Total government "stimulus" over nine trillion dollars
...poll beneath the fold
At this point, I'm really starting to wonder what this all looks like two years from now...
The federal stimulus package would raise the government's commitment to solving the economic crisis to an astronomical $9.7 trillion - enough to pay off more than 90 percent of the nation's home mortgages.
The commitment is composed of about $1 trillion in stimulus packages, about $3 trillion in lending and spending, and $5.7 trillion in agreements to provide aid, the New York Post reported.
The House has approved an $819 billion stimulus plan, which needs to be reconciled with the Senate's package of at least $780 billion.
The total value of home mortgages in the United States is calculated at $10.5 trillion by the Federal Reserve.
Sen. Byron Dorgan, a North Dakota Democrat, said on the Senate floor last week: "We've seen money go out the back door of this government unlike any time in the history of our country."
So, in other words, we could have paid off just about every mortgage in America for what we've dumped on the economy in the past year?? Setting aside the philisophical problems w/that, I dare say it would have worked better than what we've been doing. But then there would be that whole complaint about money only going to people with houses...rich people, blah, blah, blah. (Despite the fact that nobody gets hired by poor people...)
I would also point out that this is almost equal to our entire US national debt, (approx. 10.5 trillion dollars).
A trillion here, and a trillion there...pretty soon you're talking real money.






