Fed accounting of stimulus jobs inflated

From the Associated Press. I'm amazed that the AP did the research and even more amazed that the Virginian Pilot printed it on the inside pages. How did this get past the editors?

WASHINGTON — An early progress report on President Obama’s economic recovery plan overstates by thousands the number of jobs created or saved through the stimulus program, a mistake that White House officials promise will be corrected in future reports.

The government’s first accounting of jobs tied to the $787 billion stimulus program claimed more than 30,000 positions paid for with recovery money. But that figure is overstated by least 5,000 jobs, according to an Associated Press review of a sample of stimulus contracts.


The AP review found some counts were more than 10 times as high as the actual number of jobs; some jobs credited to the stimulus program were counted two and sometimes more than four times; and other jobs were credited to stimulus spending when none was produced.

For example:

A Florida child care center said its stimulus money saved 129 jobs but used the money on raises for existing employees.

A company working with the Federal Communications Commission reported that stimulus money paid for 4,231 jobs, when about 1,000 were produced.

A Georgia community college reported creating 280 jobs with recovery money, but none was created from stimulus spending.

This is the crew that wants to tell you what kind of health care you can have.