Word: trillion
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Obama considered a stimulus ranging from $800 billion to $1.3 trillion, he said in an interview with CNBC on Jan. 7. By choosing a stimulus package on the lower end of that range, he avoids a fight with Republicans in the senate. Instead, Democrats like Sen. John Kerry and Sen. Kent Conrad have been critical of the bill. Obama wants a bill passed with 80 votes, clear bipartisan support, but that vision has shrunk the bill, rendering it much less effective. As a result, Obama risks alienating his Democratic base. Many Democratic senators have shown clear disapproval about the plan?...
...truly effective stimulus plan jolts the economy by lifting consumer confidence, since tax cuts can only increase economic activity when people spend, not save. A bigger plan would undoubtedly lead to more consumer confidence, especially if Obama had been brave enough to break the trillion-dollar mark. The flurry of news headlines and television news stories that would accompany such a big figure would show the public that Obama is serious about bringing up the economy, and hopefully motivate them to spend...
...President-elect Barack Obama prepares to throw money at the current downturn - a stimulus package starting at about $800 billion, plus the second $350 billion chunk of the financial bailout - we all really do seem to be Keynesians now. Just about every expert agrees that pumping $1 trillion into a moribund economy will rev up the ethereal goods-and-services engine that Keynes called "aggregate demand" and stimulate at least some short-term activity, even if it is all wasted on money pits. (See pictures of the recession...
...Keynes was also right that there would be more sensible ways to spend it. There would also be less sensible ways to spend it. A trillion dollars' worth of bad ideas - sprawl-inducing highways and bridges to nowhere, ethanol plants and pipelines that accelerate global warming, tax breaks for overleveraged McMansion builders and burdensome new long-term federal entitlements - would be worse than mere waste. It would be smarter to buy every American an iPod, a set of Ginsu knives and 600 Subway foot-longs...
...failed to clear the spectacularly low bar Congress set for pork in the past. Even if we're freaking out about today - and we should be - we can't afford to leverage tomorrow to build the infrastructure equivalent of buried banknotes, not when the deficit is a record $1.2 trillion and the debt a staggering $10.6 trillion. A depression would make both problems worse - tax revenues plunge when incomes plunge - but every public dollar we spend on depression avoidance also plunges us deeper into our hole. It's a bit galling to hear Republican leaders warn that Obama wants...