Kevin Page, the independent parliamentary budget officer, agreed that the latest government report card is weak because it's hard to tell if the projects being funded have actually begun or if the money is being dispersed.
In the United States, the administration has provided specific details on which projects have been started and how much money is actually being spent under President Barack Obama's $787 billion (U.S.) stimulus plan, Page said.
"We still don't really see that in any significant way in the fourth quarter report" here, he said. "It's very weak in terms of, is this having a measurable impact on economic output and jobs?"
"When you read it, you don't really get that sense as to whether it's working or not," Page said of the government's 168-page analysis of the economic action program.
Based on discussions with cities, Ottawa's infrastructure money appears to have gone out too slowly this year to have much positive effect in 2009, Page said.
"Our own sense is that a lot of that (money) will be flowing in 2010, it didn't flow in 2009," he said in an interview.
If massive infrastructure spending had made it into people's pockets this year, the economy would have shown better growth in the July-through-September period, Page said.
The economy grew at an anemic annual rate of 0.4 per cent in the third quarter, Statistics Canada said.
Just a dog and pony show, in other words.
I'm reminded that the opposition parties thought that, subject to controls, the municipalities in Canada should really have figured out where to spend the stimulus cash. But that would have taken the glory away from Harper. Harper chose instead to take credit and issue huge partisan cheques and massive partisan advertising at the expense of delivering a timely stimulus to the economy. We know where Harper's priorities lay: with himself.
I'm sure Page isn't long for his job.
No comments:
Post a Comment