The Stimulus Seems to have failed

Piggy said:
As well as can be expected, I reckon.

No doubt, millions of it were wasted, but it's better than no action at all, which would have left market forces to themselves, which would have bottomed out much lower.

On the whole, I'll take it.
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One of my grants came from ARRA funds.
It has covered the education of two PhD students, resulted in 2 peer reviewed papers, a patent which will like be developed into a company and new research which will support more graduate students.
one of those students is already employed at another university and the other is likely to finish soon with a job at a pharma company.

My experience is that the funds were useful in doing what they were designed to do, stimulate the economy.
 
Piggy said:
No doubt, millions of it were wasted, but it's better than no action at all, which would have left market forces to themselves, which would have bottomed out much lower.
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Problem is, Piggy, history proves you wrong over and over and over. :D
 
joobz said:
My experience is that the funds were useful in doing what they were designed to do, stimulate the economy.
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Yeah, "stimulate" is an interesting word.

If you punch a guy in the face to keep him standing up, is that stimulating?
 
Piggy said:
Just that. Can be. Sure is nice when it ain't, but can be.
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I honestly don't get your meaning.
My point for my little tale is that the grant I had was quite small. It was made available due to the ARRA and allowed people to gain skills, making them more marketable than what they were before hand. It kept them producing in a time when funds weren't there for them to get a job. If this type of "stimulus" is like being punched in the face, I don't quite see it.
 
joobz said:
I honestly don't get your meaning.
My point for my little tale is that the grant I had was quite small. It was made available due to the ARRA and allowed people to gain skills, making them more marketable than what they were before hand. It kept them producing in a time when funds weren't there for them to get a job. If this type of "stimulus" is like being punched in the face, I don't quite see it.
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My point is simply that sometimes we have to do what is unpleasant in order to avoid less pleasant things.

There are a lot of people who are extremely worried about the level of debt/deficit/leverage/spending at the federal level.

They have a right to be worried. It's a worrisome situation.

But if that spending keeps our economy from falling, it's what we gotta do.

That said, we shouldn't let ourselves forget that -- in the current environment -- everyone's grant is coming from someone else's cut.

That's just the reality.

Everybody's stimulus is someone else's pain.

But we gotta stay on our feet, so there's no other way to run it.
 
Piggy said:
My point is simply that sometimes we have to do what is unpleasant in order to avoid less pleasant things.

There are a lot of people who are extremely worried about the level of debt/deficit/leverage/spending at the federal level.

They have a right to be worried. It's a worrisome situation.

But if that spending keeps our economy from falling, it's what we gotta do.

That said, we shouldn't let ourselves forget that -- in the current environment -- everyone's grant is coming from someone else's cut.

That's just the reality.

Everybody's stimulus is someone else's pain.

But we gotta stay on our feet, so there's no other way to run it.
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All of this I agree with. Although, the stimulus' pain is a pain to the future. It is the goal to generate enough benefits now to offset that pain. At least that's the way I'm treating it and why I work hard with the money.
 
BeAChooser said:
So how's that stimulus working out for you JREFers living here in the US? :D
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I’m pretty sure they like it better then the austerity plan in the UK. ;)

Not only did their once promising recovery in the UK stall out as soon as austerity plan was passed they look like they may be back in recession.
 
http://www.bnn.ca/News/2011/2/25/US-economy-weaker-than-first-thought.aspx

U.S. economy weaker than first thought

Reuters

February 25, 2011

The U.S. economy grew more slowly in the fourth quarter than initially estimated, as* government spending shrank more sharply and consumer spending was less robust, a government report showed Friday.

Gross domestic product grew at annualized rate of 2.8 percent, the Commerce Department said in its second estimate on Friday, marking a downward revision from its initial 3.2-percent estimate.
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Well … than some thought.
 
I notice you conveniently missed these parts

In addition, consumer spending—which accounts for more than two-thirds of U.S. economic activity—grew at a 4.1-percent rate in the final three months of 2010 instead of 4.4 percent.

It was still the fastest since the first three months of 2006 and an acceleration from the third quarter's 2.4-percent rate.
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And

The government revised business investment up, though spending on equipment and software was lower. Business spending increased at a 5.3-percent rate instead of 4.4 percent.
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and

Business investment grew at a 10.0-percent pace in the third quarter. Spending on software and equipment increased at a 5.5-percent rate instead of 5.8 percent.
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Looks like some reasonably good news there, but if business investment and spending are way up and consumer spending is coming back what's left to explain the only modest economic growth? Could it be that government spending is down now that the stimulus is over and that's dragging down the economy! :D
 
BeAChooser said:
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/564579/201103011820/How-Green-Is-Your-Lost-Job-.htm



So … how is Obama's green job stimulus working out for you folks out there? Hmmmmmm? :D
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The report appears legit (though the article is quoting some seriously biased journalists), but renewable energy is permanent. The jobs replaced would have dissapeared when the fossil fuels ran out anyway.

And the jobs lost to the damage caused by climate change will probably be fairly extensive as well.
 
stokes234 said:
The report appears legit (though the article is quoting some seriously biased journalists), but renewable energy is permanent.
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Windmills don't need maintenance? Solar panels don't need replacing? This is the first I've heard this claim. Please explain and provide the extraordinary evidence called for.

The jobs replaced would have dissapeared when the fossil fuels ran out anyway.
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This also needs evidence. The jobs lost in the article, and similar reports I've read re. Spain, mention nothing about the lost jobs being restricted to traditional energy production.

The problem, as I read the article, is more related to opportunity costs caused by the forced re-allocation of resources.
 
YoPopa said:
Windmills don't need maintenance? Solar panels don't need replacing? This is the first I've heard this claim. Please explain and provide the extraordinary evidence called for.
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You've misunderstood my point. There will always be solar and wind energy, and therefore all jobs relating to maintenance of these will be permanent - until perhaps we get far enough into the future to have robots do everything for us, at which point we probably won't need so many jobs anyway. All jobs relating to the extraction of fossil fuels and the maintenance of their plants are temporary because those fossil fuels will run out.

YoPopa said:
This also needs evidence. The jobs lost in the article, and similar reports I've read re. Spain, mention nothing about the lost jobs being restricted to traditional energy production.

The problem, as I read the article, is more related to opportunity costs caused by the forced re-allocation of resources.
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Granted - though the report itself is behind a £36 paywall, and the article is too biased for me to place trust in. I had assumed the report was referring to both. But i've never seen green jobs as being a great economic investment - we could probably become a good deal better off by pretending that global warming is a conspiracy by most of the worlds climate scientists.

I just treat the green jobs as a mitigating factor reducing the amount of money lost through the green projects. Sure, the propaganda used to promote the green industry as economically viable is a dirty tactic, but considering the amount of funding from the energy industries and big business to spread opposite disinformation, I would say that the end - in this case doing our best to prevent global warming - justifies the means.
 
stokes234 said:
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I just treat the green jobs as a mitigating factor reducing the amount of money lost through the green projects. Sure, the propaganda used to promote the green industry as economically viable is a dirty tactic, but considering the amount of funding from the energy industries and big business to spread opposite disinformation, I would say that the end - in this case doing our best to prevent global warming - justifies the means.
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We can agree to disagree on the ethics of this deception but the topic of the thread seems to be supported by your opinions.

The stimulus was a failure. The intentional fiction (AKA lie) of benefits to the economy through green energy investment is OK because of some other perceived greater good.
 
YoPopa said:
We can agree to disagree on the ethics of this deception but the topic of the thread seems to be supported by your opinions.

The stimulus was a failure. The intentional fiction (AKA lie) of benefits to the economy through green energy investment is OK because of some other perceived greater good.
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That would only be a reasonable assumption if "green jobs" were the only aspect of the stimulus. If the entire stimulus was based on green jobs creating more wealth than they take from other areas of the economy, then it probably could be declared a failure. My understanding was that the stimulus consisted of various bailouts, funds for various different parts of industry, with some green jobs on the side.

It should also be noted that renewable energy has other long term advantages, such as energy security, the mitigation of peak oil, and the reduction of carbon emissions - which, even if you don't believe in AGW, still improves your countrys international reputation.
 
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