Obama's stimulus plan up for a vote

It doesn't seem too bad to me. It might be a little excessive in parts, but I'm sure that there had to be a lot of pork worked into the bill to keep the House happy.

Some of the ideas sound pretty good. The power grid needs to be revamped (I wish they would be more willing to work with private businesses though...it just seems like Pelosi is being stubborn). The money going to alternative energy should also be a fairly productive boost that will create a number of new jobs.

The figure is quite big and probably overkill, but that's the government's usual problem. And like I said, a lot of the stuff is things that needed doing anyway. I just hope he takes after Gordon Brown's example and and invests in coast-to-coast broadband . The nerd in me would be thrilled.

Looks like the bill passed in the house today. The senate is a whole new ballgame though, I don't honestly expect the GOP to pass another one of these unless they get something big in return.

I'm torn now. I feel like I have to support the House bill now. They included a net-neutrality rider . The technology crowd has been calling for this for a long time.

I wish we weren't picking up so much of a deficit though. This will really push us to the limit. I hope that the democrats properly understand that we can't keep pulling out money out of the air for too much longer (cue Ping Pong). We probably have about another 3 trillion or so that we can realistically borrow unless foreign investment really increases. They better hope that this works just fine. Obama's going to have to balance the budget in the future years if he doesn't want to be remembered as the guy who bankrupted the country.

I find calling it a stimulus package a little disingenuous though. It's basically just a democratic spending bill. Over 100 billion is going to funding education. That's good and it will prevent some layoffs in teaching staff...but it's not a real stimulus plan. There's also a ton of other random little riders and pork throughout the bill. Some are good. There are plans for greater sexual education and aid for stop smoking programs. I just wonder how much is really going to be a direct stimulus though.

The WSJ is predicting that the Republicans won't really dig in on it too much. There is a little bit of extra stuff in there that they like and I don't think "Republicans stall stimulus plan" would make for good PR. That said, there is a little bit of worrying in the Obama camp about the bill. A number of House democrats turned against it even after he personally campaigned for it. They only thing that's certain is that the fight in the Senate will be interesting.

Guess I called that one wrong. Can't say I blame them though. I just read that they're trying to cut a bunch of it out. Actually it seems like a lot of the stuff I mentioned is on the chopping block.

I don't know why he tried to play it fast and loose. So much of the spending was not even remotely related to stimulus payments. He should have known that that would drag the bill down.

They are also really pushing it with the idea of the "bad bank" coming along at the same time. Just too much money involved and it doesn't seem to be doing much.

They reached a compromise but it is honestly still full of crap. There are still idiotic earmarks and even foreign aid packages in there. I honestly wish taht for once, we could keep a bill as its original intent.

sigh....

Well, the problem is that Keynesian theory basically wouldn't apply anymore. Politicians forget that Keynesian theory requires you to save in good times and only spend a lot in the bad. The debt is just too high. If we didn't have a national debt to worry about, then everything would probably work more or less as it was expected. It'd be easy to take on the added debt for a few years and pay it back. Just a little boost to make the market level out and recover faster.

There is also a bit of a PR problem where it seems a bit like Obama's basically just throwing money at the problem and hoping it goes away. Not the best move. He did mention the liquidity trap in Japan during his last address, so he does at least have an idea of the risks.

These bailout plans all the governments are putting forward are a complete joke. They is really no structure to them and just look where the last ones went, back to the banks! It is ridiculous, to really solve the problem they need to be changing the infrastructure and bringing everything green, so much money can be saved doing this and it's setting the world up long term, yet they just keep stuff the way it is and hand out ridiculous bailout packages to people who don't need them

As much as I dislike the stimulus plan, I don't know if I'd rely on the market's reaction. It's been jumping all over the place lately.

The problem with the Keynesian angle is that they are missing the point anyway. Most of the stimulus money isn't going to create a lot of jobs. There's some construction work that will definitely be created, but a lot of the jobs seemed rather specialized (and fairly unaffected by the recession). I'm also just not sure that all of these unemployed people will happily shift over to construction. I get the feeling that a lot of them will just stay on unemployment and try to wait it out.

The most distressing part was the plan for new incentives for low income families to buy houses. Did we not figure that one out by now?

I don't know if I can blame GM and Chrysler for wanting some help. I've heard that the unions are not giving them an inch.

True. Bailouts have been freaking out the market pretty reliably. The market just seems more skittish than usual lately, so I've been second-guessing everything.

The union is one of their worst problems. I believe that's a big problem with their high costs. I don't think we necessarily need to throw them to the wolves though.

A bailout would be fine, if it was just a little support to help them last long enough to make the necessary changes. Normally, they'd be able to get another regular loan/bond to tough it out. That sorta fell through though, which makes a government loan their last chance. The big question is whether they will be able to actually make the changes though. Especially if the union won't budge. Be a shame if it went under just because the union wouldn't take a pay cut.

There's also the natural social aspect. I've heard estimates saying that 2 million would be out of work if they just went under (since there are a lot of other people in support industries who'd be out of a job). We at least need to keep them alive for a little longer to space out the layoffs and keep the labor market from imploding.

The Parakeet said:

True. Bailouts have been freaking out the market pretty reliably. The market just seems more skittish than usual lately, so I've been second-guessing everything.

The union is one of their worst problems. I believe that's a big problem with their high costs. I don't think we necessarily need to throw them to the wolves though.

A bailout would be fine, if it was just a little support to help them last long enough to make the necessary changes. Normally, they'd be able to get another regular loan/bond to tough it out. That sorta fell through though, which makes a government loan their last chance. The big question is whether they will be able to actually make the changes though. Especially if the union won't budge. Be a shame if it went under just because the union wouldn't take a pay cut.

There's also the natural social aspect. I've heard estimates saying that 2 million would be out of work if they just went under (since there are a lot of other people in support industries who'd be out of a job). We at least need to keep them alive for a little longer to space out the layoffs and keep the labor market from imploding.

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At the very least they should have just Chapter 11'd it and restructured. That would ahve given a far enough chance without us now being responsible for them.

That's true. It still wouldn't have helped with the unions though, except that it might have given them a good scare. Two of them are probably going to have to bite the dust. One of them might be able to pick up the pieces and negotiate a good union deal. Who knows though?