Stimulus money creates 3236 jobs in Oregon, for a week....

[Phier]

By RYAN KOST (AP) – 1 day ago
PORTLAND, Ore. — How much are politicians straining to convince people that the government is stimulating the economy? In Oregon, where lawmakers are spending $176 million to supplement the federal stimulus, Democrats are taking credit for a remarkable feat: creating 3,236 new jobs in the program's first three months.
But those jobs lasted on average only 35 hours, or about one work week. After that, those workers were effectively back unemployed, according to an Associated Press analysis of state spending and hiring data. By the state's accounting, a job is a job, whether it lasts three hours, three days, three months, or a lifetime.
"Sometimes some work for an individual is better than no work," said Oregon's Senate president, Peter Courtney.
With the economy in tatters and unemployment rising, Oregon's inventive math underscores the urgency for politicians across the country to show that spending programs designed to stimulate the economy are working — even if that means stretching the facts.
At the federal level, President Barack Obama has said the federal stimulus has created 150,000 jobs, a number based on a misused formula and which is so murky it can't be verified.
At least 10 other states have launched their own miniature stimulus plans and nine others have proposed one, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Many of them, like Oregon, have promised job creation as a result of the public spending.
Ohio, for instance, passed a nearly $1.6 billion stimulus package even before Congress was looking at a federal program. When Gov. Ted Strickland first pitched the idea last year, he estimated the program could create some 80,000 jobs.
In North Carolina, a panel authorized hundreds of millions of dollars in new debt to speed up $740 million in government building projects. According to one estimate, the move could hurry the creation of 25,000 jobs.
As the bills for these programs mount, so will the pressure to show results. But, as Oregon illustrates, job estimates can very wildly.
"At best you can say it's ambiguous, at worst you can say it's intentional deception," said economist Bruce Blonigen of the University of Oregon. "You have to normalize it into a benchmark that everybody can understand."
Oregon's accounting practices would not be allowed as part of the $787 billion federal stimulus. While the White House has made the unverifiable promise that 3.5 million jobs will be saved or created by the end of next year, when accountants actually begin taking head counts this fall, there are rules intended to guard against exactly what Oregon is doing.
The White House requires states to report numbers in terms of full-time, yearlong jobs. That means a part-time mechanic counts as half a job. A full-time construction worker who has a three-month paving contract counts as one-fourth of a job.
Using that method, the AP's analysis of figures in Oregon shows the program so far has created the equivalent of 215 full-time jobs that will last three months. Oregon's House speaker, Dave Hunt, called that measurement unfair, though nearly every other state that has passed a stimulus package already uses or plans to use it.
"This stimulus plan was intentionally designed for short-term projects to pump needed jobs and income into families, businesses and communities struggling to get by," Hunt said in a statement. "No one ever said these would be full-time jobs for months at a time."
Still, critics say counting jobs, without any consideration of their duration, isn't good enough.
"You can't let them say, 'Well, we never said it was going to be full-time,'" said Steve Buckstein, a policy analyst for the Cascade Policy Institute, a free-market think tank. For the price of Oregon's $176 million, lawmakers could have provided all 3 million state residents with a one-hour job paying about $60, he said.
"By their definition, that's 3 million jobs," Buckstein said. "Is anybody gonna buy that?"
Oregon's 12.4 percent unemployment rate surpasses the national average of 9.4 percent. To supplement the federal stimulus, the state sold bonds to pay for everything from replacing light bulbs to installing carpet and finishing construction of a school in the farming community of Tillamook.
The "Go Oregon" program is still new. According to its latest progress report, 8 percent of the money has been spent and hundreds of projects have yet to be completed. More paychecks are bound to be written as construction continues.
If Oregon's dollars-to-jobs ratio remains steady, the program will create about 688 full-time, yearlong jobs. So far, it's generated only enough hours to employ 54 people full-time for a year.
Still, contractor Deborah Matthews of Pacificmark Construction, based in Milwaukie, Ore., is happy for any work. Her company picked up three contracts for painting, installing a water filter system and refurbishing a maintenance building. Prior to those contracts, which lasted about six weeks, she had laid off nearly all her construction workers. She brought back three full-time and hired a part-time worker.
"It was a little bit," she said, "to just keep us going."

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/...9EQLgD99NA4VO3


Now can some democrat/obama supporter on this board, explain how this is a good thing? How not simply giving back the money in the form of tax cuts is not a better way to stimulate the economy?


Investing in new business creates PERMANENT jobs, spending money on a project, creates a temporary fix. Perhaps less people would be defaulting on their mortgage, perhaps business would need to lay of less, but no, instead we shove it into a money pit.


And whats revolting is when the economy DOES recover, these same people who wasted billions will claim it was because of their valiant spending of other peoples money.

[JP226]

I suppose you could say being unemployed for x-1 week is better than x weeks? Not sure how that creates the ripple effect of indirect jobs but, what would I know.

[Banana Jelly]

Well employed for a couple of while isnt going to feed there children and but clothe for there family

[Hub'ite]

I guess 1 weeks better than nothing.

[Erik]

Investing in new business creates PERMANENT jobs

Not if there isn't a market.
And that's the problem: people aren't buying so businesses can't sell.

There are more than enough businesses for this market already, that's why most existing businesses are shrinking instead of expanding.
All that investing in new businesses can achieve is to make the existing, competing, businesses go bankrupt sooner.

Net effect on employment will be zero.

[Viking Prince]

Not if there isn't a market.
And that's the problem: people aren't buying so businesses can't sell.

There are more than enough businesses for this market already, that's why most existing businesses are shrinking instead of expanding.
All that investing in new businesses can achieve is to make the existing, competing, businesses go bankrupt sooner.

Net effect on employment will be zero.

I agree if the new businesses are simply copycats of existing businesses. Most if not all new businesses are innovative and offering something that is missing from the market. Even another McDonalds is offering a new location as well as new equipment. Expansion of business can occur in both expanding as well as contracting markets. The same with job losses and job gains.

Back to the OP:

I do not have any particular problems with a government offering a series of jobs that last for on average 35 hours (this can be spread over more than one week, btw) -- in some cases recent employment can be a help for a job seeker. And a bit of cash in pocket never hurts while seeking longer term employment.

The problem is with the politicians counting job creation seperate from job destruction -- which was Erik's very valid point. This is why we measure employment levels as well as labor pool changes and unemployment rates. One statistic cannot tell the whole story.

[Ramashan]

Regardless of what I feel about the Dems and Obama, the 'stimulus' and 'bailouts' were occurring and being approved before he got into the Presidents chair.

This whole economic collapse if far more complicated than just people defaulting on their mortgages because of short term work. People are defaulting on their mortgages because they either over invested (ie bought more property than they could afford in hopes of flipping or renting them at higher prices) or bought outside of their means. Which led to an extreme rise in property costs and more and more 'creative' loans to get people into the houses so that the prices and boom would continue (amongst many other things such as banks making reckless loans, packaging and splitting loans, lack of lending ehtics, lack of personal responsibility, etc etc)

The primary problem with the bailouts and stimulus is that it is all helping only 1 sector of our economy; Banks. Much of stimulus goes out so people can pay their bills, money from which inevitably ends up in bank somewhere. And the Bailouts all went to Banks, who lent that money out only to have the borrow pay the bank to borrow what was once their tax money. Again, the banks win.

What is missing from the whole equation is long term stable industry. You can't have small businesses without people capable of paying for the services. Perhaps you can have an entire economy based on small business, but then the same money is always circulating through the same stores and being sapping out little by little to the, you guessed it, banks.

You need to have an large scale industry with exports both interstate and internationally, so that money begins flowing into the system and stabalizes it so people can afford homes (within their means) and to buy all the things a home needs as well as shop at local markets, specialty stores, and shops. Unless we all end up working for banks, or perhaps industries like video games or something, we need to build some sort of stable industrial base in this country. Right now, much of that is over seas.

But, we can't alos just throw regulation, both financial and ecological, out the window for the sake of it all. But, some of the road blocks need to be removed in order to get a base started.

[Wilder]

Regardless of what I feel about the Dems and Obama, the 'stimulus' and 'bailouts' were occurring and being approved before he got into the Presidents chair.

qft


I am HIGHLY suspicious of the bailout, but I think pheir's point may be a bit mislaid. Sure, government programs are not the best way to provide longterm employment for the American populace, but, that is only half the story. Sure, the jobs that where created with the construction of the Hoover dam were temporary, but declaring it as a failure because of that is silly. We did get the Hoover damn out of it, and I think that counts for something.

This is why, whatever flaws the stimulus has, I am not to horribly upset about everything. Recently I found out that some money was appropriated as part of the stimulus was sent her to Portland, so we could construct an ultra fast, Japanese style train that would run from Salem to Seattle. That is the sort of thing that will pay off in the long run.

[InsaneHanz]

The US tax system needs complete reform. I saw this on another forum and I think it's what our government should be doing.

If we were to cut the tax rate, the effect would be rapid, positive, and dramatic. The very first thing I would do is start with the Capital Gains Tax. This tax is located at the very worst place in the business cycle. It’s the single worst tax of all. Every time, without fail, that you cut the CGT, the economy takes off like a rocket. Every time. Without fail. I would cut it down to zero percent and then put up a barrier that requires a unanimous supermajority to resurrect it. Seriously, it’s that bad. It should be uprooted immediately and never allowed to return.

Eliminating the CGT alone would be more stimulus to the economy than all these other current efforts put together.

But why stop there? Some European countries have switched over the Flat Tax system, like the one proposed by Steve Forbes in 1996. That simple change has allowed their economies to experience double digit growth when we were puttering around with 1 or 2 percent growth.

A side benefit of the Flat Tax would be the elimination of personal tax forms. There would be no April 15 tax deadline. If you set the flat tax at 20%, then they take 20% out of your paycheck. End of story. No refunds. No “amount you owe”. As of the last estimate, America spends (between actual money spent and man-hours of effort) about 300 billion dollars a year preparing taxes. This would be eliminated. That’s an instant 300 billion dollars added to the GDP for free every single year. How’s that for a stimulus?

[Hiero of Syracuse]

I heard about that too, and someone told me of another train that's being consturcted, which in the long run will be a boost for a greener earth and federal money.