Journal Article

Did the Fiscal Stimulus Work?

Abstract: Billions were spent to recover from the Great Recession. How can we know whether taxpayers got a decent bang for the buck? More than seven years after the enactment of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, economists, legislators, and the American people continue to debate the effectiveness of the measure. The largest U.S. fiscal stimulus since the 1930s, the Recovery Act pumped hundreds of billions of dollars of federal spending and tax cuts into the economy in an effort to stem the massive job losses and steep drop in economic output that characterized the Great Recession. The projected impact of the stimulus on the federal budget through 2019, when the program is set to end, amounts to $832 billion. More than 90 percent of that total was realized by the end of 2011.

Keywords: Great Recession; economic recovery; taxes;

Bibliographic Information

Provider: Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia

Part of Series: Economic Insights

Publication Date: 2017-01

Volume: 2

Issue: 1

Pages: 6-16