What Stimulus?

Let's remember something about the jobs picture and the pallet on which it's painted.

As of 2008, the Gross Domestic product of the United States was $14.6 trillion dollars. According to the Americans for Prosperity website in an article titled "Can Government Spending Stimulate the Economy, the various stimuli packages cost about 900 billion dollars. To put it in perspective. about 6.2 percent of GDP. What or who gets excited about that?

The overriding principal here is that jobs from government stimulus are temporary. The level of spending on that effort can't continue year after year, or the budget would be further bloated, as would the national debt. Government stimulus yields temp jobs, not full time or career jobs. What we have is 900 billion dollars of unemployment benefits under a different name.

Pumping 6/10's of a percent of GDP in to the economy is not to create anything except a ripple. And a temporary one at that. It does get some needed(?) projects done(?). But that's about all. It's a small pot of catch up money.

Only the private sector generates permanent jobs. Here's the catch. New jobs are created out of profits. Profits come from well managed companies. Well managed companies need certainty and profits to make investments in new products, new markets, new technology, as well as sustain existing products. Growing government spending and deficits create uncertainty.

Therefore, the very presence of a government stimulus of any amount in the current deficit situation leads to the exact opposite of what is needed for the job picture to turn around. Government can say it jumped in to the breach to save American workers, but will it last to the next payday and beyond?