Issue Position: Economy

Issue Position

There is bipartisan agreement for emergency spending on infrastructure and tax cuts that will create new jobs and reinvigorate private sector investments. Unfortunately, H.R. 1, the "American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009," falls short on both fronts.

I joined 187 of my colleagues in voting against this bill on January 28, 2009. The $825 billion economic stimulus package proposed by President Barack Obama, House Speaker Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Reid is unlikely to be a catalyst for economic growth. Rather, it is an unhealthy expansion of the federal government.

To respond to an emergency, you must act quickly. According to the Congressional Budget Office, only 7 percent of the $355 billion in discretionary spending included in the bill would be injected into the economy by the end of fiscal year 2009. By the end of 2010, only 12 percent of the funds set aside for highway construction will be spent.

Stimulus funds must be targeted to be effective. Only 3 percent of the $825 billion will go toward road and highway construction that creates jobs and aids individuals and private businesses alike. Instead, funding is used for the National Endowment for the Arts ($50 million), NASA ($400 million), and new federal government cars ($600 million). Government stimulus spending must encourage private investment.

The tax cuts proposed in the stimulus are short-term and help reduce current losses, but they do little to encourage new and long-term investment. Columbia University economist Massimo Morelli concludes an economic stimulus must "foster innovation and productive investment" which this bill does not do.

Instead of injecting new life into the economy, the bill will support a massive growth of government. $76 billion will be spent to expand 60 existing government programs - 19 of which have been described as "ineffective" or "results not demonstrated" by the Office of Management and Budget. ACORN, the community activist organization that accepts government funds to lobby on behalf of political candidates, will be eligible to receive up to hundreds of millions of dollars in community revitalization funding to further their political interests.

This is completely contrary to the purpose of the stimulus which is to create jobs to grow our economy - not help politicians and special interest influence.

Lawmakers are supposed to be stewards of taxpayer dollars, yet this bill does not have the ingredients to promote economic growth. The Brookings Institute senior fellow Pietro Nivola says, "as strong stimulus to the economy is desirable - and the faster the better." But, "there is little room for error. In the current dangerous situation, shoveling $800 billion at the problem, only to discover that too little of it actually stimulates, could prove to be a cure considerably worse than the disease."

This bill will grow the government and miss an opportunity to reinvigorate the economy. An effective stimulus can be accomplished through tax cuts and targeted spending, without making individuals and businesses more reliant on the government or saddling our children with trillions of dollars of additional debt.

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