The Stimulus Miracle: Chapter Nine - Get A Job

Okay, this must be where the jobs are, in the Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education portion of this bill. Plus, there is a lot of money being distributed here. Starting with labor, Training and Employment Services gets 4 billion, to train unemployed people how to do those jobs that have all become available. You know, the government jobs. For the Community Service Employment for Older Americans: 120 million, because old people apparently don't matter as much. The Feds will give State Unemployment Insurance 500 million, with half go to pay claims and half go for reemployment programs. Reemployment is what happens when you lose a job that you like because the economy sucks and then start working for the government. The Labor Departmental Management people need 80 million because now they have to hire more unemployed people to train unemployed people to become reemployed, and the Office of Job Corps gets 300 million for no apparent reason.

In the area of Health, Health Resources and Services gets 2.188 billion half of which is for construction, and the other half for training and stuff. The Center for Disease Control: 462 million, I assume for controlling diseases, while The National Center for Research Resources wins 1.5 billion because you can never have too much research. Meanwhile, the Office of the Director of Health and Human Services gets 1.5 billion and can give it to Centers of the National Institutes of Health and to the Common Fund for whatever, except that it can't be used to build anything. On the other hand, Health buildings and facilities receive 500 million for that purpose. Healthcare research and quality nab 1.1 million. We need quality research.

Human Services must be where the jobs are, with Low-income home energy assistance getting 1 billion because poor people need electricity, too. Child care assistance for low-income families comes to 2 billion. and another child care service under the Children and Family Services programs gets 3.2 billion, shared about equally by the programs Head Start, Early Head Start, and Community Services Block Grant Act. The head start programs already gets around 7 billion a year in funding. The Community Services Block Grant Act gets around a billion. They need more, people already with six children are having octuplets now! Aging Services programs need only 200 million because apparently old people have a lot of trouble with the aging thing, and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology gets 2 billion to do pretty much whatever they want to. Public Health Services receives 900 million, almost half for vaccinations and almost half for construction, and the Prevention and Wellness fund gets 3.15 billion because healthy people apparently need it. Also, "there is hereby established a Federal Coordinating Council for Comparative Effectiveness Research". I have no idea what that is.

In the schooling stuff, we have Education For The Disadvantaged that gets 13 billion, although disadvantaged means poor not incapable. For Impact Aid: 100 million. This is the "No Child Left Behind" thing. For School Improvement, 1.066 billion, and for Innovation and Improvement 225 million, because innovations should be less costly than simple improvement. Special Education gets 13.6 billion, which makes little sense since Vocational Rehabilitation only gets 700 million. I mean, it's supposed to be about jobs. Student Aid receives 16.126 billion, because apparently all of you students out there have already paid off your loans and now they want to loan more. Student Aid Administration needs 50 million because someone has to administrate this. Higher Education gets 100 million because it isn't as important as lower education, apparently, while the Institute of Educated Sciences needs 250 million. Dude. It's an Institute. Students are tired of those trailers, so School Modernization, Renovation, and Repair receives 14 billion, while Higher Education, Modernization, and Repair gets 6 billion and a large and wordy number of pages instructing that construction should be green and that steel must be from the U.S. follow. Oh, and Increases in Mandatory Pell Grants: 1.474 billion Must. Have. More. Pell.

Other items that didn't seem to belong anywhere else include AmeriCorps Grants at 160 million, the National Service Trust with 40 million, and SSI Administrative expenses 900 million (because it takes a lot of administration to mail those checks).

We're making headway now, at 224.904 billion dollars, and our failing schools and health care systems will be made whole again. Not a lot of jobs, unless you're a government employee type of person, or a nurse, teacher, or student. But it sure looks shiny, whatever it is.

Next: Chapter Ten – Let's Build A Fort!