De Rugy on the Big Lie of 3 Million Stimulus Jobs
Starting right the hell now, Reason economics columnist Veronique de Rugy is slated to testify up on Capitol Hill about the effects, real and imagined, of the stimulus. Over at The Corner, de Rugy reacts to the White House Concil of Economic Advisors claim that the stimulus has "saved or created" at least 3 million jobs already. Sample:
As it turns out, when you unpack the numbers, you find that [Christina] Romer and her team didn't actually count how many people got a job thanks to the stimulus. Instead, the number is a projection that relies on the myth that a dollar of government spending creates up to 2.5 dollars of economic growth. […]
I am about to release the third Stimulus Facts report based on Recovery.gov data, which show that four out of five jobs created were created in the public sector. Remember the promise made by Romer herself when the stimulus was passed, that the bill would create 3.5 million jobs in two years, mostly in the private sector? Almost two years later, 682,370 jobs were reported created, not 3 million, and over 510,000 of these were in the public sector.
Whole thing here. Tune into C-SPAN to (hopefully) watch de Rugy in action.
