The U.S. Citizen Needs to Protect His or Her Eyes!

The U.S. citizen needs to stand-up to this brain trust that insists on spending 20 years salary to do a one-year job.

U.S. Congress

(HARRISVILLE, N.H.) - How many times do you have to poke yourself in the eye with a sharp stick before you realize it hurts? That seems to be exactly what President Obama and Congress are doing with the latest plans for increased stimulus. The problem is that it isn’t their own eyes they are poking the sharp stick into... it is our eyes!

It may be worthwhile to break some of the actual and planned stimulus expenditures down and examine the actual and expected results. Then we can see for ourselves exactly what we are getting for our tax dollars and perform a rough cost/benefits analysis. We will want to specifically measure the number of jobs that would be created, as this is the issue that seems to be holding economic improvement back more than any other issue is.

First, there is the $175 million being spent by The New York City Department of Transportation to rehabilitate eight vehicular bridges, one pedestrian bridge, and one parking lot that provides commuters with access to the Staten Island Ferry Terminal. This project is expected to create an estimated 120 jobs. That works out to a cost of $1,458,333.00 per job created.

Next up is the proposed construction of an 8.5-mile long new 4-lane highway in Nelsonville, Ohio. The estimated cost for this project is $138,000,000.00 and it is expected to create 300 jobs. That works out to $460,000.00 per job created.

More than $153,000,000.00 in stimulus funds has gone to The Cancer Genome Atlas project and has created 150 jobs at a cost of $1,020,000.00 per job.

The Administration and Congress are supposed to be the best and the brightest thinkers and administrators. I believe that they probably make-up a very powerful pool of brainpower. This brings us to my next question: What is this brainpower being used for? It is obviously not being used for the profitable investment of the taxpayer’s dollar. I believe that this brainpower has been put to use almost exclusively, to estimate and acquire political gain based on party directives. Think about it. These three projects alone cost the U.S. taxpayer $466,000,000.00 and created only 570 jobs. That breaks down to a per-job cost of $817,543.85. Now that is a very expensive placement fee if you ask me.

To be fair, there are long-term benefits other than jobs that will likely be derived from these projects. The long-term benefits will surely prove worthwhile. However, the expenditure of these monies was intended to help revive the economy. The economy needs U.S. citizens to work and pay taxes. Even if we estimate that the average wage earned by a U.S. taxpayer at $40,000.000 per year, it would equate to over 20 years worth of salary per worker for an estimated 1 year of work on these projects. This revives memories of stories about the government spending $700.00 for a hammer and $470.00 for a toilet seat. Shouldn’t someone or something be doing duty as a taxpayer watchdog? Shouldn’t a taxpayer’s rights group of some sort be blowing the whistle of such outlandish expenditures? Well, I certainly think so.

The Whitehouse will be issuing a report today (Friday, September 17, 2010), defending the need to spend more taxpayer dollars in the way I’ve just described. The U.S. citizen needs to stand-up to this brain trust that insists on spending 20 years salary to do a one-year job. The average work-a-day Joe or homemaker can do a far better job at maintaining budgetary expenditures than the brain trust we have elected to guide us and set our destiny. Folks . . . write letters, send E-Mails, pick up the telephone, and call your Congressional Representatives and Senators. This has got to stop and it has got to stop NOW. . . while we can still see... but, that is just my opinion!

You can write to Bob Collingsworth at this email address: colli2@webryders.net