Stimulus Package Basic Info
Many people still want to know the contents of the Stimulus package that was passed earlier this month and signed by President Obama. So here's my best non-political guide to the Stimulus.
The real name of the bill is not Stimulus Package but rather American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. It's a long name but that's the official name. The bill was signed by President Obama on February 17, 2009 and also goes by the acronym of ARRA.
The bill was signed for $787,000,000,000. That's 787 billion dollars.
The Official White House Info: http://www.recovery.gov/
The White House has created a web page for information on the bill and its located at http://www.recovery.gov/.
The http://www.recovery.gov/site is produced by the White House (not Congress) and announces its own efforts at transparency. So what can you find at http://www.recovery.gov/?
1) You can find a simple bar chart of categories of money to be spent within the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. The bar chart is on the home page of the site under the topic Where is your Money Going. The chart is simple, useful, but meant for a younger audience.
2) You'll find a link on the Recovery.gov home page in a section named On Our Way: Read the Bill pointing you to another web page where you can find the full text of the ARRA 2009 Bill. The bill itself is 407 pages long. If you want to see it immediately, click ARRA 2009 PDF.
Transparency Problems.
This isn't political, just informational, perhaps you'll agree with me.
1) Neither http://www.recovery.gov/nor the White House has published an Excel spreadsheet of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. I've searched the Internet for an Excel spreadsheet of the Stimulus and the closest I can find is my own spreadsheet of the Senate version of this bill (Senate Bill was for $801 billion, final bill was $787 billion) on my blog: Senate Stimulus Bill
2) The actual bill in PDF format, the 407 page bill, isn't searchable. Most PDF files are searchable but this the PDF for the public at ARRA 2009 PDFis not searchable.
3) It's hard comprehending the Stimulus Bill 2009 when its in billions of dollars. I suggest the White House (and Congress) use a CPT or Cost per Taxpayer value. For example, $787 billion dollars / 300 million Americans is $ 2624.34 not including interest. That means that ARRA 2009 cost every single American $ 2624.34. It will be more with interest on the loan. If you'd like to learn more, my blog at Stimulus Cost per Taxpayer has a spreadsheet so you can calculate your portion of the Stimulus Bill for 2009.
4) Information on the ARRA 2009 is either the very simple bar chart at http://www.recovery.gov/ or the incredibly long, non-searchable PDF at ARRA 2009 PDF. We need an Excel spreadsheet of this bill.
What Can you Do?
Whether Democrat, Republican, or Independent, I think its laudable that the White House is making an effort at transparency. Let's give them a little more help.
Go to the White House and give them this simple feedback:
We appreciate the White House's attempt at transparency and we encourage it. Please provide a downloadable Excel spreadsheet of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 for Recovery.org. Secondly, make the ARRA 2009 bill a searchable PDF file. Finally, a Cost per Taxpayer number would be useful at www.Recovery.org. Thank you.
Finally
Thanks for reading this blog. I do hope you use it to give the White House your feedback. As for me, I'm neither a Republican nor a Democrat, I'm an independent voter from Chicago, IL.
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