Trading Stimulus
Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal came in for criticism here at Vox Nova a few weeks back when he announced that Louisiana would not be taking a portion of the federal stimulus funding earmarked for increased unemployment benefits (since this announcement, the governors of several other states have made similar statements). I don’t think the actions of the governors in this regard are particularly noble (you’ll note that they didn’t reject all stimulus funds, but only this one little bit). Nevertheless, I thought some of the criticism of Jindal on this score was misdirected. The money rejected by Jindal doesn’t just disappear. The money is still there, and can still be used to provide relief in other states. Louisiana’s unemployment rate is currently significantly below the national average, and if Louisiana’s rejection means that more funds are freed up for harder hit areas, that would seem to be all to the good.
Similarly, Mother Jones reported on Tuesday that cities in Los Angeles County were selling the stimulus funds earmarked for their cities, in some cases at a significant discount. It seems that, out of some misguided sense of fairness, the government had allocated some funds to every city in the area, regardless of whether a particularly municipality would even be able to use the funds. After the story broke, the Los Angeles County MTA canceled the swaps.
In both cases, what we have is the belief that stimulus funding is best allocated based on political clout and/or the whims of a central authority, rather than having local self-evaluations of need play a role.
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As far as I can tell, Jindal’s assertion was correct that a permanent change in Louisiana law was required to accept the funding for unemployment benefits. Some critics of Jindal had asserted that the law could be changed to provide more generous benefits while the federal funding was coming in, and then changed back when the funds dried up. But as far as I can tell, Jindal was correct that the change had to be permanent, and Louisiana would eventually have to find its own money to pay for those expanded benefits.
There are still arguments to be made that Jindal should have accepted the money, but the actual facts make the argument against Jindal’s position considerably more difficult.
Likewise, saying the repeal of the Mexico City Policy means the United States is providing funding for abortions in foreign countries, or the rescinding of Bush’s executive order on stem-cell research means the United States will be directly funding the killing of embryos, makes it easier to criticize Obama than sticking to the facts, although of course he is still open to criticism for those two changes.
So whether it’s Jindal or Obama, if we acknowledge the actual facts, the easy criticisms sometimes have to be more complex arguments, and sometimes — heaven forbid! — we may have to admit that the person we love to criticize has actually done something right. The human mind is constructed in such a way, however, that this rarely happens.
But as far as I can tell, Jindal was correct that the change had to be permanent, and Louisiana would eventually have to find its own money to pay for those expanded benefits.
David,
Do you have any sources for that? I’ve heard the same thing, but I’ve never read a good explanation for why that is.