Tea Party Nation For More Spending Sometimes

by Stuart Shapiro

Tea Party Nation leader Judson Phillips apparently thinks defense spending is a good thing.

If we decided to build a couple of new carriers, thousands of workers would be hired for the shipyards.  Thousands of employees would be hired for the steel mills that would provide the steel for the hull and various sub contractors would hire thousands.  Do you know what that means?

The Economist is all over the hypocrisy.

But what’s amazing here, obviously, is that Mr Phillips is justifying building aircraft carriers because government spending creates jobs and stimulates the economy. And he’s right about that! But it seems that there are no other things the government spends money on, apart from defence, that Mr Phillips believes can stimulate the economy. He appears to believe that while government spending on aircraft carriers leads to workers getting hired, spending their paychecks, and helping the recovery, government spending on highways, high-speed rail, education, and health care does not.

If the Tea Party is ready to embrace the idea that government spending can be good, I say, “Welcome Aboard!”

By: Stuart Shapiro

Stuart is a professor and the Director of the Public Policy
program at the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers
University. He teaches economics and cost-benefit analysis and studies
regulation in the United States at both the federal and state levels.
Prior to coming to Rutgers, Stuart worked for five years at the Office
of Management and Budget in Washington under Presidents Clinton and
George W. Bush.