While getting up to speed on the report, you may also come across a “fact-check” story the Associated Press is running on it.  Unfortunately, the only thing AP’s “fact check” seems to be missing is… the full facts.  Here’s the scoop:

1. Increasing Renewable Energy: The AP questions whether we’re on track to double renewable energy generation and manufacturing capacity.
   1. Doubling U.S Renewable Energy Generation Capacity: The AP acknowledges that the Recovery Act has “helped increase renewable energy,” and their own expert says that “the U.S. could probably meet the… goal.” 
   2. Doubling U.S. Renewable Energy Manufacturing Capacity: Here, the AP does not doubt that we will make our goal, but instead denigrates the significance of it.  Nevertheless, we believe that compared to the last decade in which we’ve fallen severely behind, more renewable energy manufacturing in America is a good thing.
2. Cutting the Cost of Solar Power: While the AP’s expert says “there was too much uncertainty in the world to make such a prediction,” this doesn’t fundamentally change the ability for our goal to be achieved.  Our investments in the solar sector - coupled with continued support through the tax code – already are and will continue to accelerate the pace of commercial deployment in the U.S., driving down costs significantly over the next five years.  What’s more, contrary to the assertion of their expert, the Recovery Act is driving technological innovation to lower these costs.
3. Quicker, Cheaper Genetic Mapping: The AP agrees that we will make our goal, and says “many specialists believe the price may drop to less than $1,000 in a few years,” and also goes onto mention the worthiness of this goal:  “The more sequencing scientists do allows them to better explore variations that contribute to disease.”
4. High Speed Rail: Here, the AP does not attack the report’s claim that our investments are laying the groundwork for high speed rail in America.  Instead, they point to some investments that are upgrading existing lines and say that building high speed rail is “a difficult, multiyear effort.”  We agree that it will be “a difficult, multiyear effort" and, in fact, have long said so.  But with the $8 billion we are investing through the Recovery Act, we are doing two things:  1) making upgrades to existing lines that are needed in order to equip them for supporting faster trains and 2) supporting actual high speed rail projects like the San Francisco to Los Angeles line cited by the AP. 
5. Health Information Technology: Again, the AP says nothing about the claims espoused in the report.  In fact, the AP agrees that there are “economic dividends from greater efficiency and fewer costly medical mistakes” and only says that they could be “years away.”  We agree that it will take several years to transform health IT in American hospitals and doctors’ offices and, again, have long said so.
6. Electric Vehicles: Again, the AP says nothing disputing our goal of cutting the cost of batteries by 70 percent between 2009 and 2015, and in fact acknowledges that “strides are being made.”  Instead, they criticize our efforts as “overly optimistic” and cite the price tag of the Chevy Volt.  One of the main factors in the costs of electric cars today is the price of the electric-vehicle batteries - $33,000 in 2009, the majority of the cost of the car.  Recovery Act investments are scaling up production as well as investing in new technologies – both ways to drive down prices. The battery is expected to hit a price of $10,000 by 2015, and continue to decline after that.  With a price slash of $20,000, electric vehicles will be well on their way to competing with similar non-electric vehicles.

No doubt, there may be varying opinions as we transform the American economy.  That’s what innovation is all about – a wealth of good ideas.  But based on the facts we’ve laid out above and in the report, there’s no reason to believe that with dedication and resources America can’t achieve these ambitious goals we’ve set.  Bottom line: After eight years of failed economic policies that devastated American science and innovation, we make no apology for setting ambitious targets to make American workers the most competitive in the global economy - and putting the resources behind achieving those goals.

Liz Oxhorn is the Recovery Act Communications Director

Over the past year and half, the Recovery Act has put hundreds of thousands of hard-working men and women to work on the same kind of projects for the 21st Century -- once again fueling America’s economy by repairing, rejuvenating, improving and advancing much of same infrastructure that was first created back then.

During a visit to New York City yesterday, Vice President Biden stopped by the Brooklyn Bridge where Recovery Act dollars are at work making a contribution to New York City's locally-funded effort to repair, upgrade, and preserve one of America’s most historic crossings.

Vice President Joe Biden tours a construction site underneath the Brooklyn Bridge that is partially funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, in New York City, New York, 6/2/10 (Official White House Photo by David Lienemann)

After touring the construction site alongside Mayor Bloomberg, Vice President Biden spoke about how the $508 million project, which is funded in-part by the Recovery Act, will bring the Brooklyn Bridge into a state of good repair and improve traffic flow for the more than 120,000 vehicles, 4,000 pedestrians, and 2,600 bicyclists that cross every day.  

“It’s great to see men and women back on the job, completing work on one of the truly, treasured landmarks this country possesses,” the Vice President told a crowd of about 40 construction workers near the Manhattan-side entrance to the bridge.

Vice President Joe Biden talks to construction workers during an American Recovery and Reinvestment Act event at the Brooklyn Bridge in New York City, New York, 6/2/10 (Official White House Photo by David Lienemann)

New York City says the Recovery Act’s $30 million investment in the project will create 150 jobs, generate economic activity and allow New York City to fund other critical infrastructure projects they otherwise would have eliminated or postponed. For the Brooklyn Bridge, it means a reconstructed roadway surface, rehabilitated and retrofitted steel support structures, expanded entrance ramps, and repainting to prevent corrosion.
 
As Vice President Biden noted, the Recovery Act has funded nearly 1,300 bridge projects and 14,000 transportation across the United States to-date.

Vice President Joe Biden speaks in front of the Brooklyn Bridge during an American Recovery and Reinvestment Act event, in New York City, New York, 6/2/10 (Official White House Photo by David Lienemann)

Liz Oxhorn is the Recovery Act Communications Director

Perhaps the President was on to something last year when he chose Navistar’s Wakarusa plant as the location to announce these awards – because that Indiana team marking this important milestone today is none other than the fine folks at Navistar.  You may remember some of them from this video of the President’s visit there last year.  Their community was hard-hit when a local employer, RV manufacturer Monaco Coach, went bankrupt during the economic downturn.  Like communities across the country, they’re still making their way to back to economic recovery – but they’re starting to see a brighter future thanks to the Recovery Act.  The electric truck being unveiled today?  It was manufactured at one of Monaco’s old facilities - which is today Navistar’s new electric vehicle facility.  And it was made with the help of some former Monaco employees – who, thanks to the Recovery Act, are now on the job at Navistar.

The folks at Navistar took a few minutes in the middle of their busy launch day to take a phone call from a special guest.

Vice President Joe Biden calls the Navistar Electric Truck Team to congratulate them on shipping their first vehicle as a result of Recovery Act funding, from his home office in Wilmington, Delaware, May 13, 2010. (Official White House Photo by David Lienemann)

Vice President Biden congratulated the team not only reaching this important milestone, but on playing a leading role in putting Recovery Act dollars to work manufacturing smarter, cost-efficient vehicles and helping build an industry that will create good middle-class jobs for years to come.  This is just the beginning for Navistar’s electric vehicle program – they plan to eventually develop and deploy 400 of these trucks and put sixty people to work in the process thanks to the Recovery Act investment.

And this wasn’t just an accomplishment for Navistar, but for the entire advanced battery and electric vehicle industry.  In fact, the battery that is powering the new electric delivery truck unveiled today was built in Michigan by Michigan workers at A123 Systems – also thanks to a Recovery Act award announced last year.

It’s easy to get a look at this electric delivery truck and the other advanced technology the Recovery Act awardees are producing and think this is just about the future.  But Navistar and companies like it are bringing the future to market today.  In fact, this truck isn’t a model or test vehicle – it’s going to be immediately put on the road by the customer making deliveries in a smarter, more cost-efficient way.  A plug-in powered vehicle that can carry in excess of 2 tons a distance of up to 100 miles per charge – that’s not the future, that’s today.

And because of the advances the more than 40 recipients of the Recovery Act’s $2.4 billion investment in electric vehicles are making today, we’re going to go from two advanced vehicle battery factories last year to 30 by 2012.  We’ll go from two percent of the world’s advanced vehicle battery market share to 20 percent by 2012.  And we’re not just making the parts here at home, we’re also helping plant the power stations to fuel electric cars all over the country.  So while Navistar’s customer will hit the road with a brand new electric vehicle soon – it may not be long before you do too.

Liz Oxhorn is Recovery Act Communications Director

But you may have also noticed an item in their survey that stands in pretty stark contrast to what leading economists have found.  According to NABE:

• The vast majority (73%) of respondents “reported the fiscal stimulus in February 2009 has had no impact on employment to date.”

Now we know that that the Recovery Act hasn’t just had an impact on employment so far – it’s had a BIG impact on employment.  From private forecasters like Moody’s Economy.com and IHS Global to public economists like the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, economists across the board have gone on-the-record saying that the Recovery Act is already responsible for millions of jobs nationwide and contributing to the economic growth that is fueling our recovery.  Here are just a few of them:

• IHS Global Insight chief economist Nariman Behravesh: Without the stimulus, said Nariman Behravesh, chief economist at IHS Global Insight in Lexington, 3 million more Americans would be out of work and the national unemployment rate, just below 10 percent, would be 12 percent - or higher. “There is no doubt that it had an impact,’’ Behravesh said. “When there is a shortfall in private sector demand, there is a role for government to step in and fill the gap.’’ [The Boston Globe, 3/7/2010]
• Stuart Hoffman, chief economist at PNC Bank: "The stimulus worked," said Stuart Hoffman, chief economist at PNC Bank. Without it, "the unemployment rate would probably be closer to 11 percent and the economy might not have grown at all last year.” [ABC News, 2/18/10]
• Economist Stephen Herzenberg: “Cut through all the numbers, though, and this is what you find: The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act saved us from plunging into a second Great Depression… The Recovery Act brought the economy back from the brink.  And these figures probably underestimate its impact, because they don't take market psychology into account. When the legislation passed, the economy was plunging at a pace similar to that of the 1930s. If Congress had sat on its hands, unemployment now could easily be 12 percent to 15 percent - and on its way to 20 percent.”  [Philadelphia Inquirer, 1/17/10]
• Mark Zandi of Moody’s Economy.com: “The catalyst for the transition from recession to recovery was the unprecedented monetary and fiscal stimulus provided by government policymakers...The Recovery Act’s expanded unemployment insurance benefits, financial aid to state governments, tax cuts for households and businesses, and tax credits for home purchases all contributed to the turn in the economy. The recovery has gained traction in recent months as the sources of GDP growth have broadened to include consumer spending, business investment and exports. The job market has also stabilized. After declining by some 8.4 million jobs between December 2007 and February 2010, payroll employment expanded by 162,000 in March.” [Testimony before Senate Finance Committee, 4/14/2010]

And economic experts at major trade associations say that the Recovery Act has had a substantial impact on employment in their industry:

• Associated General Contractors economist Ken Simonson: “’The stimulus is saving construction jobs, driving demand for new equipment and delivering better and more efficient infrastructure,’ said Ken Simonson, an economist with Associated General Contractors, which represents a large part of the construction industry.  Simonson calculated that roughly 15,000 jobs have been created or preserved for every $1 billion the government has spent on infrastructure projects, which is well above the Association’s year-ago estimate of 9,700 jobs. He said that stimulus-funded road construction projects alone have created 280,000 jobs over the past year, as well as an unknown number of ancillary jobs for subcontractors supplying equipment and raw materials.”  [San Diego Union Tribune, 2/17/10]
• Rhone Resch, President and CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association: “One year ago today, President Obama visited a solar installation to sign the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The purpose of the bill was to stimulate immediate job growth with a strong emphasis on clean energy technologies like solar. And that is exactly what happened. In 2009, the Recovery Act helped the solar industry create 18,000 new American jobs. More than 50 new solar energy manufacturing plants are under construction now with the support of ARRA.” [Solar Energy Industries Association, 2/17/10]

So how exactly did this group of 68 NABE members get it so wrong?  Well, there is more than meets the eye here… 

If you take a closer look at the survey, you will find that they were asked about conditions at their company:

• The NABE April 2010 Industry Survey report presents the responses of 68 NABE members to a survey conducted between March 25, 2010, and April 10, 2010, on business conditions in their firm or industry and reflects first-quarter 2010 results and the near-term outlook.

Now keep in mind that the Recovery Act was specifically designed to get the most employment bang for the taxpayer buck through a combination of targeted relief for hard-hit families and businesses and seed money to jump-start job-creating projects across a wide array of industries and communities.  Those targeted investments multiply down the supply chain and across industries to grow the economy as a whole.  What it wasn’t designed to be is a handout to every company across the country – so we wouldn’t expect that every company surveyed would have received Recovery Act funding.  But interestingly, if 73 percent of the companies surveyed saw no impact on employment to-date, that could mean more than 25 percent of them did see a direct employment benefit – which would be a pretty impressive sign that the Recovery Act has had a broad reach so far.

And keep in mind that the Recovery Act hasn’t just created jobs directly by paying salaries for workers.  Recent analysis from the Council of Economic Advisors found that about half of the jobs created by the Recovery Act so far were as a result of tax relief and income supports like unemployment benefits – money that doesn’t go to companies, but to consumers.  When consumers have more money in their pockets, they spend it purchasing from companies just like the ones surveyed by NABE.  So while the economic experts at these companies may not have seen the dollars themselves, they are no doubt seeing the impact of them as they, along with other companies nationwide, have helped create the roughly 2.5 million jobs supported by the Recovery Act so far.  

But don’t just take our word for it.  This is what NABE had to say as recently as last month about how the Recovery Act is helping grow the economy:

• "Eighty-three percent believe that GDP is currently higher than it would have been without the 2009 stimulus package (ARRA)."
• And more than half of the respondents to that survey “view[ed] the 2009 stimulus package as a positive factor for the economy over the longer term.”

Liz Oxhorn is Recovery Act Communications Director

Here is what they had to say:

FL – St. Petersburg Times - One year later, stimulus shows results in Florida: The reality is the bleak economic picture in the Sunshine State would look a lot darker without the federal money.  The tale is in the numbers, even if there are disputes over the precise figures.  Without the federal help, the state would have been forced to lay off thousands of teachers and would be facing an even deeper budget crisis…  In the Tampa Bay area, the impact of the stimulus money will be felt for decades. Construction on more U.S. 19 overpasses already is under way in North Pinellas, and in Hillsborough a connector between Interstate 4 and the Lee Roy Selmon Crosstown Expressway will help business at the Port of Tampa and create thousands of jobs.  The stimulus money earmarked for high-speed rail between Tampa and Orlando will jump-start a project that could help transform the economy for an entire region. 

KS- The Wichita Eagle - Hatred of stimulus bill misplaced:  Obama administration officials are fanning out across the country to raise awareness about the impact of the federal stimulus bill, which became law a year ago today. Based on a new CNN poll, they have their work cut out.  Only one-quarter of Americans think the federal stimulus plan has helped the middle class, and only one-third think it helped low-income Americans. Meanwhile, 74 percent think that at least half the stimulus spending has been wasted.  Such perceptions are understandable, given the struggles families are facing and the stimulus bill's failure to reduce the unemployment rate. But they don't match what was actually in the bill.  The largest item in the stimulus package was a workers' tax cut worth $116 billion. According to the CNN poll, 70 percent of the public support the tax cuts in the bill.  The second and fourth largest items in the package were aid to states for Medicaid ($87.1 billion) and education and other essential services ($53.6 billion). Imagine how much worse state budget problems would be without this federal help.  The third largest item ($69.8 billion) prevented middle-income Americans from having to pay alternative minimum taxes. Other large items include: $35.8 billion to extend unemployment benefits; $27.5 billion for road and bridge construction; $25.1 billion for extending COBRA health insurance to unemployed workers and their families; $20.9 billion for food assistance to low-income Americans; $14.8 billion for an expanded child tax credit; $14.4 billion for aid to seniors and disabled veterans.  All total, these items account for about 60 percent of stimulus spending.  Is this wasted money?  Most of the remaining stimulus spending was for business tax cuts, college Pell Grants, and projects such as upgrading the electricity grid and public transit systems. According to the CNN poll, 80 percent of Americans support the infrastructure investments. 

MD - Baltimore Sun - The stimulus: More successful than you think:  Unlike the Bush administration's stimulus programs, in which the treasury sent checks to taxpayers that were largely saved or used to pay down debt, the Obama stimulus tax cuts came gradually in the form of reduced payroll tax deductions designed to make sure more of it was spent.  And the program isn't done.  The spending that will come next is weighted toward infrastructure, both physical and digital, that will not only put people to work now but will also pay lasting dividends.  According to The Washington Post, just $31 billion that was allocated for road construction, expansion of broadband service, energy efficiency, high speed rail, smart grid upgrades, electronic health records and other projects has been spent.  That leaves nearly $200 billion yet to come.  The stimulus has not single-handedly returned the economy to growth and prosperity. But it has helped stave off what many feared little more than a year ago might turn into a full-fledged depression, and it still has more punch left.  It may not have been perfect, but it was certainly not a mistake.

MA – Boston Globe – A Fact: Stimulus created jobs - The numbers are in, and there can no longer be any doubt that President Obama’s stimulus bill, passed just over a year ago, helped pull America from the brink of economic catastrophe, in part by creating millions of jobs that would not otherwise have existed.  All of the major economic research firms that have studied the stimulus’ effect have come to this conclusion….  Joblessness is still sky-high, of course, and the United States is by no means out of the woods economically.  It’s understandable that Americans whose situations haven’t been visibly improved by the bill want to rail against it and outsized government spending, and the stimulus certainly wasn’t without its flaws.  Still, though, it’s ridiculous to deny, as many have, that adding 2.5 million jobs was a poor use of government funds, or that the bill’s other features, which ranged from expanded COBRA health benefits for laid-off workers to money to forestall layoffs of teachers, firefighters, and police officers, helped many Americans to stay on their feet.  Stimulus opponents, often motivated by strictly ideological or political concerns, have repeatedly claimed that the bill didn’t create a single job that the economy wouldn’t have created anyway. This isn’t true, and it should be beyond the bounds of political debate to claim it.

NH – Concord Monitor – Stimulus program is easily justified:  Many people have come to believe that the money spent so far under the $787 billion federal stimulus program was wasted.  The truth is that things would have been much worse without the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.  The unemployment rate, currently down to 9.7 percent, would have been higher.  The president's Council of Economic Advisers says that it could have hit 11.2 percent if the spending hadn't created and, more notably, saved jobs. But direct job creation and preservation was only part of the stimulus package.  Some 40 percent of the money was used to cut taxes for workers. If that money was wasted, it wasn't wasted by Congress or Washington bureaucrats, but by people who got the extra money. But they didn't waste it, either. They spent it on things like food, gas and mortgage payments….  People are angry about the federal bailout of the financial industry, angry about the bailout of the auto industry, and angry about the money paid to or extorted by members of Congress in exchange for their support. But anger at the stimulus program is unjustified….  The stimulus program could have been better and should have been bigger. But it's doing a decent job of keeping the economy afloat until it can swim again and people employed who would otherwise need assistance.

NY- The Journal News - Recovery Act not a failure:  The law's "safety net" helped to feed, clothe, shelter, and provide medical care for millions who were furloughed, unemployed or otherwise blindsided by the Great Recession.  How the needy might have managed without such help is a human riddle seldom even acknowledged by so many of the stimulus law's critics, the most vociferous being congressional Republicans, who did not support the measure. They have made sport of mocking the recovery law, largely ignoring what it is supposed to help us recover from.  The recession began in December 2007 under President George W. Bush.  By the time Obama took the oath of office in January 2009, the economy had shed some 4.4 million jobs, a figure that ballooned to 6 million by the time the Recovery Act was signed in February 2009.  Mercifully, such bloodletting has slowed considerably in the time since.

NY - New York Times - Truth and Fiction on the Stimulus Bill: It was a pleasure to see President Obama come out swinging this week and win a round in the long-running fight with Republicans over the $787 billion stimulus bill. On Wednesday, the first anniversary of the signing of the package into law, Mr. Obama and other administration officials detailed the success of the stimulus while Republicans kept trying to label it a failure. Democrats did not shy from pointing out that many Republicans who voted against the stimulus then lobbied to get some of the money for their districts. (The Wall Street Journal assembled a particularly telling hall of shame by using the Freedom of Information Act to obtain letters written by more than a dozen Republican lawmakers to various government agencies, asking that stimulus money be awarded for job-creating projects in their districts.)  There is virtually no dispute among economists that the stimulus prevented a bad recession from becoming much worse. Among other things, it has preserved or created 1.6 million to 1.8 million jobs, according to various private sector analyses, and it is expected, ultimately, to add a total of roughly 2.5 million jobs.  But that hasn't stopped Republicans -- all but three of whom voted against the stimulus -- from claiming that it failed to create ''a single job.'' They also have called it a waste and socialism, when it is basically Economics 101 for how government should act in a deep recession. They also blame the stimulus for the widening budget deficit. Wrong again. Today's deficits are largely rooted in the profligate Bush years, with stimulus contributing little to the long-term shortfall because the spending is temporary.

PA - Lancaster Intelligencer Journal - Stimulus Payoff: "Americans will be spending the next few decades paying for a failed government experiment that provided zero relief" - Pennsylvania Republican Party.  Zero relief? Really?  Talk to the local construction firms that paved roads and repaired bridges in the past year. Without the stimulus, most of that work would not have been done.  Tell it to the 328 teenagers who got work in Lancaster County last summer or to the seven new Head Start employees who are working with pre-school children.  How about the $4 million Lancaster city received to upgrade sewer pumps and to address chronic sewage overflows? Without the funds, how does local government pay for upgrades mandated by Chesapeake Bay pollution regulations?  Or the $3.25 million that SouthEast Lancaster Health Services received to add 24 exam rooms and expand dental space. Anyone who has seen the lines of people seeking medical and dental attention at the clinic understands how necessary those services are.  Housing Development Corp. is using stimulus money to weatherize 750 homes. The Lancaster Housing Authority is replacing aging elevators and more than 300 windows at the Church and Farnum street highrises for the elderly.  Funds have been set aside to help pay the rents of those who have lost jobs or whose hours have been cut.  The list goes on and on….  But the stimulus' biggest accomplishment may have been that it pulled the nation back from the brink of economic disaster….  [T]o insist, as TV talk show host Glenn Beck did, that the stimulus "still hasn't done squat,'' ignores the positive impact it has had on the economy. Worse, it feeds a culture in Washington that has become so divisive that there is little room for compromise.  Taxpayers have a right to criticize specific stimulus allocations with which they disagree. And Congress has an obligation to ensure that funds are not wasted or used in a fraudulent manner.  But to suggest the stimulus has provided "zero relief'' is a fiction advanced by those whose ideology blinds them from the facts.

PA – Philadelphia Inquirer – How the stimulus rescued America:  Cut through all the numbers, though, and this is what you find: The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act saved us from plunging into a second Great Depression….  The Recovery Act brought the economy back from the brink.  And these figures probably underestimate its impact, because they don't take market psychology into account. When the legislation passed, the economy was plunging at a pace similar to that of the 1930s. If Congress had sat on its hands, unemployment now could easily be 12 percent to 15 percent - and on its way to 20 percent….  With the enactment of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act a year ago, Congress took the first major step toward bringing the economy back from the brink. And it worked.  Now we need our leaders to take additional steps to assure that the economy delivers for regular Pennsylvanians and Americans. Otherwise, unemployment will remain high for years to come.

PA – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - Real dollars: The stimulus program bolstered Pennsylvania: In case any Pennsylvanians are still skeptical about the economic stimulus package that came out of Washington last year, the evidence of its impact is writ large across the landscape.  The state Department of General Services reports that $11 billion was paid to state residents in tax benefits; $13.5 billion was routed through state agencies for highway construction, school improvement, clean energy and other projects; and the remainder went to local governments or federal programs that support universities, fix locks and dams, improve housing or help businesses.  All told, the dollars in Pennsylvania have translated into 12,000 jobs so far….  In the end, the first year of stimulus spending did not erase the nation's high jobless rate, although no one predicted that it would. More job creation efforts are necessary, but Pennsylvania and the nation would be in a deeper stew if this recovery program had not happened.

TN - Decatur Daily - Federal stimulus has worked as designed: Wednesday, President Barack Obama reminded a grumbling nation of those days and how the economy is gradually bouncing back. The rebound isn’t nearly as rapid as any of us would like, but as the president said, a depression is no longer a possibility. The president made the statement on the one-year anniversary of the $787 billion American Economic Recovery and Investment Act.  Millions of people are still out of work, as the president noted. He also emphasized that the recovery program wasn’t meant to put everyone back to work, but to stop the slide, build confidence and help people survive the hard times. The president is looking to the private sector to generate jobs and fuel the economy — not government — although it is giving work to 3.5 million. It is difficult to ask someone without a job to be patient, but the Great Depression lasted from 1929 to 1939 and the recovery was slow.

VA - The Roanoke Times - Stimulus act made the economy better:  According to a recent CBS News/New York Times poll, only 6 percent of Americans believe the federal stimulus package enacted a year ago last week created jobs. Do the math and that means that 94 percent of Americans are misinformed.  As New York Times economy columnist David Leonhardt wrote in a piece last week, there is no practical doubt that the stimulus created jobs and halted the free fall of the American economy last year: "Just look at the outside evaluations of the stimulus. Perhaps the best-known economic research firms are IHS Global Insight, Macroeconomic Advisers and Moody's Economy.com. They all estimate that the bill has added 1.6 million to 1.8 million jobs so far and that its ultimate impact will be roughly 2.5 million jobs. The Congressional Budget Office, an independent agency, considers these estimates to be conservative."  Yes, the economy is still bad. Unemployment is still high. Without the stimulus, though, experts agree it would have been far, far worse.  As Leonhardt wrote, "Saying that things could have been even worse doesn't exactly inspire. Liberals don't like the stimulus because they wish it were bigger. Republicans don't like it because it's a Democratic program."  As Congress prepares another stimulus bill (called a "jobs" bill, as he notes, since stimulus has become a dirty word), Leonhardt thinks it would make sense to study what worked about last year's bill and what did not.  That does make tremendous sense.  Unfortunately, even as Republicans beg for money from the bill for their states and districts, they continue to bad mouth it and claim that absolutely nothing about it has worked.  Republicans have staked their chances in November's mid-term elections on the continuation of economic misery. Some have even begun to raise some alarm that the economic recovery will be too strong for voters to ignore by the election.  Karl Rove, for instance, seemed in a recent appearance on Fox News to be setting up a fallback position: "The economy is stabilized compared to where it was a year ago, but is it because the government has spent $200 billion in the stimulus program? I don't think so."  How dedicated are Republicans to obstructing Democratic efforts to improve the economy and get Americans back to work? Senate Republicans appear willing to filibuster a $15 billion jobs bill that contains only provisions with which they've already announced agreement.  The economy is not in good shape. But it's getting better. And, clearly, it would have been far worse without the much-maligned stimulus bill.  The facts are clear, even if most of the American public can't seem to see them.

Liz Oxhorn is Recovery Act Communications Director

Stuart Hoffman, chief economist at PNC Bank: "The stimulus worked," said Stuart Hoffman, chief economist at PNC Bank. Without it, "the unemployment rate would probably be closer to 11 percent" and the economy might not have grown at all last year.” [ABC News, 2/18/10]

Economist Stephen Herzenberg: “Cut through all the numbers, though, and this is what you find: The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act saved us from plunging into a second Great Depression… The Recovery Act brought the economy back from the brink.  And these figures probably underestimate its impact, because they don't take market psychology into account. When the legislation passed, the economy was plunging at a pace similar to that of the 1930s. If Congress had sat on its hands, unemployment now could easily be 12 percent to 15 percent - and on its way to 20 percent.”  [Philadelphia Inquirer, 1/17/10]

Mark Zandi of Moody’s Economy.com: “The economy has shed some three million jobs over the past year, but it would have lost closer to five million without stimulus,” said Mark Zandi, who is currently advising Congressional Democrats but also advised Senator John McCain, the 2008 Republican presidential nominee. “The economy is still struggling, but it would have been much worse without stimulus.” [New York Times, 1/17/10]

Lawrence Mishel, President of the Economic Policy Institute: “If you go to the economic forecasters, who make their money doing this, they confirm that the -- you know, we have saved around two million jobs in the process.  If you look at what actually happened in the economy, in the beginning of 2009, we were losing 750,000 jobs a month. In the last three months, we were losing about 35,000. This wasn't by accident that we went from a deep, you know, decline in the economy to an actual growing economy…. And the administration's actually done something pretty marvelous of trying to actually track where all the money went, who got it, and how many jobs were created. And, if anything, they understate the amount of jobs being created. Yes, so, I think there's been a tremendous effort to actually document the impact of this.”  [PBS Newshour, 2/17/10]

Nariman Behravesh, chief economist of IHS/Global Insight: “It prevented things from getting much worse than they otherwise would have been,’ Nariman Behravesh, Global Insight’s chief economist, says. ‘I think everyone would have to acknowledge that’s a good thing.” [New York Times, 2/17/2010]

OMB Watch: “[T]he one thing that cannot be denied is that the Act has substantially advanced the cause of fiscal transparency.  We could complain that the transparency provisions of the Act are not perfect, but without the Act, we wouldn't even have anything to gripe about.  We'd still be stuck arguing whether timely recipient reporting is a feasible goal or not.  In this sense, the Recovery Act provided a convenient pilot program for fiscal transparency.  Now, one year later, the Act has not only proved that broad-based recipient reporting is feasible, it has shown that the reporting is useful.  By showing how multiple levels of recipients (although not all levels of sub-recipients) have used their federal funding, the Recovery Act has provided the government and its citizens an unprecedented ability to see where its money has gone.”  [OMBWatch.org, 2/17/10]

Associated General Contractors economist Ken Simonson: “’The stimulus is saving construction jobs, driving demand for new equipment and delivering better and more efficient infrastructure,’ said Ken Simonson, an economist with Associated General Contractors, which represents a large part of the construction industry.  Simonson calculated that roughly 15,000 jobs have been created or preserved for every $1 billion the government has spent on infrastructure projects, which is well above the association’s year-ago estimate of 9,700 jobs. He said that stimulus-funded road construction projects alone have created 280,000 jobs over the past year, as well as an unknown number of ancillary jobs for subcontractors supplying equipment and raw materials.”  [San Diego Union Tribune, 2/17/10]

Rhone Resch, President and CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association: “One year ago today, President Obama visited a solar installation to sign the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The purpose of the bill was to stimulate immediate job growth with a strong emphasis on clean energy technologies like solar. And that is exactly what happened. In 2009, the Recovery Act helped the solar industry create 18,000 new American jobs. More than 50 new solar energy manufacturing plants are under construction now with the support of ARRA.” [Solar Energy Industries Association, 2/17/10]

Michael Graetz, a former George H.W. Bush Treasury official: "’It was right 40 years ago, and it's right today, and it's nice that something good comes out of the stimulus,’ says Michael Graetz, a Columbia Law School tax professor who did a stint at Treasury in the George H. W. Bush years.  Today, beneath partisan gunfire and ideological clashes in Washington, one of the few things on which Democrats and Republicans in the Senate agree is that Build America Bonds should be made permanent.  It probably will be.”  [Wall Street Journal, 2/17/10]

Liz Oxhorn is Recovery Act Communications Director

Kitty Schaller, the head of MANNA Food Bank in Asheville, North Carolina says the Recovery Act has helped "provide for the most basic needs for people who are truly in need." "The economic stimulus package has helped us to provide for the most basic needs for people who are truly in need.” [CNN, 1/26/10]

Peter Wilf, a researcher at Penn State University, says his Recovery Act research grant is "stimulating the economy." “I want to mention this [funding] was not just for me, this is for 17 investigators and their students. It's not just for Penn State but many institutions. We are stimulating the economy. We have numerous people working under this grant. The money is circulating, a percentage of it, back into the US economy and we also feel that exciting science is good for the US economy. So, yes, I’m proud now that we are in this program.  I’m proud of it and I'm happy to wear the badge.” [CNN, 1/26/10

Mayor John Fetterman, of Braddock, PA says the Recovery Act has "helped a great deal" and is "very beneficial." “It has helped a great deal. We have got about $250,000 to upgrade our sewer system to be in compliance with the Environmental Protection Agency. And not sexy kind of things, or head-line grabbing but still necessary in a community like Braddock where we are having to raise taxes because of revenue loss. We also got a smaller grant that allowed us to hire 30 young people, very beneficial.” [CNN, 1/26/10]

Steven Kyle, an economics professor at Cornell University, says the Recovery Act is "stimulating the economy." “Sure it's stimulating the economy. That food is produced here in the United States. That stimulates the U.S. economy. Those farmers then end up with more money and they turn around and buy more equipment, hire more laborers, maybe they buy themselves a new caterpillar tractor. Who knows?” [CNN, 1/26/10]

Mayor Kasim Reed of Atlanta says "the stimulus definitely saved jobs"and helped "avert furloughs of teachers, firefighters and state patrolmen."  “The stimulus definitely saved jobs. Were it not for the stimulus, thousands of state employees ran the risk of being furloughed or laid off... I was in the state senate at the time and we had a large hole in our budget. Those stimulus dollars did help to avert furloughs of teachers, firefighters and state patrolmen.” [CNN, 1/26/10]

Mayor Phil Gordon, of Phoenix, says that because of the Recovery Act, "thousands of people are going back to work." "The picture in Phoenix, Arizona, is clear: Because of ARRA, key projects are under way, our environment is improving -- and thousands of people are going back to work." [CNN.com, 1/25/10]

James Ceaton, a construction worker from Phoenix, said he "would still be out of a job" if it weren't for the Recovery Act. "Without the stimulus I would still be out of a job." [CNN.com, 1/25/10]

Jeanne Simons, a seventh- and eighth-grade teacher in Phoenix, AZ says without the Recovery Act, she would have lost her teaching position. "Last year, she was told that if ARRA funds were not approved, she would lose her teaching position. If her position had been eliminated, the remaining teachers would have faced class sizes of between 40 and 50 students -- a daunting task for any educator to face.” [CNN.com, 1/25/10]

Liz Oxhorn is Recovery Act Communications Director

Michael Johnson of Orlando, FL said the Recovery Act's Homelessness Prevention and Rapid Re-housing Program is “truly is an impactful program.” “This truly is an impactful program. That my kids could wake up in their own rooms on Christmas morning and walk out to the Christmas tree. I mean we never thought we’d have a place to put a Christmas tree.” [CNN, 1/25/10]

Bobby Jones, a general foreman from Aiken, SC said the Recovery Act is "keeping [him] employed.” “I'm working on the DUO project (depleted uranium oxide), I was in D&D (deactivation and decommissioning) and I moved over here [to DOE’s Savannah River Site] in October. They needed someone to run the night shift so I came over. It's still stimulus funded and it's keeping me employed.” [CNNMoney.com, 1/25/10]

Wellington Hall a traffic engineer from Providence, RI said “none of this would be possible without the stimulus and I’m very grateful for that.” “I just got assigned as a project manager of a highway safety improvement project -- the goal is to identify intersections with high crash rates and work with consultants to mitigate accidents and make them safer. It feels good to know that these are some of the roads I drive on and that my coworkers and friends drive on. It feels good to know I'm making an impact. Right now I'm working on other things too, like using renewable energy to save on electrical costs. There are always things to keep me busy. This job has definitely helped me. I bought a house in august with my fiancé, got engaged in November and graduated last week. None of this would be possible without the stimulus and I'm very grateful for that. We're planning on getting married sometime in 2011.” [CNNMoney.com, 1/25/10]

Officer Patrick Dunn of Englewood, CO said that “If it wasn’t for the stimulus I probably wouldn’t have been hired.” “If it wasn’t for the stimulus, I probably wouldn’t have been hired. We had one income. My wife has been supporting the whole income. We have three kids. I have a 6, 5 1/2-year-old daughter and 20-month-old twins. There was a lot of pressure put on her.” [CNN, 1/25/10]

Officer Eddie Blackwell of Englewood, CO says the Recovery Act “gave [him] a golden opportunity to become a police officer.” “The stimulus package opened the opportunity, gave me a golden opportunity to become a police officer. I jumped on it.” [CNN, 1/25/10]

Chief Tom Vandermee of Englewood, CO believes the Recovery Act “has been extremely rewarding for [his] community.” “Our slice of this stimulus package, I can tell you, has been extremely rewarding for this community.” [CNN, 1/25/10]

Troy Cooper, an electrician from Coatesville, PA says the Recovery Act is “definitely going to help” him re-hire workers he was forced to lay off last year. “What we're doing has some of the incentive money built into it, so I say, yeah it's definitely going to help. Hopefully within the next month or so I'll be able to start bringing people back on from layoff.” [CNN, 1/25/10]

Richard Bennett an Iraq War veteran and the President Fidelias Design and Construction from Coatesville, PA says the opportunity he now has because of the Recovery Act “feels amazing, almost surreal.” “Now I'm president of a multimillion dollar construction company. It feels amazing, almost surreal.” [CNN, 1/25/10]

Patricia Dunn, a nurse practitioner from Mount Kisco, NY says the Recovery Act “made it possible for [her] to have this job.” “I had wanted to work for this organization six months prior to being offered my current position. They had a part-time opening but I needed full-time. When the [stimulus] funding came through, they offered me a position. Without a doubt, the funding made it possible for me to have this job. We've also, through stimulus, been able to hire more employees and that's great. The organization has hired several new physicians who started a few months ago.” [CNNMoney.com, 1/25/10]

Valatisha Jacinto, a school teacher from Waco, TX, “never thought anything that good would ever happen to her” before she was able to buy a house with an $8,000 Recovery Act tax credit through the first-time homebuyers program. "Thanks to the $8,000 tax credit for first-time homebuyers, in March, Valatisha bought a three-bedroom, two-bath home for $105,000. She took out a 4.9% FHA-insured 30-year loan, putting her monthly expenses, including property taxes and insurance, at just $830. She says, 'I never thought anything that good would happen to me.'" [CNNMoney.com, 1/25/10]

Rob Logan from Ypsilanti, MI “wouldn’t have been able to afford [his] house” without the Recovery Act.

Rob bought his Ypsilanti, Mich., house for $71,000 in October because of the $8,000 tax credit for first-time homebuyers. "I wouldn't have been able to afford my house without it. It was one of the main reasons I started looking." [CNNMoney.com, 1/25/10]

Chris Saliture from St. Paul, MN says the Recovery Act is “what got [him] started” looking for a house. "For Chris, the $8,000 tax credit for first-time homebuyers credit was vital. 'That's what got me started. I knew the incentive program was going on. I may still have looked, but this had an impact on what I could afford." [CNNMoney.com, 1/25/10]

Liz Oxhorn is Recovery Act Communications Director

But CNN recently decided to find out for themselves – and the verdict couldn’t be more clear:

“But we took a closer look at the Senators’ top ten examples of so-called waste, we found nine of the ten did not tell the whole story and in some cases were inaccurate.”  [CNN, 1/25/10]

You may recall the Senators’ claim at the time that: “The tranquil hamlet of Bainbridge Island, Washington, received $190,000 to upgrade a patrol boat for which it has little need—while it considers downsizing its police force.” [McCain/Coburn Stimulus Checkup, 12/8/10] 

• Not true, Lt. Bob Day of the Bainbridge Island Police Department told CNN: 
  • “There's some technology we'll be getting with this grant that is going to be able to help us better protect the port and to share information with port security partners.”  [Lt. Bob Day, CNN, 1/25/10]
• In fact, Lt. Day questions whether the two Senators understand security priorities:
  • “Unless Senators Coburn and McCain think that homeland defense and port security is something that really isn't important and it isn't a priority, I would take exception with their estimate on that.”  [Lt. Bob Day, CNN, 1/25/10]
• And notes the purchase supports jobs:
  • “The vendors we’re working with, it's keeping their people employed.”  [Lt. Bob Day, CNN, 1/25/10]
• CNN’s verdict?
  • “[T]hey called the upgrade to this boat unnecessary in a small town they call a tranquil hamlet. But more than 6 million passengers travel each year on the ferry between Bainbridge island and Seattle.  City officials say the ferry system is a high risk security target and the stimulus money a valid investment. The Department of Homeland Security agrees.” [CNN, 1/25/10]

And then there was the Senators’ claim that: An “almost empty mall” was awarded an energy grant to install a geothermal heating and cooling system. [McCain/Coburn Stimulus Checkup, 12/8/10]

• Not true, developer Dave Thrash told CNN - the mall already has three department stores committed to the new project:
  • “We're not going to heat an empty mall. We're developing the property into a modern open-air center, and the goal is to deploy this technology into the commercial space.”  [Dave Thrash, CNN, 1/25/10]
• In fact, the project will create more than 200 jobs and cut costs the Department of Energy’s Matt Rogers notes:
  • “Jobs, cost and innovation. What made us excited were the ability to create more than 200 jobs for just the construction of this project…. And in the particular technology that they are using here is an innovative approach to ground source heat pumps that actually makes the capital cost lower.”  [Matt Rogers, CNN, 1/25/10]

If this were the first time the Senators had released a report on the Recovery Act that had more holes than a block of Swiss cheese, it might be easier to consider this a simple case of confusion.  But we aren’t talking about a great track record with accuracy here.  The last time the Senators went through this exercise, more than half of the items in that report turned out to be false or misleading claims as well – while other projects attacked included medical research to help hearing impaired children, and a state of the art project to create jobs in advanced technology.

While this may have been an entertaining exercise for the two Senators, the underlying issues here could not be more serious.  Last year, we faced the greatest economic crisis since the Great Depression – and while others, including the two Senators, would have preferred to do nothing, we chose to act through the Recovery Act and other economic rescue efforts.  Nearly a year later, the evidence is now undeniable that the Recovery Act is working to create jobs and drive economic growth across the country.  In fact,  the CBO now says the Recovery Act is responsible for as many as 2.4 million jobs through projects like these:

• In Oklahoma, the Recovery Act is helping build new flood-control dams and repair old, unsafe, and obsolete dams across the state – a move that not only creates jobs, but saves taxpayer dollars usually spent cleaning up floods. 
• In Arizona, a local company is putting $99 million in Recovery funds, which were matched by an equal amount of private capital, to launch the largest deployment of electric vehicles and charging infrastructure in U.S. history – an effort the company says will create an additional 750 position across multiple states. 

The question is not whether the Recovery Act is money well-spent.  Everyone from independent economists and the CBO to Republican and Democratic governors and workers across the country on the job at Recovery projects says that it is.  The question is whether critics like the two Senators will finally admit that they were wrong to oppose this vital job-creating legislation - and that it’s working in Arizona, Oklahoma and across the country.

Liz Oxhorn is Recovery Act Communications Director

Three months ago, the critics denied that the Recovery Act was making any jobs.  Today, everyone – including the critics - can see those jobs for themselves on Recovery.gov.  Now that the evidence has proven them wrong, they are left to cast doubts about just how many jobs were made and where.  But for all of the attempts to distract and distort from the program’s progress, these reports – directly from the recipients of Recovery Act dollars - make one thing indisputably clear: the Recovery Act is now responsible for supporting at least one million jobs across the country. 

It’s time to keep the critics honest.  Here are some of the misleading things you may have been hearing about how we are tracking our progress supporting jobs through the Recovery Act – and the truth behind them:

FICTION: The reports recipients of Recovery Act funds filed are riddled with errors.
FACT: More than 130,000 reports were collected from recipients who were required to fill out 99 different data fields – that's over 12 million pieces of information collected directly from those putting the funds to work.  Much has been made of incorrectly coded Congressional Districts, but that issue – which the Recovery Board has already fixed – affected about 1 percent of reports.  And other potential over or under-counts of jobs you may have seen highlighted in the media amount to less than 5 percent of all reports.

FICTION: The Administration is misleading people about where Recovery Act money is going.
FACT: The reports you see on Recovery.gov were filed by over 130,000 recipients of Recovery Act dollars and they were responsible for inputting the information – including their Congressional District.  We don’t expect that these recipients – many of which are small community organizations or businesses - will do this perfectly the first time out of the gate, but we do take our role reviewing the reports very seriously and continue to work with the recipients to improve the accuracy of their reports.  The fact is, though, that the errors you are seeing are simply typos or basic human error.

FICTION: The jobs that were listed in non-existent Congressional Districts were not real.
FACT: The jobs and related projects listed are legitimate – they were just coded in the wrong Congressional District.  The Recovery Board moved quickly to correct the coding and posting error – but before that happened, the public was still able to click through to find the address of the recipient and confirm their correct Congressional District on their own.

FICTION: The Administration has failed to meet expectations it set for the quality of data it would collect.
FACT: From the beginning, even before the data was collected, Administration officials said repeatedly that they did not expect the initial reports to be perfect, but certainly expected them to provide an unprecedented and largely accurate look at the Recovery Act at work – and they do.  We will continue to collect this information every three months and we expect the data we collect to get sharper and more precise each time we do it.

FICTION: These errors mean that none of the reports and related jobs numbers can be trusted.
FACT: Overall, less than 5 percent of the reports have been identified as potential over or under-counts of jobs.  That is a lower possible revision rate than most long-standing, widely-accepted government economic indicators.  Take for example:

• Payroll Employment, 2008: Original Average Monthly Decline – 157,000, Revised Average Monthly Decline –230,000, 46 percent lower than original

Independent economist Mark Zandi said it best:

• "Well, these numbers are [verified]. The 600,000-plus estimates from the administration come from recipients of the stimulus aid. And, so, we know for sure that these jobs are for real.  Now, of course, it doesn't count all of the other jobs created by the tax cuts and other elements of the stimulus. That is much more difficult to count, at least directly. But the 600,000-plus, that's numbers that are counted directly and accurate...  All of the statistics that we get on the economy that the government collects are based on surveys and samples, similar to the one that was conducted here. So, I think they are using the same approaches and techniques in constructing these estimates then -- that we use for constructing all kinds of estimates to try to get a gauge of where the economy is."  [Newshour, 10/30/09]

FICTION:  The jobs numbers are already lower than expected – and this lack of credibility just makes the case for the job impact of the Recovery Act even weaker.
FACT:  In fact, economists say that, because the reports cover less than half of the money put to work so far and only direct jobs, they point to a job impact of at least double what was reported.  So even if reports totaled only 500,000 jobs – not the over 600,000 reported – it would still confirm Administration and independent estimates of over 1 million jobs. 
But don’t take our word for it.  Here is what economist John Irons, who is testifying before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Recovery Act jobs today, had to say:

• "New data from recipients of grants, loans, and contracts made under the Recovery Act count about 650,000 new jobs created or retained to date, one of the strongest signs yet that the Recovery Act has led to significant job creation. The data, which reflect a fraction of all the Recovery Act investments made to date, are consistent with other estimates of jobs creation showing that between 1.1 and 1.5 million jobs have been created or preserved as a result of the stimulus package to date. It follows recent news that the economy as a whole grew by a 3.5% annual rate in the third quarter, another indication that the Recovery Act has provided a much needed spark to the economy."  [Economic Policy Institute, 10/30/09]

FICTION: The Administration already had to remove 60,000 inaccurate jobs from the website – who knows what other inaccurate items they’ve posted that should come down.
FACT: The Administration worked with the Recovery Board to have 60,000 over-counted jobs removed from the list before it was ever posted on Recovery.gov in order to dramatically increase accuracy pre-posting.  Items flagged as possible over or under reports since the data was posted on Recovery.gov are a fraction of this size, indicating the vast majority of errors were caught before then.

Liz Oxhorn is Recovery Act Communications Director