Washington DC Wins: Whipping North Carolina in Stimulus Jobs Chase
Updated November 1, 2009
Let’s say that despite all you’ve heard about erroneous stimulus jobs reporting in recent weeks, you still buy the argument that the stimulus is “creating & saving” jobs. How are private North Carolina businesses – and the unemployed – faring under the program?
According to a review of the data by the Washington Post, Washington DC (population 591,000) is soundly whipping the entire state of North Carolina (population 9.2 million) in the race for stimulus jobs, primarily jobs aimed at growing government. Federal contractors in DC have “created or saved” 370 jobs by spending stimulus money while federal contractors in North Carolina have “created or saved” only 301 jobs.
As the government town’s newspaper crowed, “the reports suggest that the stimulus money is providing a particular boost for metropolitan Washington, even though the recession has less impact here than elsewhere … and the District is ahead of big states such as Michigan, North Carolina and New Jersey.”
In fact, Maryland, a state forty percent smaller than North Carolina, has won over three times as many jobs.
Government Wins
So what inference can we draw? Government is the big winner in the stimulus game. The Washington Post explained that “a large share of the contracts are from the General Services Administration, which has $5.5 billion in stimulus funding to spend on federal buildings, as much as a third of which will probably be spent on buildings in the Washington region.” For example, large pots of cash have been awarded to construction firms working on the headquarters of the Commerce Department, Veterans Administration, Interior Department, Coast Guard, and Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
Moreover, Washington is counting – in jobs – the spending by departments to get stimulus initiatives up and running. “Even in cases where another region is involved, the management and oversight work is often concentrated in Washington, resulting in new hires at federal departments or by the organizations and contractors clustered around the capital.”
We can also examine the inefficiency of government in directing the economy. According to October’s reporting, federal contractors nationally, which have been awarded $16 billion so far, have actually collected $2.2 billion in stimulus money to date, "creating" 30,000 jobs. That equates to $71,000 for each job, according to CNN. Of course, $71,000/job is a measure of economic inefficiency.
There are other needs however – like political payback. For example, a battery company where General Electric Corporation has a $190 million investment is slated to get $600 million from the stimulus. While it may seem a quaint notion to wonder about conflict of interest, isn’t it a glaring one for NBC News – the most Obama-friendly network with 73% positive coverage according to George Mason University’s nonpartisan Center for Media and Public Affairs – when their corporate parent GE is drooling over stimulus bucks?
State Government Wins
The Perdue administration says that 28,073 jobs have been “created or saved” in North Carolina by virtue of stimulus spending, but neither recovery.gov nor ncrecovery.gov breaks down how many of those jobs are going to government workers and how many are creating jobs within the private sector. But even the most determined study of stimulus spending by project type indicates that most of the jobs being “created or saved” appear to be government jobs, with more than 90-percent coming through two main channels: education spending on teachers & other school personnel; and spending to help keep the Medicaid program running.
In North Carolina, the Employment Security Commission counts actual jobs. Since the stimulus passed; the NCESC shows an increase of 4600 jobs for federal, state and local government in North Carolina, while the private sector has lost 14,000 jobs – and unemployment continues to soar above the national average.
Obama Changes Language
Is the stimulus working? Well, consider this. A few weeks ago, Vice President Biden declared the $787 billion spending bill is "doing more, faster, more efficiently, and more effectively than most expected." And perhaps that's true – for government workers.
But North Carolina was promised 105,000 jobs because of the stimulus. Even if we accept claims the stimulus has created or saved 28,000+ jobs, we’re eighty thousand short – and given the evidence, it’s becoming harder and harder to feel good about the mounting debt being created, especially since it seems to be growing government, rather than for the creation of a healthy private sector.
New York Times reporter John Harwood says that a proposal for a second stimulus package won’t be called a “stimulus, but rather, it will be called a “job creation” package. Harwood told CNBC that the administration believes that the word “stimulus” been discredited.
Enough said.
