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Strategies & Market Trends : The Residential Real Estate Crash Index -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Les H who wrote (172612)	12/19/2008 1:54:52 PM
From: Les H	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 306849

The $850 billion figure is also meeting resistance from House Democrats, who say anything beyond the $600 billion House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has mentioned would probably lose votes among fiscally conservative Democrats known as Blue Dogs. Concerns about the political viability of the package are compounded by fears that its economic effectiveness could be diluted. Rivlin said she would prefer quick approval of a much smaller package that contains only items that would rapidly push cash into the economy, such as aid to states and the poor and perhaps a payroll tax holiday. That could be followed, she said, by a larger spending package with investments thoughtfully crafted to achieve Obama's broader economic goals. "Mass transit, the high-tech stuff, investment in health IT. Those are all good ideas. But they aren't stimulus," Rivlin said. Simon Johnson, an economist at MIT, said he shares Rivlin's concern that such a huge pot of money would probably be misspent. "My personal opinion is you can spend $450 billion quite sensibly," Simon said. "But if you start raising it up, you have to ask whether you're getting good value for the money." madison.com