While the president last night touted the agreement among the White House and House leaders (both Republican and Democrat) on the framework of a stimulus package to be enacted quickly, it looks like the agreement may be delayed. That’s because Senate Democrats are developing their own version:
There seems ample room to improve the ‘consensus’ stimulus package that the House is preparing to pass. But it’s not clear that the Baucus/Senate Democrat plan will be much more effective at boosting economic growth. Extending unemployment benefits and boosting home-heating aid are nice ideas, but they’re unlikely to generate new jobs. And when a bill like this one is delayed, it increases the chances of collapsing under its own weight — as happened to president Clinton’s 1993 stimulus package.
Washington being what it is, there are plenty of lobbyists who have been encouraged by the Senate’s delay to push their own pet projects. And in general, those ideas are also unlikely to do anything to get the economy moving:
Legislators have probably gone too far out on a limb with the promise of one-time tax rebates to back down now. If the Senate’s broad bill takes more than a few weeks, leaders will probably move a narrow bill centered on the rebates. However, Congressional leaders have already been burned several times in the current Congress by their inability to muster votes for legislation that had previously seemed likely to pass easily. Immigration reform and FISA are just two examples of areas where an activist minority proved able to derail bills they opposed. Could the current delay put leaders in the same position a month from now?
