GOP.gov
October 15, 2009
Today, the White House announced the first “hard” evidence of their effort to account for jobs created by the $787 billion “stimulus” bill. Today’s report is the first confirmed number of jobs created by the “stimulus” and includes data on the $16 billion awarded to 5,232 federal contract recipients to date.
Jobs Created?: Today’s report says that $16 billion in federal contracts awarded from the “stimulus” have resulted in 30,383 government-supported jobs. While the White House’s Chief Economist, Jared Bernstein, said that the number of jobs “exceeds our projections,” it represents 1 percent of the roughly 3 million jobs that have been lost since the “stimulus” was passed in February.
Cost per Job: With $16 billion in federal contracts awarded, each job created in the past seven months cost $526,610. These federal jobs are directly paid for with taxpayer dollars and, as such, do not reflect growth in the real private-sector economy. If the cost per government job remains the same, the $787 “stimulus” could possibly produce 208,000 jobs in eight months-compared to the 263,000 jobs lost in the month of September alone.
Unemployment: In January, the president promised that the trillion dollar stimulus bill would keep unemployment below 8 percent. According the today’s report, $110 billion has been paid out for contracts, grants, loans, and entitlements since February. Over that same span of time, the unemployment rate has jumped from 8.1 percent to a 26-year high of 9.8 percent.
Read more here.
