Delaware

The News Journal Editorial Board has decided to weigh in again on the Recovery Package — against FTR — and to do so in a way that serves not only as a symbol of the real lack of basic economic knowledge of folks in the media, but also is an example (one of many) of how awful this paper continues to get. To wit:

• They complain that the package does not follow economists’ guidance of being “quick, temporary and targeted.” The OMB, of course, tells us that 65%+ of the House Bill will be spent in 2 years (the stated goal) and 75%+ of the Senate Bill will be spent in the next 2 years. If you read the bill at all, you’ll note that the multiple hundred pages of these bills is a targeted list of spending priorities and none of them comes with a perpetual spending provision. Additional money to the Recovery program pools would need to be authorized by Congress in subsequent budget years.
• Their only stated measure of the quality of the bills is the total price tag — so that the Senate Bill ends up being better than the House Bill because it is cheaper. If you are going to invoke economists’ guidance for the shape of the bill, you’d think that they’d do that to assess the quality and effectiveness of the bill.

(more after the jump.)