It's Official: The Stimulus Isn't a Waste of Money

Paul Krugman? Oh the guy that said 600 billion would be a good number for the stimulus and now whines we didn't spend enough? That Paul Krugman? For god sakes.

No, the Paul Krugman who said that the 700+ number wasn't going to be enough. He turned out to be closer to being correct than anyone else.

sorry dick, thats a no go.... ...

Krugman-
Nov 10 2008

When I put all this together, I conclude that the stimulus package should be at least 4% of GDP, or $600 billion.



Stimulus math (wonkish) - NYTimes.com

oh and his excuse here $600 Billion - NYTimes.com, doesn't hold water he also says" by jan when, I wrote the piece it became apparent", well the piece was dated nov 10th, he made the same errors etc. they did, only sooner and they still added another what (?) 35% to the total over his projection and if it was apparent the "slump was going to be deeper " they would have added more right? Well they did as I said another 250 Billion worth.......not including all of the add ons since...and the 410 Billion omni bus spending bill too. Epic fail.

Bullshit, hes a weasel.....please... and a back slider.......

Gee, what was Bush saying in 2008? "The fundamentals of economy are sound." Remember that? Nope, Krugman was closer than virtually everyone else, and even his pessimistic scenario turned out to be too optimistic. We were in deeper shit than anyone predicted.
 
No, the Paul Krugman who said that the 700+ number wasn't going to be enough. He turned out to be closer to being correct than anyone else.

sorry dick, thats a no go.... ...

Krugman-
Nov 10 2008

When I put all this together, I conclude that the stimulus package should be at least 4% of GDP, or $600 billion.



Stimulus math (wonkish) - NYTimes.com

oh and his excuse here $600 Billion - NYTimes.com, doesn't hold water he also says" by jan when, I wrote the piece it became apparent", well the piece was dated nov 10th, he made the same errors etc. they did, only sooner and they still added another what (?) 35% to the total over his projection and if it was apparent the "slump was going to be deeper " they would have added more right? Well they did as I said another 250 Billion worth.......not including all of the add ons since...and the 410 Billion omni bus spending bill too. Epic fail.

Bullshit, hes a weasel.....please... and a back slider.......

Gee, what was Bush saying in 2008? "The fundamentals of economy are sound." Remember that? Nope, Krugman was closer than virtually everyone else, and even his pessimistic scenario turned out to be too optimistic. We were in deeper shit than anyone predicted.

Actually BUsh didn't say that. Please post where he did.
That was in fact John McCain. And he was right.
 
sorry dick, thats a no go.... ...

Krugman-
Nov 10 2008

When I put all this together, I conclude that the stimulus package should be at least 4% of GDP, or $600 billion.



Stimulus math (wonkish) - NYTimes.com

oh and his excuse here $600 Billion - NYTimes.com, doesn't hold water he also says" by jan when, I wrote the piece it became apparent", well the piece was dated nov 10th, he made the same errors etc. they did, only sooner and they still added another what (?) 35% to the total over his projection and if it was apparent the "slump was going to be deeper " they would have added more right? Well they did as I said another 250 Billion worth.......not including all of the add ons since...and the 410 Billion omni bus spending bill too. Epic fail.

Bullshit, hes a weasel.....please... and a back slider.......

Gee, what was Bush saying in 2008? "The fundamentals of economy are sound." Remember that? Nope, Krugman was closer than virtually everyone else, and even his pessimistic scenario turned out to be too optimistic. We were in deeper shit than anyone predicted.

Actually BUsh didn't say that. Please post where he did.
That was in fact John McCain. And he was right.

"I say that the fundamentals of our nation's economy are strong," Bush told a White House news conference.
 
Nobody is going to be convinced by those citations until and unless unemployment gets below 6%

I agree.

While I have absolutely no doubt that sans that Stimulus money, millions more would be unemployed, (mostly in public jobs like cops, prison guards, teaching, health care and social services jobs funded by the states) the Stimulus money didn't actually go to job creation.

Where's those WPA responses that a real Kynesian economist would have proposed?

They're not there.

Why?

Because the stimulus wasn't large enough.

Now that TARP is being repaid, now that that $800 billion is no longer at risk, isn't it time to start thinking creatively about putting Americans back to work?

I think it is.

I think failure to do that will insure that this working class depression will continue otherwise.

Now we can do that or we can bite the bullet and just let market forces continue to make the average American poorer and poorer.

That or we could impose tariffs thus making it more sensible for corporations to create jobs here in the USA.

There's money to invest in US industry IF it makes sense to invest here.

But as long as investing in China or elsewhere brings a better return than investing in this nation?

Well one can hardly expect the market to ignore that fact.

Our problems are as much POLITICAL as they are financial, folks.

Always have been, actually.
 
Gee, what was Bush saying in 2008? "The fundamentals of economy are sound." Remember that? Nope, Krugman was closer than virtually everyone else, and even his pessimistic scenario turned out to be too optimistic. We were in deeper shit than anyone predicted.

Actually BUsh didn't say that. Please post where he did.
That was in fact John McCain. And he was right.

"I say that the fundamentals of our nation's economy are strong," Bush told a White House news conference.

OK, he did say that. So did McCain.
And they were both right.
 
No, but that benchmark was based on expert opinion that by doing nothing unemployment would reach 10%,

Except that your mistaken in your terms. 8% wasn't a benchmark, it was an estimate based on consensus view that doing nothing would cause unemployment to reach 10%. The estimates turned out to be too conservative.

Not true.

2drhs2b.jpg


Page 5

That's the actual prediction from the Council of Economic Advisors.

You're agreeing with me. It was an estimate, not a benchmark. The estimate fell well short of understanding how deep shit we were in at that point of time. People like Paul Krugman's darker scenario was closer to hitting the mark, as it turned out.

You can't claim that something that is predicted, but has not yet happened, is a benchmark. It's an estimate. The bottom line remains that most economists, who don't have a political ax to grind, have concluded that unemployment would have been 1.5%-2.0% higher, had the stimulus package not been enacted.

You have not substantiated your claim that this official estimate was based on some fictitious "consensus" that unemployment would reach 10% if nothing was done.

This official estimate put out by the Obama administration to justify the stimulus was way off the mark. Trying to revise history just exposes the whole concept as a fraud.
 
January 10, 2009, 7:25 am

The key thing if you want to do comparisons is to note that I made estimates of the average effect over 2009-2010, while they do estimates of effect in the fourth quarter of 2010, which is roughly when the plan is estimated to have its maximum effect. So they say the plan would lower unemployment by about 2 percentage points, I said 1.7, but their estimate may actually be a bit more pessimistic than mine. They have the plan raising GDP by 3.7 percent, but that’s at peak; I thought 2.5 percent or so average over 2 years, again not much difference.

So this looks like an estimate from the Obama team itself saying — as best as I can figure it out — that the plan would close only around a third of the output gap over the next two years.

One more point: the estimate of what would happen to the economy in the absence of a stimulus plan seems kind of optimistic. The chart above has unemployment ex-stimulus peaking at 9 percent in the first quarter of 2010 and coming down through the year; the CBO estimates an average unemployment rate of 9 percent for 2010, so the Obama people are more optimistic than the CBO, and a lot more optimistic than I am.

He was wrong on every single point. Amazing.

This was about 2 weeks before Obama even took office. His prediction was still more correct than anyone else. Obama and CBO were more conservative in their estimates, and even Krugman's more pessimistic estimate was rosier than the abyss Bush put us in.

Again with the "abyss" nonsense. When did that supposedly happen and how did Obama supposedly get us out of it?
 
Not true.

2drhs2b.jpg


Page 5

That's the actual prediction from the Council of Economic Advisors.

You're agreeing with me. It was an estimate, not a benchmark. The estimate fell well short of understanding how deep shit we were in at that point of time. People like Paul Krugman's darker scenario was closer to hitting the mark, as it turned out.

You can't claim that something that is predicted, but has not yet happened, is a benchmark. It's an estimate. The bottom line remains that most economists, who don't have a political ax to grind, have concluded that unemployment would have been 1.5%-2.0% higher, had the stimulus package not been enacted.

You have not substantiated your claim that this official estimate was based on some fictitious "consensus" that unemployment would reach 10% if nothing was done.

This official estimate put out by the Obama administration to justify the stimulus was way off the mark. Trying to revise history just exposes the whole concept as a fraud.

I never called the consensus fictitious. It was the expert opinions of some very good economists. It turns out that the consensus view was too optimistic, and that Krugman's more pessimistic view was closer to being correct. Remember, this was all accomplished within weeks of taking office, due to the exigent nature of the crisis.

And you're right, Obama's brand new administration's view was off the mark. Bush had put us in deeper shit than anyone thought possible. That's not being fraudulent, that's trusting some idiot, supply side neocon way more than one should. If more money were spent, the pain would have been less. Whether the impact on the long term economy would have been worth the debt is another issue.
 
He was wrong on every single point. Amazing.

This was about 2 weeks before Obama even took office. His prediction was still more correct than anyone else. Obama and CBO were more conservative in their estimates, and even Krugman's more pessimistic estimate was rosier than the abyss Bush put us in.

Again with the "abyss" nonsense. When did that supposedly happen and how did Obama supposedly get us out of it?

If you don't see how not doing anything regarding the collapsing financial system would have resulted in tumbling into a full economic free fall, I don't know what to tell you. That would be a fringe view, and not really worth much time arguing against, as the only ones who I've heard argue that nothing should have been done are ideologues who would probably love to see government shrunk to the size that it could be sunk in Norquest's bathtub.
 
You're agreeing with me. It was an estimate, not a benchmark. The estimate fell well short of understanding how deep shit we were in at that point of time. People like Paul Krugman's darker scenario was closer to hitting the mark, as it turned out.

You can't claim that something that is predicted, but has not yet happened, is a benchmark. It's an estimate. The bottom line remains that most economists, who don't have a political ax to grind, have concluded that unemployment would have been 1.5%-2.0% higher, had the stimulus package not been enacted.

You have not substantiated your claim that this official estimate was based on some fictitious "consensus" that unemployment would reach 10% if nothing was done.

This official estimate put out by the Obama administration to justify the stimulus was way off the mark. Trying to revise history just exposes the whole concept as a fraud.

I never called the consensus fictitious. It was the expert opinions of some very good economists. It turns out that the consensus view was too optimistic, and that Krugman's more pessimistic view was closer to being correct. Remember, this was all accomplished within weeks of taking office, due to the exigent nature of the crisis.

And you're right, Obama's brand new administration's view was off the mark. Bush had put us in deeper shit than anyone thought possible. That's not being fraudulent, that's trusting some idiot, supply side neocon way more than one should. If more money were spent, the pain would have been less. Whether the impact on the long term economy would have been worth the debt is another issue.

I called the consensus fictitious because it never existed. Let's review your claim:

8% wasn't a benchmark, it was an estimate based on consensus view that doing nothing would cause unemployment to reach 10%.

You have yet to substantiate any part of it, especially the part where the prediction of no higher than 8% with the stimulus was derived from some other view that it would be 10%. The official plan was quite specific.

Attempts to revise history are just that.

If the CEA was so wrong last year what in the world makes you think they are correct this year when they say that it was worse than they thought?
 
This was about 2 weeks before Obama even took office. His prediction was still more correct than anyone else. Obama and CBO were more conservative in their estimates, and even Krugman's more pessimistic estimate was rosier than the abyss Bush put us in.

Again with the "abyss" nonsense. When did that supposedly happen and how did Obama supposedly get us out of it?

If you don't see how not doing anything regarding the collapsing financial system would have resulted in tumbling into a full economic free fall, I don't know what to tell you. That would be a fringe view, and not really worth much time arguing against, as the only ones who I've heard argue that nothing should have been done are ideologues who would probably love to see government shrunk to the size that it could be sunk in Norquest's bathtub.

Notice how you didn't answer the questions. When was the financial system collapsing when was the "full economic free fall" avoided, and what role did Obama play in that?
 

Then why TARP? Then why did our economy go into the greatest recession since the Great Depression. Truthiness?

Do you recognize the difference between a normal downturn in the business cycle and an economy fundamentally unsound? Doubtless the distinction is lost on you but there it is.
TARP was there to stabilize the banks. I supported that. When Bush extended it to auto companies despite Congressional votes I opposed it.
Why did the economy decline so much? Because of frantic attempts to pump money into losing propositions. That was both Bush and Obama. Had they simply allowed Fannie/Freddie to fail, etc etc the downturn would have been more severe but over very quickly.
 
No, the Paul Krugman who said that the 700+ number wasn't going to be enough. He turned out to be closer to being correct than anyone else.

sorry dick, thats a no go.... ...

Krugman-
Nov 10 2008

When I put all this together, I conclude that the stimulus package should be at least 4% of GDP, or $600 billion.



Stimulus math (wonkish) - NYTimes.com

oh and his excuse here $600 Billion - NYTimes.com, doesn't hold water he also says" by jan when, I wrote the piece it became apparent", well the piece was dated nov 10th, he made the same errors etc. they did, only sooner and they still added another what (?) 35% to the total over his projection and if it was apparent the "slump was going to be deeper " they would have added more right? Well they did as I said another 250 Billion worth.......not including all of the add ons since...and the 410 Billion omni bus spending bill too. Epic fail.

Bullshit, hes a weasel.....please... and a back slider.......

Gee, what was Bush saying in 2008? "The fundamentals of economy are sound." Remember that? Nope, Krugman was closer than virtually everyone else, and even his pessimistic scenario turned out to be too optimistic. We were in deeper shit than anyone predicted.


who gives a hoot?


Krugman was wrong, very wrong, so wrong he has little credibilityleft when it comes to this. This is what s the economic guru at the Times gets paid for to prognosticate and provide predictions based on his expertise.

And yeees, Boooosh, here let me clear it up for you so qwe can get past this- Bush has a loser dildo stuck on the end of his nose, that is attached to his face which is attached to his head which sits on a pike.....happy?....we are not talking about booooosh, we are speaking about the bollocks that was the stimulus.
 
You have not substantiated your claim that this official estimate was based on some fictitious "consensus" that unemployment would reach 10% if nothing was done.

This official estimate put out by the Obama administration to justify the stimulus was way off the mark. Trying to revise history just exposes the whole concept as a fraud.

I never called the consensus fictitious. It was the expert opinions of some very good economists. It turns out that the consensus view was too optimistic, and that Krugman's more pessimistic view was closer to being correct. Remember, this was all accomplished within weeks of taking office, due to the exigent nature of the crisis.

And you're right, Obama's brand new administration's view was off the mark. Bush had put us in deeper shit than anyone thought possible. That's not being fraudulent, that's trusting some idiot, supply side neocon way more than one should. If more money were spent, the pain would have been less. Whether the impact on the long term economy would have been worth the debt is another issue.

I called the consensus fictitious because it never existed. Let's review your claim:

8% wasn't a benchmark, it was an estimate based on consensus view that doing nothing would cause unemployment to reach 10%.

You have yet to substantiate any part of it, especially the part where the prediction of no higher than 8% with the stimulus was derived from some other view that it would be 10%. The official plan was quite specific.

Attempts to revise history are just that.

If the CEA was so wrong last year what in the world makes you think they are correct this year when they say that it was worse than they thought?

They were wrong last year. Bush's economy was worse than anyone had thought. But these are bright economists, and since if they were given more than a few short weeks to present their views and advice, and with the wealth of all data now available, that a much more reasonable evaluation is expected. They didn't have the luxury of time and the level of available resources last year, now they did have that.

I'd also point out that the CEA report jibes very close to the independent CBO report, so that lends a lot more weight to the evaluation of the Stimulus effect.
 
Nobody is going to be convinced by those citations until and unless unemployment gets below 6%

I agree.

While I have absolutely no doubt that sans that Stimulus money, millions more would be unemployed, (mostly in public jobs like cops, prison guards, teaching, health care and social services jobs funded by the states) the Stimulus money didn't actually go to job creation.

Where's those WPA responses that a real Kynesian economist would have proposed?

They're not there.

Why?

Because the stimulus wasn't large enough.

.


I disagree. NO AMOUNT would have been large enough that we could borrow/print and task for 'stimulus' and still leave the US as with viable operating financial system at the same time.


We did this,for 10 years, japan has been doing it for over 10.....the experts that put a number out there, they went with it, in addition as we have seen the final n numbers added up top way more than they prophesied would be necessary.....so the "not enough: gig doesn't hold water imho.

This is what economist said in the 40's as well- ( at least Morgenthau had the spine to admit they had spent till they were blue in the face and had no answers left) and what they/He are saying now ala the Krugman post where he trys to wiggle off the hook, (the man hasn't a shred of integrity btw).

Because they know that this defense is protected from empirical experimentation to test its theory; ergo argumentum ad ignorantiam .....so, once again, academia and the intellectuals skate.
 
I never called the consensus fictitious. It was the expert opinions of some very good economists. It turns out that the consensus view was too optimistic, and that Krugman's more pessimistic view was closer to being correct. Remember, this was all accomplished within weeks of taking office, due to the exigent nature of the crisis.

And you're right, Obama's brand new administration's view was off the mark. Bush had put us in deeper shit than anyone thought possible. That's not being fraudulent, that's trusting some idiot, supply side neocon way more than one should. If more money were spent, the pain would have been less. Whether the impact on the long term economy would have been worth the debt is another issue.

I called the consensus fictitious because it never existed. Let's review your claim:

8% wasn't a benchmark, it was an estimate based on consensus view that doing nothing would cause unemployment to reach 10%.

You have yet to substantiate any part of it, especially the part where the prediction of no higher than 8% with the stimulus was derived from some other view that it would be 10%. The official plan was quite specific.

Attempts to revise history are just that.

If the CEA was so wrong last year what in the world makes you think they are correct this year when they say that it was worse than they thought?

They were wrong last year. Bush's economy was worse than anyone had thought. But these are bright economists, and since if they were given more than a few short weeks to present their views and advice, and with the wealth of all data now available, that a much more reasonable evaluation is expected. They didn't have the luxury of time and the level of available resources last year, now they did have that.

Interesting. If that was the case one would think they would have presented it that way. Instead, they made a very distinct and specific projection as justification for their very specific and "expert" plan. Then it failed miserably.

More time doesn't change their flawed view of the economy. What specifically is different than their previous statements about how bad the economy was? Nobody seems to be able or willing to answer that.

I'd also point out that the CEA report jibes very close to the independent CBO report, so that lends a lot more weight to the evaluation of the Stimulus effect.

Only in the fact that they were both huge failures based on faulty economic modelling. 3 million jobs for $500 Billion and unemployment is still above 9%?

Also in case you missed it:

When was the financial system collapsing, when was the "full economic free fall" avoided, and what role did Obama play in that?
 
I called the consensus fictitious because it never existed. Let's review your claim:



You have yet to substantiate any part of it, especially the part where the prediction of no higher than 8% with the stimulus was derived from some other view that it would be 10%. The official plan was quite specific.

Attempts to revise history are just that.

If the CEA was so wrong last year what in the world makes you think they are correct this year when they say that it was worse than they thought?

They were wrong last year. Bush's economy was worse than anyone had thought. But these are bright economists, and since if they were given more than a few short weeks to present their views and advice, and with the wealth of all data now available, that a much more reasonable evaluation is expected. They didn't have the luxury of time and the level of available resources last year, now they did have that.

Interesting. If that was the case one would think they would have presented it that way. Instead, they made a very distinct and specific projection as justification for their very specific and "expert" plan. Then it failed miserably.

That was the case. The Stimulus bill was enacted 5 weeks after Obama took office. The economists had about 3 weeks to develop an advisory plan, with projections.

More time doesn't change their flawed view of the economy. What specifically is different than their previous statements about how bad the economy was? Nobody seems to be able or willing to answer that.

Oh come on, that's nonsense. If I asked you to give a full analysis, with advise, and projections on an economy in free fall, are you saying that one could do an equally accurate and thorough job in three weeks than in say six months?

I'd also point out that the CEA report jibes very close to the independent CBO report, so that lends a lot more weight to the evaluation of the Stimulus effect.

Only in the fact that they were both huge failures based on faulty economic modelling. 3 million jobs for $500 Billion and unemployment is still above 9%?

Also in case you missed it:

When was the financial system collapsing, when was the "full economic free fall" avoided, and what role did Obama play in that?

Phase 1 of TARP was done by Bush, and Phase 2 by Obama. Obama put the teeth into the bailout, which is why we're getting our money back. I didn't miss anything.
 
They were wrong last year. Bush's economy was worse than anyone had thought. But these are bright economists, and since if they were given more than a few short weeks to present their views and advice, and with the wealth of all data now available, that a much more reasonable evaluation is expected. They didn't have the luxury of time and the level of available resources last year, now they did have that.

Interesting. If that was the case one would think they would have presented it that way. Instead, they made a very distinct and specific projection as justification for their very specific and "expert" plan. Then it failed miserably.

That was the case. The Stimulus bill was enacted 5 weeks after Obama took office. The economists had about 3 weeks to develop an advisory plan, with projections.

Interesting. Never saw anything from them stating that this was a rushed plan. They presented their plan as a solution to the problem, complete with authoritative predictions.

If they didn't have enough time to do this correctly why didn't they say so?


Oh come on, that's nonsense. If I asked you to give a full analysis, with advise, and projections on an economy in free fall, are you saying that one could do an equally accurate and thorough job in three weeks than in say six months?

Yes. More time doesn't make a flawed view of the economy any less flawed. A correct view of the economy doesn't change with less time.

I'd also point out that the CEA report jibes very close to the independent CBO report, so that lends a lot more weight to the evaluation of the Stimulus effect.

Only in the fact that they were both huge failures based on faulty economic modelling. 3 million jobs for $500 Billion and unemployment is still above 9%?

Also in case you missed it:

When was the financial system collapsing, when was the "full economic free fall" avoided, and what role did Obama play in that?

Phase 1 of TARP was done by Bush, and Phase 2 by Obama. Obama put the teeth into the bailout, which is why we're getting our money back. I didn't miss anything.

How did Obama put teeth into the bailout?

According to the NBER, the recession ended in June of 2009. I don't see how $92 Billion in increased outlays made that happen but if it did, I don't see the purpose of the rest of the $604 Billion stimulus.

http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/99xx/doc9968/hr1.pdf
 

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