Monday, February 16, 2009

Assignment #3 JPernick

This article was written by Madison Powers, a CQ Guest columnist, and appeared in the "CQ Politics". Madison wrote this article to let the American people know about the trade-offs that need to be done in order to pass the new stimulus plan. His audience is the American people as well as anyone else concerned with the United States' fate.

The author mentions two trade-offs that need to take place in order for this plan to go through. First he mentions the equity-efficiency trade-off. This basically means that it is the goal to spend 1 trillion dollars in order to boost the economy and create new jobs. This seems like a good idea, but many are questioning this because some think that the American people cannot afford to stay afloat. In these hard economic times, America might not be able to afford equity.

The author also mentions that we need to fix our infrastructure. An equal balance of money needs to be spent in order to create jobs, but money also needs to be spent elsewhere in order to keep the economy flowing. Some believe that putting money into new projects will not support the economy efficiently. Why build new projects when we need to fix so many ongoing problems already?

Either way, no matter what we do, we have a real problem on our hands. Would this stimulus really be enough to boost the economy, or would it just be a waste of 1 trillion dollars? this is going to take time and a lot of debating to decide what is best for the country. the best thing is to be aware of the current political events going on, so that we can be aware of what ever decision is made.