House Passes $154 Billion Jobs Package
This afternoon, the House passed a $154 billion economic aid package. Below we have listed the major spending areas within the bill:
| Spending Initiative | Amount |
| Highway Infrastructure | $28 billion |
| Other Infrastructure | $21 billion |
| Education Jobs Fund | $23 billion |
| Other Jobs Spending | $4 billion |
| Unemployment Insurance (6 month extension) | $41 billion |
| COBRA Extension (6 month extension) | $12 billion |
| FMAP Extension | $24 billion |
| Other Items | $3 billion |
| Total | $154 billion |
Note: Numbers may not add exactly due to rounding.
To help pay for some of these initiatives, Congress and the Administration have both supported rescissions in TARP funds. In all, this bill cuts $75 billion in total TARP funding. As we have noted here, here, and here, using leftover TARP funds to pay for new stimulus spending amounts to a budget gimmick. Policymakers should find genuine offsets, even if these offsets occur in the out-years, to pay for any and all new spending and tax cuts.