First Hard Data on Stimulus Released

Jobs President Barack Obama More than 30000 Jobs Were Created or Saved at Businesses that Received Federal Contracts White House Reports

by CBS/AP

Published: Thu, October 15, 2009 - 11:12 am CST

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Businesses receiving federal contracts under President Barack Obama's economic stimulus program reported creating or saving more than 30,000 jobs in the first months of the program, according to data released Thursday by a government oversight board.

The numbers, based on jobs linked to less than $16 billion in federal contracts, represent just a sliver of the $787 billion stimulus package. But they offer the first hard data on the early effects of the program. Until now, the White House has relied on economic models to argue that the program created jobs and eased the recession. Critics point to rising unemployment to argue it wasn't worth the cost.

The data rebut criticism that the stimulus simply padded the government payroll, creating only public-sector jobs. The businesses reporting jobs ranged from small roofing companies hired to repair military buildings to large corporations paid to clean up nuclear waste.

But the numbers represent such a small snapshot, they are unlikely to significantly change the debate over whether stimulus was the right prescription for an ailing economy.

The report card reflects agency data but not recipient data, which will not be reported until October 30th. CBS News producer Laura Stricker reports that recipients are now frantically working to file information with the government about what money they received and what they are doing with it.

In addition, the agencies themselves are widely varied on how many details they submitted to Recovery.gov. Some departments were very thorough, while others just submitted lists with little detail.

Jared Bernstein, the chief economic adviser to Vice President Joe Biden, said it was too early to draw conclusions from the data "but the early indications are quite positive."

The White House has repeatedly played up the impact of the Recovery Act, with Biden traveling the country to stress its effectiveness. He will be talking up the Act today in St. Louis at the County Police and Fire Training Center.

Bernstein, following the White House line, said "the direct count by Recovery Act recipients of jobs created or saved from this small percentage of the Recovery Act exceeds our projections." He said it was further evidence that the stimulus provided "a much needed lift in a very difficult period for our economy."

In the short term, the most significant thing about the job numbers may be that they exist at all. The government has never before attempted to track the effects, in real time, of a huge government program. The data released by the independent Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board allow taxpayers to see not just where their money is going, but what the government is getting in return and how many people are on the job.

Broader numbers on local stimulus spending, for everything from repairing public housing and building schools to repaving highways and keeping teachers off the unemployment lines, won't be available until late this month. Those figures are expected to show early stimulus money saving thousands of teaching jobs and creating construction work for highway projects nationwide.

Taken together, the two batches of data will offer a head count of people working on stimulus projects. Because nobody knew what to expect from the numbers, the White House set no goals and raised no expectations for what they would reveal.

The reporting does not attempt to measure jobs created by $288 billion in tax cuts or the sizable increases in spending on Medicaid and unemployment benefits. The White House has said that, when considering those factors and estimating the ripple effect through the economy, more than 1 million jobs have been created or saved so far.

Obama has set a goal of creating or saving 3.5 million jobs by the end of next year. Since signing the stimulus in February, Obama has watched the economy shed millions of jobs as unemployment climbed higher than his economists predicted. The White House says things would have been far worse without the stimulus.

Contracting jobs are normally temporary and some are part-time. Auditors, fearing businesses would use part-time jobs to inflate the numbers, required companies to convert all jobs numbers to full-time. That means a 20-hour-a-week roofing job is counted as half a job.

Check out the full report at recovery.gov.

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BamaBob Says:

Thu, Oct 15, 2009 at 1:08 pm

Another thing that is really bugging me is this health care reform stuff. Why do the politicians we voted into office keep LYING about the cost of this monstrosity???

One of the ways Baucus claims he will control costs is to cut the reimbursement rate for doctors by 21%. While one hand is doing that, the other hand is writing a bill to give doctors a $247 billion increase in Medicare fees.

WHY ARE THEY LYING TO US and working around the clock to shove this catastrophe down our throats? What is the real motivation in all of this????????????

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091014/ap_on_go_co/us_doctor_dollars

freedomtofascismcom Says:

Thu, Oct 15, 2009 at 12:48 pm

a defeatist attitude will get the job done. No we, you and everyone living here in this nation must take on an active role in their own governing less you find out very soon that you are being goverend by your inferiors, corrupt ones at that. I am confident that anyone I speak to would say without a doubt that they could do a better job than what is currently being done in any capacity in whitewashington. We as a nation have a duty to co-create our own reality in government and a duty to remove government if it does not seek to ensure it operates with our best interests in mind, by best interest I mean life, liberty and happiness. Clearly they have failed, or clearly WE HAVE FAILED OURSELVES AND OUR CHILDREN. We cannot look to another to claim our rights , or to have our benefit in their hearts like we would, no. We must , each one of us become active to the point of running for office if we do not like the way things are. Merely relying on the most detached and disconnected folks in the country (CON-gress) is going to get the same result over and over ,like it has for 100 yrs in this nation. The definition of insanity is to continue to do the same thing and expect a different result. Enough of relying on liars to make things better. Do not look outside for help. It is all between your ears, all of the answers to your problems. We only need to remeber how powerful we really are and how intelligent, how persistant, how we are truly co-creators of the reality we want to have.

rmseek1234 Says:

Thu, Oct 15, 2009 at 12:32 pm

Puh-leeze! We have heard no straight talk yet. What makes you think it will change? At least until the next election?

freedomtofascismcom Says:

Thu, Oct 15, 2009 at 12:30 pm

It can’t Bob, its not possible. Either the job was there , or it was not. Americans have not learned that the Federal Reserve is a PRIVATE BANK with shareholders(bosses). They loan $ to the defacto US govt. at interest when we can makeour own $ interest free.How is the loan paid back? The principal is designed to never be able to be paid back , keeping American’s in debt forever. The income tax fraud is used to pay the national debt which is the interest on the loan. Under Regan’s admin , he appointed Peter Grace aka Grace commission in the late 80s. The summary on where our tax $ goes is as follows. ” Wr have found that 100% of revenue collected by way of the income tax is fully absorbed by the interest on the national debt and that not one nickle is used to pay for the goods and services Americans expect from government fromtaxation. Tiis folks coupled with fractional lending is why you are a slave. The federal banks are required to only hold 10% in reserve on loanable $ this means they can take your savings account $ hold 10% in reserve and loan 9 times the origional amount. Then each bank down the line can do the same thing , 10% and 9 times the loan again and again. You had better wake up folks. The Federal Reserve bank is no more Federal than federal express. END THE FED!!!!!! End the fed and see what real freedom used to taste like. Fools whoever told you paper was so bloody valuable? Idiots!!!!

BamaBob Says:

Thu, Oct 15, 2009 at 12:26 pm

Yeah, actual new jobs, or the number of people called back from a lay off. A “saved” job could be anything anyone wants it to be. They could claim the whole world would have collapsed without the stimulus bucks, so they saved billions and billions of jobs. How could anyone prove them wrong?

Stick with real numbers and start shooting straight with the public for a change!!!

rmseek1234 Says:

Thu, Oct 15, 2009 at 12:20 pm

To make us believe they have accomplished something they haven’t BB. Oh,hail the one…lol

Why don’t we get “true” statistics? Like how many of these contracts were in the works BEFORE the stimulus,and how many jobs were actually created BEFORE the stimulus,but weren’t put into effect until after?

southfan1981 Says:

Thu, Oct 15, 2009 at 12:19 pm

I am thinking maybe we should have gone with the Bush/McCain economic stimulus plan. We would all be safe and sound by now. Maybe, just maybe, some of us would be dining with the “Have Mores” instead of having a Hardees biscuit for Sunday dinner.

BamaBob Says:

Thu, Oct 15, 2009 at 12:15 pm

They need to drop that “jobs saved” BS. How can such a thing be mathematically quantified?