Art Laffer and the Effect of Government Stimulus on Jobs and Investment…

August 10th, 2012 | Posted by George Ford in Federal Budget | Federal Deficit | Jobs | Law and Economics | Regulatory Reform | Stimulus - (Comments Off)

This week, noted economist Arthur Laffer wrote an interesting piece in the Wall Street Journal entitled The Real “Stimulus” Record.  In this piece, Dr. Laffer argues that before policymakers in Washington again try yet another round of stimulus spending in an ostensible attempt to mitigate high unemployment and poor growth rates, they should remember that President Obama’s first stimulus package did not exactly meet with great success.  As support for his argument, Dr. Laffer cites the facts that while stimulus spending over the past five years totaled more than $4 trillion, increasing  U.S. Federal government spending from 21.4% to 27.3% of GDP over the 2007 …
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More Evidence on the Failure of Government “Stimulus”…

March 13th, 2012 | Posted by Larry Spiwak in Employment | Federal Budget | Federal Deficit | Law and Economics | Regulatory Reform | Stimulus - (Comments Off)

Last week, there was sad story in the Washington Times reporting that the District of Columbia has received more than $855 million in federal economic stimulus funds since 2009, but that this spending had not been shown to produce any significant improvement in the city’s jobs outlook.  As a third-generation Washingtonian, it would be easy for me to blame the failure of federal stimulus to actually do any stimulating on the congenital dysfunction of the D.C. Government.  Instead, I think the lesson learned here is that despite its intentions, government stimulus just isn’t that helpful in creating new private sector jobs regardless of geographic location. …
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Thoughts About Today’s Oversight Hearing on the FCC’s Budget and Spending…

February 16th, 2012 | Posted by Larry Spiwak in "Cost Per Regulator" | Federal Budget | Federal Communications Commission | Federal Deficit | Jobs | Regulation | Regulatory Reform - (Comments Off)

Earlier today, the Subcommittee on Communications and Technology of the House Energy and Commerce Committee held an oversight hearing on entitled “The Budget and Spending of the Federal Communications Commission.”  Given the growing size of the federal bureaucracy, conducting this sort of oversight is indeed welcome news. In his opening statement, Committee Chairman Greg Walden noted that “Last year, the FCC was given a budget of $424.8 million, and the FCC has reported that it can maintain current services with a budget of $421.2 million.  Although that’s less than a one percent decrease, it’s a start, and I appreciate the work of the FCC to …
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