Speaking for my interest group, I think the stimulus package is a fine idea

Writing in the Financial Times, Jeffrey Sachs fires a warning shot across the bow of stimulus enthusiasts: The US debate over the fiscal stimulus is remarkable in its neglect of the medium term – that is, the budgetary challenges over a period of five to 10 years. Neither the White House nor Congress has offered ...

By , a professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and co-host of the Space the Nation podcast.

Writing in the Financial Times, Jeffrey Sachs fires a warning shot across the bow of stimulus enthusiasts:

Writing in the Financial Times, Jeffrey Sachs fires a warning shot across the bow of stimulus enthusiasts:

The US debate over the fiscal stimulus is remarkable in its neglect of the medium term – that is, the budgetary challenges over a period of five to 10 years. Neither the White House nor Congress has offered the public a scenario of how the proposed mega-deficits will affect the budget and government programmes beyond the next 12 to 24 months. Without a sound medium-term fiscal framework, the stimulus package can easily do more harm than good, since the prospect of trillion-dollar-plus deficits as far as the eye can see will weigh heavily on the confidence of consumers and businesses, and thereby undermine even the short-term benefits of the stimulus package….

The most obvious problem with the stimulus package is that it has been turned into a fiscal piñata – with a mad scramble for candy on the floor. We seem all too eager to rectify a generation of a nation saving too little by saving even less – this time through expanding government borrowing. First it was former US Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan’s bubble, then Wall Street’s, and now – in the third act – it will be Washington’s….

Perhaps Mr Obama should reflect on the fact that the Clinton-era boom began in 1993 with tax rises and a congressional rejection of a fiscal stimulus package. This time, there is certainly a cyclical case for deficit- financed public spending, but accompanied by phased-in tax increases to provide proper financing of crucial government functions in the medium term.

Hmmm… Sachs makes some valid points here. Maybe we should take a moment or two to ponder this.

Hey, what’s this Sam Dillon story in the New York Times saying? 

The economic stimulus plan that Congress has scheduled for a vote on Wednesday would shower the nation’s school districts, child care centers and university campuses with $150 billion in new federal spending, a vast two-year investment that would more than double the Department of Education’s current budget.

The proposed emergency expenditures on nearly every realm of education, including school renovation, special education, Head Start and grants to needy college students, would amount to the largest increase in federal aid since Washington began to spend significantly on education after World War II.

You know, it’s nay-sayers like Sachs that are keeping our country mired in recession.  I can’t believe his nitpicking is going to stand in the way of my tasty slab of pork getting America going again.

Daniel W. Drezner is a professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and co-host of the Space the Nation podcast. Twitter: @dandrezner

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