Word: cash
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...roads; repairs don't have the same bringing-home-the-bacon oomph. Most state transportation departments have become virtual asphalt factories, and most states have laws preventing the use of federal transportation dollars for anything but roads. Yet Congress keeps writing the states blank checks, lavishing the most cash on the ones that do the most driving and paving, actually mandating that federal officials "shall in no way infringe on the sovereign rights of the states to determine which projects shall be federally financed." It's our money, their choices. The result is that Congress does a terrific...
...partly because our liabilities could crush us if foreign investors sour on Treasury bonds. That's why Obama's advisers want to focus on temporary initiatives that won't drown us in red ink by creating long-term obligations, which they call tails. It would be nice to give cash-strapped transit agencies enough money to reduce fares for a year, but what happens when the year is over? Similarly, some liberals have proposed temporary increases in Social Security benefits, but that kind of generosity tends to become permanent...
...Treasury, but they don't provide stimulus if they don't get spent. That's what happened last year to a $168 billion stimulus package that relied on income tax rebates - remember when $168 billion was a big deal? - but foundered when many recipients hoarded the cash or paid down credit-card debt. It turns out that smart personal-finance decisions make for a lousy stimulus...
...main downside of tax cuts and benefit increases will be their tails; pity the politician who tries to taketh away what he's already giveth. That's why the best test of any cash stimulus will be whether it makes sense on its merits. Obama's aides have already dropped a proposal to give businesses a $3,000 credit for every job they create - an invitation to game the system. But payroll-tax relief will reward work and put money in the hands of the people who need it most. And there's no time like the present...
...states like Alabama, Kansas and Texas have been releasing lists of shovel-ready transportation projects that are dramatically skewed toward out-of-the-way sprawl roads. Missouri's list was all roads, none of them in St. Louis. Obama has vowed to reject earmarks, but if Congress simply passes cash to the states according to the usual formulas - and it will unless Obama intervenes - America is in for yet another festival of asphalt. There is even talk of waiving the regular cost-sharing requirements for local and state governments, an excellent way to make sure they green-light oinkers they...