Here's who will benefit from stimulus

[jefferson_dem]

This bill looks really really good, folks. :thumbsup:

Here's who will benefit from stimulus
Posted February 12, 2009 7:10 AM

by Noam N. Levey

First-time home-buyers would get a larger tax break. Laid-off workers would receive higher unemployment benefits and new subsidies for heath insurance.

And all but the wealthiest workers would soon get a tax credit worth as much as $800 per couple.

Bigger government checks -- long favored by lawmakers in an ailing economy -- could soon begin landing in mailboxes across the country, and new tax breaks would be available to many families, if the economic stimulus package clears Congress this week.

The $789-billion compromise worked out by House and Senate negotiators Wednesday contains a long list of new ways that Americans can get money from Washington as they struggle through the worsening recession.

Below are some provisions of the bill, which must still be approved by the House and Senate before being sent to President Obama for his signature.

Taxpayers

For most Americans, aid would show up most directly in a simple tax credit.

Workers making less than $75,000 a year would get a $400 credit for 2009 and 2010. Couples making up to $150,000 would get $800.

Higher-income taxpayers would see smaller credits. Individuals making more than $100,000 a year and couples making more than $200,000 would not get the credit.

<SNIP>

http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2009/02/heres_who_will_benefit_from_st.html

[MadHound]

1. And once again, schools lose

Sorry, I find it hard to be enthusiastic when schools and states are taking the brunt of the beating in this bill. Hell, the conference committee cut out nearly fifty billion from the Senate bill, what, that wasn't bare bones enough?

Cutting out good stimulus money, especially to help out our schools, when it isn't needed doesn't seem like the smart or right thing to do. It's just the same attitude I see all the time, this country shits and shits on schools, and then when surprise!, our schools are underperforming, it's the fault of the schools, the teachers, anybody, everybody except all those fucking idiots who refused to fund the schools.

That's OK, we'll keep plugging along, we're used to working for peanuts, in substandard facilities, dealing with outrageous requirements. After all, this is nothing new, just more of the same old shit.

[iamjoy]

3. Not Just Schools

Yeah, I don't want a paltry $400 (or $800 with my husband). We're doing okay for now, thankfully. We both have work and mine has health insurance. I'm worried about losing my job and my future, who couldn't be in these times, but right now, we're hanging in there.

I'm upset that schools aren't funded. If we don't invest in our future, we are not going to regain our status as a world leader.

Trying to nudge us out of the recession by blindly throwing money around is not going to help us long term. They tried that twice in the past eight years. It gave us a temporary blip and now look at where we are. We need to invest in education so that our children grow up prepared to compete in the changing world. We need to improve our roads and bridges and invest in public transportation. These investments will create jobs, and create them here in America. Give Americans money, previously we spent it on stuff made overseas. However, consumer confidence being what it is (nearly non-existent) most people now would just save it. That's good behavior, but it's not going to stimulate the economy.

Invest in schools and infrastructure - you'll create jobs now and in twenty years we'll have something to show for it. Give Americans $400 now and what will you have in 20 years?

[MadHound]

4. Hear Hear! I would gladly give my 400 dollars up for increased school funding

Instead, I'll probably use it to buy school supplies and such like stuff for my students who are in need.

[jefferson_dem]

5. This write-up only addresses direct benefits to Americans and not infrastructure funding...

or "job creation" projects.

Of course, some of the education dollars were stripped out of this bill. We need to fix that ... in follow0up legislation if not in this bill.

[MadHound]

7. Ah yes, that always popular "followup legislation"

We've been promised "followup legislation" for years and decades now, yet are schools continue to decay into decrepitude, teacher's salaries continue to lag behind where they need to be, simple basics like supplies and up to date books go unpurchased, on and on. The only thing that increases when it comes to education are the demands to meet unreasonable standards, the amount of work put on the shoulders of teachers and school personel, and the complaints because our schools are failing to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear.

School projects are a great, and truly needed way of stimulating America. It would provide jobs and is an investment in our future.

Instead, once again schools are left hold one more IOU that they'll never be able to collect on.

[jefferson_dem]

10. I share your frustration.

n/t

[CTyankee]

18. Well, yes, when repubs were in control, you are right. But now we have a different ball game.

Why don't you give Obama a chance to follow up? I really don't believe he is your, or my, enemy. And besides, this bill contains lots of money for states and that money will preserve teachers' jobs in the immediate future, surely a good thing.

We got so beat down during the Bush years we find it hard to trust anymore. We've got to come out of our protective crouch and be hopeful...just despairing does not help us and doesn't get us more money for education, either.

Take heart. Obama is with you...

[MadHound]

25. Frankly given the track record of both 'Pugs and Dems regarding education

I have very little hope regarding this or any other administration. About the best that I'm hoping for is that Obama slows down the bleeding, but I seriously doubt he'll stop it. Furthermore his insistence on "reforming" NCLB, rather than doing the right thing and getting rid of it completely doesn't give me great cause for hope. Neither does the appointment of Duncan, a man who is pushing a "private/public" model of schools, give me much cause for celebration.

Sorry, but when it comes to education my cynicism is grounded in reality, and frankly Obama is going to have to prove it to me, I'm not giving him the benefit of the doubt. When it comes to education, nobody is "with me", at least nobody in government. Hope is all well and good, but hope doesn't repair and modernize schools, raise pay for teachers, and provide the best education for our children. And apparently hope isn't going to restore the education money that was hacked out of this stimulus. Given that the states also lost out badly on this stimulus, to the tune of 35 billion dollars, just how many teaching jobs are going to be saved? Yeah, not many.

Obama blew this chance, and we'll see if he follows up. If he does, all fine and good. But given the track record of most politicians, I doubt that much, if any follow up is going to be forthcoming for education.

[CTyankee]

26. I won't give anybody a free pass but I wonder what would have happened if McCain

had won. We have a blessing compared with him...

[asteroid2003QQ47]

9. Not " smart or right" is a matter of perspective.

That you see it for what it is and always has been identifies your class status.
Have you perchance read *CLASS* by Paul Fussell, especially Chapter 6, The Life of the Mind?
-------------------------------------------------------------

"That erroneous assumption is to the effect that the aim of public education is to fill the young of the species with knowledge and awaken their intelligence, and so make them fit to discharge the duties of citizenship in an enlightened and independent manner. Nothing could be further from the truth. The aim of public education is not to spread enlightenment at all; it is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed and train a standardized citizenry, to put down dissent and originality. That is its aim in the United States, whatever the pretensions of politicians, pedagogues and other such mountebanks, and that is its aim everwhere else."
-H.L. Mencken

[MadHound]

12. So you would rather schools just crumble into dust?

I don't know about where you live, but I do know that the schools I'm working with are full of dedicated teachers and administrators who are working their underfunded, underpaid asses off to provide the best education possible, despite the lack of money, despite the obstacles like NCLB, despite the flak we receive from politicians and citizens every single day. We're not trying to put out a "standardized citizen", far from it, the pedagogy and practice actually encourages differences, and trains teachers how to deal with them and teach to them.

Does there have to be a certain amount of conforming in school, certainly, to the same degree that you find in any large organization. But there is no deliberate plot to cookie cutter kids.

Let me guess, you had a bad experience in school, and therefore you want to punish them as much as possible, right? Well lighten up, generations of people like you have driven schools to the brink of failure.

If you want to know the real conspiracy in public education then you have to look no further than NCLB and the drive to privatize education. That's the real conspiracy, to get rid of public education altogether and replace it with private education, in many cases religious education. Talk about producing a standardized citizen:shrug:

Tell you what, why don't you come to my seventh grade history class sometime, where we'll be using readings like Zinn and Chomsky in addition to the textbook. Will that change your mind?

[2Design]

16. you are right the nclb and the drive to break unions to privatize

education and leave all children not of wealth behind is where these red state men are headed - the south shall rise again is their motto

[asteroid2003QQ47]

28. Down big fellow, I'm with you!

I am to blame for not being more succinct, however schools turning to dust (far too many Downeast) are not, in my opinion, as serious an issue as universal failure to cull out the deadwood. Physical plant will get refurbished while calls to refurbish faculty and administrators are met with circled wagons. It only takes a handful of weak-links to cripple a school.
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The teacher who really teaches, that is, who really works with contents within the context of methodological exactitude, will deny as false the hypocritical formula, ‘do as I say, not as I do.’ Whoever is engaged in ‘right thinking’ knows only too well that words not given body (made flesh) have little or no value. Right thinking is right doing.
-- Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of Freedom.

[Dinger]

17. That Deserves It's Own Goddamned Thread!

Then arne charter-school duncan is our sec. of education. This sucks, and that's an understatement. Schools, teachers, and students are the new "whipping boys." Bend over, and brace for it.

[1corona4u]

21. Our schools in Florida...

are mostly funded by property tax payers. They cost me $700.00 per year, which is more than HALF of my property taxes. As the economy sits right now, at least YOU have a job, and in today's salary market, your pay would be at the top of what most employers are offering.

Sorry, I have no sympathy for teachers right now. You chose that profession. Deal with it.

[DisgustipatedinCA]

23. let me guess...you have no kids

My best guess: you don't have children, or they're already grown and gone, so you don't think you should have to pay taxes to support schools. Since you have to pay the taxes anyway, you've taken your aggression out on teachers as a group. This group, fwiw, is one of the most underpaid and overtaxed groups of college-educated professionals. They got a degree not in order to go to Wall Street so they could buy a Ferrari come Christmastime, but so that they could teach our children.

Sorry, I have no sympathy for you right now. You chose to buy the house. Pay your fucking taxes and deal with it.

Sincerely,
A non-teacher who has nothing but respect for the profession.

[Spangle]

2. $400 ??? And that will help HOW??

A Job would have helped so much more. Not only would I be paying taxes, I would be buying stuff.

The increase in unemployoment, that is just for those that are one it now.. right?? HOw will that help all those who have used theirs up, yet still are not working. Or looking for a job again.

Or those joining the work force for the first time. Who now have to compete with extremely over qualified persons for the bottom jobs.

I'm a stay at home Mom, my kids finally don't need me at home. I finally can go to work. I need to go to work. We lived on a tight budget just so I could stay home. Now, the over time is gone and the pay cut 5%.. and I can't get a job to make it up.

Yea! But I get $400. That will be going on past due bills. Normal monthly stuff. Don't know how that will help.

[ColesCountyDem]

6. If you've already filed your 2008 taxes, will you get a check instead? n/t

[Bluenorthwest]

8. If i'm not mistaken, the $400

will show up as less deduction, at about $8 a week for an individual. Worthless. $400 at once is one thing, $8 a week is another...

[Sadie5]

11. Stimulus checks

I thought there was to be no more stimulus checks, only tax breaks. Where are those jobs? we could use money to the states which would lower property taxes. Yet the cash strapped states keep on building football stadiums and tax the already cash strapped citizens. Giving money to the states might help the schools out of a pinch too.

[K Gardner]

13. This is F'ing B/S ! I'd rather not have a measley $400 "credit" and give the damned money

to the schools, or create a freakin job. This is what the Republicans are pushing?? This crap?

Gimme a freakin BREAK ! Take these stinking worthless tax credits and put them into high speed rail.

This infuriates me !

[jefferson_dem]

14. Please. $8,000,000,000 is allocated for high-speed in this bill.

Perhaps this article is misleading since it only discusses provisions that directly benefit taxpayers.

INFRASTRUCTURE

_ $46 billion for transportation projects, including $27 billion for highway and bridge construction and repair; $8.4 billion for mass transit; $8 billion for construction of high-speed railways and $1.3 billion for Amtrak; $4.6 billion for the Army Corps of Engineers; $4 billion for public housing improvements; $6.4 billion for clean and drinking water projects; $7 billion to bring broadband Internet service to underserved areas.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/11/AR2009021103678_pf.html

[Hieronymus]

27. I'm impressed with this .. I'm all for high speed rail.

[QC]

15. Woo hoo! $8 a week!

Hope I don't get carried away and spend it all in one place!

In the meantime, the teachers and cops and firefighters in my area are getting laid off, but I still get that eight bucks!

[debbierlus]

19. Yeah. We saw how wonderful the economy became after the last round of stimulus checks

:sarcasm:

[WI_DEM]

22. no stimulus checks are going out. It's all from payroll.

[1corona4u]

20. BFD...

didn't work last time, won't work this time. How about all those people who are either homeless, or are not eligible for benefits? no one ever thinks about them.

Just another circle jerk that goes nowhere.

[amborin]

24. from the ny times:

<http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x5031884#5037323>