The President Obama-backed-and-signed stimulus package of 2009 was in the $700 billion range before cost overruns bumped it to above $800 billion. Some people have argued about the size vs. effectiveness of that spending bill, thus missing the point. The $700 billion target was a wholly political number. It was payback.

Congress had passed the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, the year before for $700 billion to bail out the financial institutions and added a bit on top of that. TARP was viewed as servicing Wall Street, and Wall Street was seen as a Republican interest. Now Democrats, firmly in power, wanted to shower their own constituents with largesse.