contractors. Evidence is overwhelming that such spending yields the biggest return for every dollar spent." Quotes-end.png
From The Stimulus Advances, by The New York Times editorial board (The New York Times, January 29, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "In Minnesota, less than two years after the Interstate 35W bridge collapse and less than a year after passage of the transportation bill, the debate has special meaning. However, decaying infrastructure is an issue of national significance, and the stimulus bill provides an opportunity to get the nation's transportation system back on the right track while creating jobs in the process." Quotes-end.png
From For real stimulus, fix infrastructure, by Star Tribune editorial board (Star Tribune, January 29, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "There's $89 billion for Medicaid, the health-insurance plan for the poor, and $13.3 billion of health-insurance assistance for the unemployed. That's not direct job creation, but it would help to preserve jobs in the health sector. And helping people in need is the right thing to do." Quotes-end.png
From Stimulus bill: On the whole, it makes sense, by The Salt Lake Tribune editorial board (The Salt Lake Tribune, January 29, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "There has been no doubt in recent months that the economy was sliding downhill into an icy river. But if anyone wasn't sure about that, the separate announcements by powerhouse companies including Caterpillar, Home Depot, Sprint Nextel and Texas Instruments that they will be eliminating 75,000 jobs -- on top of the 2.6 million lost in 2008 -- made the reality of America's deepening recession very clear." Quotes-end.png
From Pass the stimulus: Republicans oppose needed aid at their peril, by Pittsburgh Post-Gazette editorial board (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, January 28, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The truth, of course, is that the country is hemorrhaging jobs and Americans are heading to the poorhouse by the millions. The stock markets and the value of the family home have collapsed, and there is virtual across-the-board agreement that the country is caught up in the worst economic disaster since at least World War II. The Republican answer to this turmoil? Tax cuts. They need to go into rehab." Quotes-end.png
From The Same Old Song, by Bob Herbert (The New York Times, January 26, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Wave after wave of bad economic news has created its own psychology of fear and lowered expectations. As in the old Movietone News, the eyes and ears of the world are upon the United States. Failure to act would be devastating not just for Wall Street and Main Street but for much of the rest of the world, which is looking to our country for leadership in this crisis." Quotes-end.png
From Why I Support the Stimulus, by Arlen Specter (The Washington Post, February 9, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "We need a buildup of serious high-return public investments, and we can and should start now. The added stimulus will be useful in future years, but even more useful will be the infrastructure! The most rapid spending will come from sizeable immediate transfers to state and local governments, to the poor, to those without health insurance, and the start-up of some infrastructure spending, and this initial boost will be enough to "buy time" for a sustained and meaningful growth in infrastructure in later years." Quotes-end.png
From 5 Points on the Critical State of the Economy, by Jeffrey Sachs (The Huffington Post, February 9, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Even if the entire sum were to be stolen by federal employees and spent entirely on fast cars, fancy homes, gambling junkets and fancy clothes, it would still be an $800 billion increase in the demand for goods and services -- a pretty good working definition for economic stimulus. The only question is whether spending it on other things would create more long-term value, which it almost certainly would." Quotes-end.png
From Wanted: Personal Economic Trainers. Apply at Capitol., by Steven Pearlstein (The Washington Post, February 6, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "To address a projected loss of more than $2 trillion in economic activity, Congress is debating an overall stimulus package of $819 billion to $900 billion. Although those figures sound large, on a dollar-for-dollar basis they would plug less than half the growing hole in the economy. So the stimulus size is hardly excessive - and conservatives' calls for cutting it back make little sense." Quotes-end.png
From A large stimulus bill for large problems, by Scot Lehigh (The Boston Globe, February 6, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Rising unemployment and underemployment means that the need for unemployment benefits and income support — such as help in paying for health care — are rising faster than Congress can get its act together to provide relief." Quotes-end.png
From Disappearing Jobs, by The New York Times editorial board (The New York Times, February 6, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "In recent days, there have been misguided criticisms of this plan that echo the failed theories that helped lead us into this crisis -- the notion that tax cuts alone will solve all our problems; that we can meet our enormous tests with half-steps and piecemeal measures; that we can ignore fundamental challenges such as energy independence and the high cost of health care and still expect our economy and our country to thrive." Quotes-end.png
From The Action Americans Need, by Barack Obama (The Washington Post, February 5, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Japan experienced a “lost decade” of deflation and stagnation in the 1990s — and the only thing that let Japan escape from its trap was a global boom that boosted the nation’s exports. Who will rescue America from a similar trap now that the whole world is slumping at the same time?" Quotes-end.png
From On the Edge, by Paul Krugman (The New York Times, February 5, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Short-term stimulus — more unemployment insurance, shovel-ready projects that put Americans to work — are a top priority. But Republican claims that spending money on projects that would take a year or two to develop is not stimulus are nonsense. By all projections, this will be a long recession and a protracted recovery. Money should be in the pipeline now for 2010 and 2011." Quotes-end.png
From Getting Tough in Washington, by The New York Times editorial board (The New York Times, February 5, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "There are concerns that the stimulus plan's $789 billion price tag is too large. To pay for it we will have to borrow the money, adding significantly to the government's debt load. But without a stimulus, the depression would undermine tax revenue and fuel more government spending, producing even larger deficits and debt burdens." Quotes-end.png
From Imperfect stimulus plan is still the best answer, by Mark Zandi (The Philadelphia Inquirer, February 15, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The workers get pay checks. They use the income to pay taxes - direct to the US government. So immediately the government can use these tax revenues to fix the budget. Then workers purchase goods and services - boosting the economy. Companies hire more workers to deal with demand for materials from stimulus-sponsored programs. More employed workers equals more taxpayers." Quotes-end.png
From The Fiscal Stimulus Will Pay For Itself, by Ann Pettifor (The Huffington Post, February 15, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Actually, economists are uncertain about the impact of fiscal stimulus on short-term growth, and the historical evidence -- from the New Deal to contemporary Japan -- does not settle the issue. But the president was right to this extent: The country faces a dire slump, the preferred means of dealing with it (Federal Reserve monetary policy) has been pushed to the limit, and, therefore, fiscal stimulus is a risk worth taking." Quotes-end.png
From A Fiscal Gamble, by The Washington Post editorial board (The Washington Post, February 13, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "When it began life in the House last month, it was a grab bag easy to snipe at because Democrats stuffed it with projects that had little or nothing to do with the original purpose — strengthening the social safety net and creating jobs. In the main, that's what the latest version does. Much of the money goes to help people who've been thrown out of work, and there's spending for projects aimed at creating jobs." Quotes-end.png
From GOP greets stimulus bill with ‘audacity of nope’, by USA Today editorial board (USA Today, February 12, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Keynes proposed burying money in mineshafts, so that workers would be hired to dig it out. (Imagine what the GOP could do with material like that.) World War II was an effective stimulus that, economically speaking, consisted of 100 percent waste. If war hadn't broken out, we could have enjoyed the same economic benefit by building all those tanks and planes and dumping them into the ocean." Quotes-end.png
From In Defense of Waste, by Jonathan Chait (The New Republic, February 12, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The American Society of Civil Engineers estimates that America needs $2.2 trillion of repairs and upgrades during the next five years just to have an adequate infrastructure. So we should be working on our infrastructure anyway, even if we weren't in a deepening recession. Since we are in a deepening recession, the case for infrastructure spending is even stronger." Quotes-end.png
From Government spending can create jobs, by Charles Ballard (The Detroit News, February 12, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Congress is almost at the finish line. Ms. Collins and other moderates have pushed back effectively against some of the more egregious spending provisions in the House bill. Now the conference committee should do the same to a few excessive tax breaks in the Senate bill, and then let Congress promptly send the product to Mr. Obama." Quotes-end.png
From Bang for the Bucks, by The Washington Post editorial board (The Washington Post, February 10, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "This is not, repeat not, a time for compromise. Meeting in the middle, which the Senate sees as its role in our democracy, renders the whole exercise potentially useless. If we don't get enough money into the economy, and if we don't do it soon, we risk wasting a king's ransom on a stimulus that's too puny to stimulate." Quotes-end.png
From Roll Over the Republicans, by Eugene Robinson (The Washington Post, February 10, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The biggest difference between Clinton's original agenda and the public investments Obama is proposing is that Clinton came to office as the U.S. economy was emerging from a recession; Obama is facing the worst downturn since the Great Depression. Even fiscal conservatives concede that when consumers stop buying and businesses stop investing, as they are now, the government must step in as the buyer and lender of last resort." Quotes-end.png
From Once the Stimulus Kicks In, the Real Fight Begins, by Robert Reich (The Washington Post, February 1, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "To say that the stimulus should be simpler, faster-acting and more disciplined is true but no more use than saying the economy should never have been allowed to get into this mess in the first place. With Democrats in power, the stimulus was bound to be a vehicle for all manner of questionable projects difficult to defend on their merits. A 600-page wish-list? What a surprise. Yet it is better to have this plan than no plan." Quotes-end.png
From Bad politics and urgent remedies, by Clive Crook (Financial Times, February 1, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "One can make a good case for simplifying the package, and for tilting it somewhat further in the direction of tax cuts (cutting the payroll tax is especially attractive) in order to shove more of the stimulus to the front. But the aggregate mix of tax cuts and spending increases in the current proposal is not unreasonable. It certainly does not justify an effort to stall the bill." Quotes-end.png
From The US needs its stimulus now, by Financial Times editorial board (Financial Times, February 1, 2009) (view)

Against this position


Quotes-start.png "Further, no one can be sure that we are not already at the trough of the recession - such that this money will be spent mostly after the recovery is well under way. How long until the debt incurred under this program is so immense that it causes a downgrade in the nation's sovereign debt? What happens to us then? " Quotes-end.png
From Politics of payoff, by Ben Stein (New York Post, January 31, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The stimulus legislation is a strange response to the president's inaugural call for "a new era of responsibility." State and local governments, which in the five flush years 2003–07 irresponsibly increased spending five times faster than population growth, will get hundreds of billions. Forty-nine states have governors better than California's, but as that state sinks into insolvency (its budget deficit is 40 percent of the sum of all the states' deficits) Arnold Schwarzenegger is merrily saving the planet." Quotes-end.png
From Stimulating Times, by George F. Will (Newsweek, January 31, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The very heart of the widely applauded Welfare Reform Act of 1996 is a cap on the amount of federal cash that can be sent to states each year for welfare payments. But, thanks to the simple phrase slipped into the legislation, the new "stimulus" bill abolishes the limits on the amount of federal money for the so-called Emergency Fund, which ships welfare cash to states." Quotes-end.png
From Change for the worse, by Charles Hurt (New York Post, January 30, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The legislation also forbids states to apply income tests in most cases. House Democrat Henry Waxman was so thrilled by this blowout, it was left to Republicans to remind him that the very banking millionaires he dragged to the Hill last year for a grilling would now qualify for government aid." Quotes-end.png
From Democratic Stealth Care, by Kimberley Strassel (The Wall Street Journal, January 30, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Lawrence Lindsey and John H. Makin have done a ton of work outlining why a payroll tax cut or temporary suspension would be good for the economy. Makin writes that a 12- to 18-month suspension in the payroll tax would immediately increase personal disposable income by 3.5 percent. Workers would have an instant raise that would be larger, and last longer, than the "Making Work Pay" tax credit in the Democratic plan." Quotes-end.png
From The Right Stimulus, by Matthew Continetti (The Weekly Standard, January 30, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "That's what the stimulus bill was about—not knowing what time it is, not knowing the old pork-barrel, group-greasing ways are over, done, embarrassing. When you create a bill like that, it doesn't mean you're a pro, it doesn't mean you're a tough, no-nonsense pol. It means you're a slob." Quotes-end.png
From Look at the Time, by Peggy Noonan (The Wall Street Journal, January 30, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The Wall Street Journal calculated that only 12 percent of the bill's provisions can accurately be called stimulative. The rest is simply being thrown at favored constituencies by Congress. The bill even includes a provision forbidding the use of foreign steel in the construction projects it funds. Does no one in Congress remember Smoot-Hawley?" Quotes-end.png
From Bad medicine: Stimulus bill is sickening, by New Hampshire Union Leader editorial board (New Hampshire Union Leader, January 30, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png ""In the long run, we are all dead," Lord Keynes, the newly fashionable economist, famously said. But, if this bill passes, in the medium term we're all dead. It's a massive expansion of the state in the same direction that has brought sclerosis to Europe." Quotes-end.png
From Stimulated right into being another Europe, by Mark Steyn (The Orange County Register, January 30, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The plan to finance health insurance premiums for the unemployed would actually increase unemployment by giving employers an incentive to lay off workers rather than pay health premiums during a time of weak demand. And this supposedly two-year program would create a precedent that could be hard to reverse." Quotes-end.png
From An $800 Billion Mistake, by Martin Feldstein (The Washington Post, January 29, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Strip out the permanent government programs. Many of them are worthy, but we can have that debate another day. Make the short-term stimulus bigger. Many liberal economists have been complaining it is too small, so replace the permanent programs with something like a big payroll tax cut, which would help the working class." Quotes-end.png
From Cleaner and Faster, by David Brooks (The New York Times, January 29, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The Congressional Budget Office and the Joint Committee on Taxation have calculated that only $170 billion, or about one-fifth of the $816 billion package will be spent in fiscal 2009. An additional $356 billion will be spent in 2010. That leaves $290 billion to be spent when even the most pessimistic forecasters think the economy will be in recovery mode." Quotes-end.png
From How About a Payroll Tax Stimulus?, by Lawrence Lindsey (The Wall Street Journal, January 29, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "When government finances start to buckle under that subsidy, the comparative effectiveness outfit will start to ration care to control costs, much like the United Kingdom's National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE). The draft report accompanying the House portion of the bill notes that procedures and drugs "that are found to be less effective and in some cases, more expensive, will no longer be prescribed."" Quotes-end.png
From The Entitlement Stimulus, by The Wall Street Journal editorial board (The Wall Street Journal, January 29, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Add the roughly $20 billion for business tax cuts, and by our estimate only $90 billion out of $825 billion, or about 12 cents of every $1, is for something that can plausibly be considered a growth stimulus. And even many of these projects aren't likely to help the economy immediately. As Peter Orszag, the President's new budget director, told Congress a year ago, "even those [public works] that are 'on the shelf' generally cannot be undertaken quickly enough to provide timely stimulus to the economy."" Quotes-end.png
From A 40-Year Wish List, by The Wall Street Journal editorial board (The Wall Street Journal, January 28, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "In the 1990s, Japan tried without success to deficit-spend its way out of recession, enacting 10 "stimulus" bills in eight years and spending trillions of yen on public infrastructure. Yet unemployment grew worse, the economy remained anemic, and Japan was left with the largest national debt in the industrialized world: 170 percent of GDP." Quotes-end.png
From An overoptimistic stimulus plan, by Jeff Jacoby (The Boston Globe, January 28, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "In short, a growing body of evidence suggests that a dollar of extra spending is likely to lift nominal income by less than a dollar, arguably much less. Several studies suggest the multiplier may be less than zero after a couple of years, because private investment (including housing) eventually falls by more than government spending rises. Another $550 billion of deficit spending on top of a deficit already above $1 trillion is likely to prove more dangerous than helpful to an economy already overloaded with risky debt." Quotes-end.png
From $646,214 Per Government Job, by Alan Reynolds (The Wall Street Journal, January 28, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The pork barreling is one reason Americans have grown so cynical about government, and it is one thing Obama has specifically pledged to change. The stimulus package provides an excellent opportunity for him to show he's serious. He ought to send the bill back to the House and demand it be stripped clean of earmarks and repackaged as a strategic spending plan that addresses the goals spelled out by the administration." Quotes-end.png
From Slice the pork from stimulus program, by The Detroit News editorial board (The Detroit News, January 28, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "At first glance, this seems like a pretty good deal. After all, the city's budget deficit, pre-bailout, is expected to hit $11.3 billion over the next 2½ years; Albany is looking at a $15.8 billion hole over the next 15 months. But then, where's the bailout money going to come from? New Yorkers themselves, ultimately: The city and state send far more money to Washington than they get back. Taken that way, the bailout doesn't seem like such a bargain. " Quotes-end.png
From $825B, keep the change, by New York Post editorial board (New York Post, January 28, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Building on that insight, a cut in the payroll-tax rate—paid by both individuals and businesses—should be the bill’s centerpiece. By rights, such a cut should have bipartisan appeal. For Democrats, a payroll-tax cut helps those lower-income workers who don’t make enough to pay income taxes. (President Obama already supports a tax credit to offset the payroll tax.) For Republicans, it’s a genuine tax cut that benefits employers, too." Quotes-end.png
From When Maynard Met Nancy, by Rich Lowry (National Review, January 27, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "House Republicans wisely are distancing themselves from this boondoggle. On Friday, they urged the president to stimulate the economy solely through tax cuts -- not frivolous spending. Their proposal includes slashing rates on those in the two lowest income tax brackets, making unemployment benefits off limits to the IRS, offering incentives to home buyers who make down payments of at least 5 percent and cutting taxes on small businesses. That makes more sense than spending too much, too late." Quotes-end.png
From 'We wrote the bill', by Las Vegas Review-Journal editorial board (Las Vegas Review-Journal, January 25, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "We'd be better off doing nothing, the nonpartisan CBO says. Why? Both stimulus plans spend vast sums in ways that won't do much to boost output or employment. They will, however, swell the national debt, leading to less investment." Quotes-end.png
From Tax-Cut Stimulus, by Investor's Business Daily editorial board (Investor's Business Daily, February 9, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "When Barack Obama ran last year, he didn't say he'd engage in faith-based economy policy on a grand scale. He didn't say he'd toss aside the normal processes of governing. He didn't say he'd quickly act to add waste to the federal budget. And he didn't say he'd try to brush away criticism with the mere assertion of his victory." Quotes-end.png
From Sorry, O: 'I Won' Won't Cover This, by Rich Lowry (New York Post, February 6, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "It's the essential fraud of rushing through a bill in which the normal rules (committee hearings, finding revenue to pay for the programs) are suspended on the grounds that a national emergency requires an immediate job-creating stimulus -- and then throwing into it hundreds of billions that have nothing to do with stimulus, that Congress's own budget office says won't be spent until 2011 and beyond, and that are little more than the back-scratching, special-interest, lobby-driven parochialism that Obama came to Washington to abolish. He said." Quotes-end.png
From The Fierce Urgency of Pork, by Charles Krauthammer (The Washington Post, February 6, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The born-again Keynesians seem to have forgotten that their prescription stood the best chance of working in a more or less closed economy. But this is a globalized world, where uncoordinated profligacy by national governments is more likely to generate bond-market and currency-market volatility than a return to growth. There is a better way to go: in the opposite direction. The aim must be not to increase debt but to reduce it." Quotes-end.png
From Keynes can't help us now, by Niall Ferguson (Los Angeles Times, February 6, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "So there it is: Mr. Obama is now endorsing a sort of reductionist Keynesianism that argues that any government spending is an economic stimulus. This is so manifestly false that we doubt Mr. Obama really believes it. He has to know that it matters what the government spends the money on, as well as how it is financed." Quotes-end.png
From The Stimulus Tragedy, by The Wall Street Journal editorial board (The Wall Street Journal, February 6, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "I'm all in favor of flipping the bird to the global community. But at least, when Rummy was doing his shtick about "Old Europe," he did it intentionally. To cheese off the foreigners entirely accidentally before you've even had your first black-tie banquet is quite an accomplishment." Quotes-end.png
From Obama mythology could use some stimulus, by Mark Steyn (The Orange County Register, February 6, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The FBI gets $75,000,000 for "salaries and expenses." Inside the $6,200,000,000 Weatherization Assistance Program one finds "expenses" of $500,000,000. How many bureaucrats does it take to "expense" a half-billion dollars?" Quotes-end.png
From What Is Congress Stimulating?, by Daniel Henninger (The Wall Street Journal, February 5, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "At a time of economic peril, it will make things worse - by absorbing massive amounts of scarce resources and credit that could better be deployed to the nation's already troubled financial markets and loan-starved businesses. This measure is most likely to leave us with double-digit unemployment rates a year from now - and Congress responding with an even larger bailout." Quotes-end.png
From Empty 'stimulus', by Ronald Utt (New York Post, February 4, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Remember when the problem with Americans was that we saved too little, preferring instant gratification even when we couldn't afford it? As Obama put it in October, "we were allowed and even encouraged to spend without limits, to borrow instead of save." Economists worried that our low saving rate made our economy and our government dangerously dependent on the whims of foreign investors. Yet on Monday, when Commerce Department data showed that the U.S. saving rate had risen sharply, from less than 1 percent of after-tax income a year ago to 3.6 percent in December, the press treated the increase as bad news." Quotes-end.png
From The New Era of Irresponsibility, by Jacob Sullum (Reason, February 4, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The fact is it's Obama's effort to get much of his domestic agenda enacted under the guise of stimulus that has lawmakers — on both sides — increasingly agitated. And make no mistake, a significant portion of the stimulus spending comes right out of the agenda Obama announced last summer — long before the need for a massive stimulus bill emerged." Quotes-end.png
From Unreal Stimulus, by Investor's Business Daily editorial board (Investor's Business Daily, February 4, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "With an actual price tag of $1.2 trillion when interest payments on this deficit spending are factored in, this is money that will come from an empty pocket. Congress will raise taxes at a time when Americans can least afford them, or it will borrow the funds and pass the astronomical debt onto the next generation of taxpayers." Quotes-end.png
From Real Stimulus Wouldn't Empty Wallets, by Pete Sepp (Investor's Business Daily, February 4, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Less than 10% of the bill could be considered true stimulus, if one assumes tax credits and infrastructure spending will jolt the economy. The other 90% of the bill represents one of the most egregious acts of generational theft in our nation's history, with taxpayer money going to special-interest earmarks, an ill-conceived bailout to states, and permanent spending increases that expand government's reach in areas like health care and education." Quotes-end.png
From The Stimulus Package Is More Debt We Don't Need, by Tom Coburn (The Wall Street Journal, February 3, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "It is obvious that this bill is not “timely, targeted and temporary.” Instead, much of the measure is a travesty. When the Senate begins debating the House measure today, we pray that Republicans are not the only ones to have figured this out." Quotes-end.png
From A looming fiasco?, by The San Diego Union-Tribune editorial board (The San Diego Union-Tribune, February 2, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The central purpose is simple: halt downward momentum. Perhaps some of the out-year spending might ultimately prove useful. But the immediate need is for the stimulus package to stimulate -- now. It needs to be front-loaded; it isn't." Quotes-end.png
From Too Little Bang for The Bucks, by Robert J. Samuelson (The Washington Post, February 2, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Everyone isn't a pessimist in hard times: The optimism of many entrepreneurs and consumers fueled the takeoff of personal computers during the deep recession of the early 1980s. Amazon has just launched the Kindle 2; its (equally pricey) predecessor sold out last November amid the Wall Street meltdown. But competing with expanded public spending makes it harder for innovations like the personal computer and the Kindle to secure the resources they need." Quotes-end.png
From Don't Believe the Stimulus Scaremongers, by Amar Bhide (The Wall Street Journal, February 17, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Instead, the young president seems to want to take us back to some of the failed policies of the 1930s, under the mistaken impression that they were a great triumph. He illustrates with dreadful clarity George Santayana’s most-quoted aphorism: those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it." Quotes-end.png
From Obama’s new deal is the same old blunder, by Dominic Lawson (The Times, February 15, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Do Ms. Romer and Mr. Bernstein believe the current bill will produce their January study's job numbers? Is the bill in Congress now a strong-form stimulus or a weak-form stimulus? If the latter, then it's a waste of money. Martin Feldstein, an early supporter of stimulus, now says that the bill's effects are weak and need a redo even if it takes a month or two." Quotes-end.png
From Exactly How Does Stimulus Work?, by Daniel Henninger (The Wall Street Journal, February 15, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "By some estimates, the stimulus bill contains roughly $250 billion in welfare spending, another $6,700 for every poor man woman and child in this country, along with the erosion of the 1996 reforms. It can be counted on to "stimulate" the loss of another generation to welfare dependency." Quotes-end.png
From On the dole again, by Michael Tanner (New York Post, February 13, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "To prevent stagflation, we should enact fiscal policy reforms that apply the lessons we learned from the 1970s. Keynesian stimuli based on borrowing and spending have not worked and will not work. One-time rebate checks do not increase the incentive to expand business operations and create jobs. But marginal cuts in tax rates do." Quotes-end.png
From Thirty Years Later, a Return to Stagflation, by Paul Ryan (The New York Times, February 13, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Republicans have a better solution: an economic recovery plan that lets families and small businesses keep more of what they earn. By our analysis, the Republican plan would create 6.2 million jobs, twice the number created under the Democrats' plan, at half the cost. We favor fast-acting tax relief that will boost our economy and create new jobs not slow-moving, wasteful government spending." Quotes-end.png
From Stop the spending sprees, by Michael Steele (USA Today, February 12, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "By releasing $800 billion in new welfare spending over the next decade and undermining current work requirements, it will largely undo the successful 1996 welfare reform. Once again, Washington will be paying bonuses to states that expand their welfare rolls. In what world is increasing dependency on government a stimulus for the private economy?" Quotes-end.png
From 'Historic' Stimulus Is Egregious Waste, by Investor's Business Daily editorial board (Investor's Business Daily, February 12, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "All told - and safely assuming the major spending provisions become permanently enshrined - the final price tag of this government hogzilla of all hogzillas over the next 10 years will be a whopping $3.27 trillion with a capital T." Quotes-end.png
From Wake up and smell the trillions in pork, by Michelle Malkin (New York Post, February 12, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "A natural economic recovery will begin sometime this year, not because of the president's policies, but because soon this will be the longest recession since World War II. However, thanks to the administration's retrograde policies -- cut from the cloth of the 1970s and even the 1930s -- the recovery will not be what it should be. Rather, unemployment will remain too high, and inflation will resurge, recreating the disastrous economic results we suffered the last time Keynesian policies were dominant." Quotes-end.png
From Reaganomics vs. Obamanomics, by Peter Ferrara (The Wall Street Journal, February 11, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Here is a question for Washington's Keynesians: If uninhibited deficit spending is the key to economic growth, how could the Bush administration's galloping budget increases and unbroken string of deficits have left the economy in recession? If Keynes was right, why didn't the enormous growth of government outlays stop the Great Depression in its tracks?" Quotes-end.png
From Money for nothing won't grow the economy, by Jeff Jacoby (The Boston Globe, February 1, 2009) (view)

Mixed on this position


Quotes-start.png "The strong parts are those initiatives most likely to spark critical job growth and provide emergency economic aid: individual and business tax relief, aid for state Medicaid programs and unemployment benefits. But the package also carries too much fat. Green energy initiatives, construction money for schools and job-creating provisions such as weatherizing buildings and building highways may be good ideas, but they don't belong in this particular legislation. And these are the items that have inflated the package to historic levels." Quotes-end.png
From Not all stimulus ideas are created equal, by The Dallas Morning News editorial board (The Dallas Morning News, January 27, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "When people get work they wouldn't otherwise get on building or widening or resurfacing a highway, that indeed qualifies as stimulus. Those people get paychecks. Taxes come out of those paychecks. The money gets spent, then re-circulated. People get to work faster on better, wider roads." Quotes-end.png
From Stimulus? Yes, some, by John Brummett (Las Vegas Review-Journal, February 8, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Pelosi and her pals were more than happy to make the new president look weak in order to get their long-held wish list. The president has ordered the removal of all programs that aren't likely to give the economy an immediate boost. But perhaps he should scrap the whole thing and start over. " Quotes-end.png
From 'Stimulus' Follies: Pelosi's Poison, by Kirsten Powers (New York Post, February 6, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Obama and his allies on Capitol Hill will have plenty of opportunities to advance their views on education, healthcare, poverty and other social issues. But those are battles for another day. They shouldn't use the stimulus package as a way to circumvent those debates." Quotes-end.png
From The nation needs jobs, not a political agenda, by Los Angeles Times editorial board (Los Angeles Times, February 2, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "Among the final bill's provisions are several with a strong record of stimulating spending, such as extended unemployment benefits and increased investments in highways and public transit. We also welcome farsighted proposals for promoting broadband Internet access, high-speed rail and a modernized electrical grid. But the version worked out by the White House and congressional leaders serves as a case study for the time-worn notion that haste makes waste." Quotes-end.png
From Too little in return for stimulus plan, by Los Angeles Times editorial board (Los Angeles Times, February 13, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "It was disappointing that not a single Republican in the House voted for the Democratic bill, considering the stakes and Obama's attempt to work with them. But it's unfair to portray the GOP as choosing party over country. They raise valid concerns about whether the spending will have an impact quickly, and whether more tax cuts should be included to spur consumer spending and job growth. Given the ineffectiveness of the earlier $700 billion federal bailout, lawmakers have a duty to be asking these questions." Quotes-end.png
From Jobs, now, by The Philadelphia Inquirer editorial board (The Philadelphia Inquirer, February 1, 2009) (view)
Quotes-start.png "The concern: Instead of giving the economy a "targeted, timely and temporary" injection, the plan has been larded with spending on existing social programs or hastily designed new ones, much of it permanent or probably permanent -- and not enough of it likely to create new jobs." Quotes-end.png
From Take Charge, by The Washington Post editorial board (The Washington Post, February 1, 2009) (view)