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Friday, October 30, 2009

Schools Are Where Stimulus Saved Jobs


More than half of positions saved were teachers, White House report shows

The best symbol of the $787 billion federal stimulus program turns out not to be of a construction worker in a hard hat, but rather of a classroom teacher saved from a layoff.

On Friday, the Obama administration released the most detailed information yet on the jobs created by the stimulus. Preliminary data showed that of the 640,239 jobs created or saved, 325,000, or more than half, were jobs in education that school districts claimed were saved when stimulus money averted the need for layoffs. While the stimulus was initially sold in large part as a public works program, only about 80,000 of the jobs that were claimed Friday were in construction.

The figures do not include jobs indirectly created by the money pumped into the economy through tax cuts, unemployment benefits and aid to states for Medicaid. If those were included, the administration estimates, the tally would rise to more than 1 million jobs saved or created.

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4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Leave it to the government to spend $1.2 million to save a $40,000 job.

Let's give them the benefit of the doubt, and say they saved or created 1 million jobs. That's a cool $787,000 per job.

Where did the other $730,000 go?

I bet that we could have taken each one of those lost jobs, paid them $25,000 and given them a year of vocational training or post-high school education, and given them much better job skills to adapt to changing industries. That would have saved a huge amount of cash, reshaped our economy, and given displaced workers more marketable skills that our economy needs as it evolves.

This bailout makes me sick.

Anonymous said...

I don't believe a word the White House says.

Anonymous said...

I think I heard on a news show once that if they took all the money they gave to the car companies, which we taxpayers will nevere see again, and they gave it to working age people. Each person in the country would have received $25,000. They bailed out the car companies and they still went bankrupt. The country didn't collapse and we'll never see that money back. At least the banks are paying the money back with interest.

Anonymous said...

It is always the teachers and cops that are threatened. How about cutting the dead wood support staff and other maintenace personnel?