The Congress seeks a stimulus package.

I hadn't heard anything about this. I know Obama has some sort of pandering notion of sending out some additional tax rebates come June 2009. But the Congress?

Is it true? Has anybody got a link?

Maybe some kind of public program, with the government employing people to work on public infrastructure projects?
That would have the added benefit of preventing highway, rail, and other public infrastructure from falling apart, as the ASCE suggests we're in danger of.(see I-85, MN)
Then, it's not a handout!

You'd think someone would have tried something like that in the past.

11%? Newest figures show 6.1% unemployment (of those looking for work). Of these over 5.5% have been unemployed for the last year so we can assume they have already lost their home or they don't own one anyway. This shows us an increase of .6% in unemployment. There are just over 300,000,000 Americans. 50% of our nation is under the age of 18 and not breadwinners who support a home. 60% of American Families do own their own home. 80% of the homeowners are married to a spouse who works, this means an increase of 27,000 homes on the market in which there is no-one person to make a house payment. If one where to assume that 30% of Americans have their home paid for the number shrinks to 18,900 homes that may face foreclosure. According to the last census there are 18,443 towns in the USA. So we basically have an increase of 1 more house on the market per town. Not much of an impact.

The Levy Institute has done pretty well at making medium term economic projections. They looked at the fiscal stimulus issue back in April.

Fiscal Stimulus Policy
Analysis

Their summary statement was:

"As the government prepares to dispense the tax rebates that largely make up its recently approved $168 billion stimulus package, President Dimitri B. Papadimitriou and Research Scholars Greg Hannsgen and Gennaro Zezza explore the possibility of an additional fiscal stimulus of about $450 billion spread over three quarters—challenging the notion that a larger and more prolonged additional stimulus is unnecessary and will generate inflationary pressures. They find that, given current projections of even a moderate recession, a fiscal stimulus totaling $600 billion would not be too much. They also find that a temporary stimulus—even one lasting four quarters—will have only a temporary effect. An enduring recovery will depend on a prolonged increase in exports, the authors say, due to the weak dollar, a modest increase in imports, and the closing of the current account gap."

Total GSE holdings are $5.3 trillion, not 1.6.

The problems with our economy are artificial. Very similar to the Great Depression. Then we had ample resources, and millions of workers willing to use those resources to make goods and services for a robust economy. The problem was MONEY. Money is only a medium of exchange. Our goods and services could not be exchanged, because the medium had been cornered by the elite. Look at the old cartoons of bankers during the '30's. They were despised. It is like a monopoly game. After awhile, one player in monopoly will monopolize the money and the resources to earn money. The game will soon shut down. In monopoly, we start the game over. We need to do that now with our economy. Confiscate the money grabed by the theives who have not really earned it (hedge funds,etc.)and use it to decrease/eliminate private and public debt. If that sounds radical, it is. It would also work. A real economic problem is when there is drought, or war or disease has killed off much of the work force, or severe natural disasters, etc. We are experiencing a man-made problem that could be solved with man-made solutions.

We keep sending jobs to every place around the globe that has lesser cost of production.

This is really dumb. Every time I hear someone say that labor costs in the U.S. are too high or uncompetitve I want to puke. The cost of labor in the U.S. is simply a reflection of the cost of living in the U.S. The same applies to the cost of energy and everything else that is required to manufacture a product. All the executives of corporations that send manufacturing elsewhere are worried only about their bottom line. They don't think for a second what happens when Americans lose jobs. People without money can't buy products at any price.

In the end it is just plain dumb to pit the American work force against that of China or Taiwan or Indonesia. Look at the standard of living in those areas and it become immediately apparent why there is a differential. Corporate executives who complain about this are basically saying they don't like America becasue it is too expensive to live here. Dumb bastards.

Shooter & OldSarg you are each wrong when you say that those who disagree with you need a course in economics. I have had the economic courses you are referring to, and so have most who post here. What you are not acknowledging is that there are other ways to look at the grand theory of economics. The predominate view in the United States at present is the so-called "Chicago School", ie, a reference to the Economic Theories of the University of Chicago. President Bush, and many of his advisors assume that the Chicago School's theories are "facts." They aren't. There are more ways to run a country and more ways to have a robust economy than to let the Robber Barrons run unfettered. The Chicago School running unfettered is close to what we have had the past 30 years. Do we not see the ultimate results? This economy will continue to decline unless we reign in the outsourcing to other countries and, somehow, eliminate the massive debt that has built up. What is debt, afterall? It is only a piece of paper that documents that one party owes money to another party. We now have a situation where a small group of the elite own massive amounts of debt owed by the rest. I know, you can argue that our "pension funds, etc. own this debt. ie, that the average man owns his own debt." That is nonsense. The wealthy one percent pretty much own it all now. We need to tear up their pieces of paper. We need to confiscate and eradicate much of the debt and outlaw most outsourcing. Incidentally, I have zero debt.

I've always thought it odd that the government recently handing out (unearned) money to us to 'stimulate' the economy raised no Republican screeds. But if the government were to create programs to put people to work, the end product being a stimulus to the economy, Republicans would have gone ballistic. Queer, to say the least.

"The ideal stimulus would involve battery clamps, an electric source, and Bush administration officials."

All you would need is a rope.