Talk:American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009/Archive 3

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

criticism?

should it be noted that alot of people have criticised the bill as just being a spending bill. it seems like the article has been written a little slanted and seems like it is praising the bill. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.136.158.111 (talk) 22:37, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Criticism of the bill should be limited to economists and pertinent politicians unless otherwise published by a reliable source. WSJ released a survey of prominent economists and their opinion of the act which is currently listed in the "assessment" section. Wikifan12345 (talk) 01:37, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Tax relief or tax hike?

The sub-section on tax relief for companies allocates $7 billion for a "change (that) would increase taxes on the merged banks by $7 billion over 10 years." Now I'm no accountant, but that hardly sounds like a tax break to me, but the money is added to the total cost to that heading (tax relief). Perhaps it should be subtracted. Perhaps this is why problems with the totals were noted above. 153.112.128.9 (talk) 11:19, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Citations for line-item discussion and amounts

I wrote most of the parts providing a line-item list account of what's in the stimulus. There is no source other than the 4 sources I provided at the very beginning (sources 26-29) of that long section. I looked at articles and the bill itself to make the different subheadings and added up the amounts myself after allocating different line-items to different sections. It is however not original research to do that, because the line-items itself are all in the bill and have a dollar amount attached to them. Themanwithoutapast (talk) 20:21, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

I propose adding the following sentence regarding recovery.org

The article has these two consecutive sentences:

"On July 20, 2009, the Drudge Report published links to pages on Recovery.org which detailed expensive contracts awarded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture for items such as mozzarella cheese, frozen ham and canned pork. A statement released by the USDA the same day explained that the mult-imillion dollar contracts were intended to purchase food items under The Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP) and defended the expenditures.[47]"

That is too vague, because it does not cite the specific criticism that Drudge had made. Therefore, in between those two sentences, I propose the following sentence be added:

"For example, recovery.org stated that "$1,191,200" was spent on "2 POUND FROZEN HAM SLICED."

I cannot add this myself as I am under a topic ban, so I am asking that someone else please add it if they think it would make the article better. Thank you.

Grundle2600 (talk) 01:01, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

First of all, wrong article. Furthermore a little reminder for perspective: [1]. Remember? Or didn't you hear that?--The Magnificent Clean-keeper (talk) 02:06, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

I did not propose adding a new topic to this article. Instead, I proposed clarifying a topic that was already in the article. The two sentences that I quoted were already there, but they were too vague, so I proposed adding one more sentence to clarify it. That other article that you linked to also contained a mention of recovery.org, so it's also relevant in that article too. Grundle2600 (talk) 15:35, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Which paragraph is more clear?

This one:

"On July 20, 2009, the Drudge Report published links to pages on Recovery.org which detailed expensive contracts awarded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture for items such as mozzarella cheese, frozen ham and canned pork. A statement released by the USDA the same day explained that the mult-imillion dollar contracts were intended to purchase food items under The Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP) and defended the expenditures.[47]"

Or this one:

"On July 20, 2009, the Drudge Report published links to pages on Recovery.org which detailed expensive contracts awarded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture for items such as mozzarella cheese, frozen ham and canned pork. For example, recovery.org stated that "$1,191,200" was spent on "2 POUND FROZEN HAM SLICED." A statement released by the USDA the same day explained that the mult-imillion dollar contracts were intended to purchase food items under The Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP) and defended the expenditures.[47]"

The second paragraph is more clear, because it cites what Drudge's complaint was. The first paragraph is vague, because it does not cite what Drudge's complaint was. To leave out Drudge's complaint violates NPOV.

Grundle2600 (talk) 15:47, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

The article still does not include Drudge's specific complaint that recovery.org stated that "$1,191,200" was spent on "2 POUND FROZEN HAM SLICED." But the article does include the government's response to Drudge. That's unbalanced. Grundle2600 (talk) 14:54, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

I do not approve of the re-merge of the comparison of house and senate article into this article

Back when this article was written it was extremely problematic to put in a comparison of provisions which are now not in the bill any more and can easily be confused with the actual provisions and details of the bill which are laid out later on. Plus, the comparison section is long, isn't in text format, rather a list comparison and doesn't add very much valuable information to the article. The comparison is also incomplete and unreferenced as well as, which was also the reason why it was put into a separate article in the first place so people could work on it there without "contaminating" this pretty important main article. Themanwithoutapast (talk) 15:09, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

• I remerged it. But I agree with User:Themanwithoutapast that it's clunky in this article. Some articles about historic legislation do contain extensive discussions of legislative history. The separate article fork seemed out of place. I think a merged article is better, perhaps with a briefer comparison.—Markles 15:56, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Article missing details

Not sure where I should post this. This particular Reinvestment Act appears to missing a lot of the provisions in the document, and therefore is understating the appropriations of the Act. For example, most of the appropriations that are listed under Section III: Department of Defense, which I calculated to be $3.8 billion and additional $225bln in R&D, are missing. Can someone take a look? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Maylinglai (talk • contribs) 13:30, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Neutrality of Redirection from "stimulus bill"

I can certainly understand that most of us regard ARRA as "the stimulus bill" or "the stimulus package" , but there have been several from several past presidents. The Bush Administration passed one early in his first term, and is called a stimulus bill by several members of the past Bush White House, including former press secretary Scott McClellan. Thoughts? Ideas? 98.224.102.46 (talk) 06:35, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

Several Editors (HyperCapitalist and LoonyMonkey) are making capricious, arbitrary, and hypocritical edits to this page

I added a link to a highly relevant stimulus tracking website (http://stimulus-watchdog.com/) to this page. Wikipedia policy clearly allows "those (external links) that contain further research that is accurate and on-topic." This site clearly meets this standard- please visit it and find out for yourself. Loonymonkey deleted it as "spam." Under Wikipedia policy it is clearly not spam. If Loonymonkey had bothered looking at the website in question, he would see that it clearly meets these standards, because it provides accurate, timely, and comprehensive tracking of stimulus spending in the interests of providing transparency to the American people.

When I re-added it, HyperCapitalist removed it and marked it as "vandalism." It is clearly not vandalism under the wikipedia policy...anybody can clearly look at the site (http://stimulus-watchdog.com/) and know that it is not vandalism. When I questioned him on it, he changed his story and said that it was removed because it had ads. I pointed out that other sites linked to also served ads, and that it was hypocrisy to allow some sites with ads but not others. He then pointed me to a policy implying the http://stimulus-watchdog.com/ site was an "irrelevant link to a shock site." This is clearly not irrelevant nor is it a shock site - It is an up-to-date site documenting, from public government sources, over 80,000 stimulus grants, contracts, and loans sorted by state, city, zip code, and recipient. It is timely, accurate, and on-topic. the fact that it contains ads should not disqualify it (unless there is a blanket policy that no sites with ads can be linked to from Wikipedia).

In summary, I feel the actions of these two editors are capricious, arbitrary, and hypocritical. By the way, exactly what makes them authorities on the ARRA anyway? What exactly are their qualifications to serve as editors of this page? 96.255.26.223 (talk) 03:11, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

Please read the wikipedia guidelines for external links, in particular read WP:ELNO and WP:LINKSPAM. Also, while you're at it, you should also read WP:NPA. --Loonymonkey (talk) 16:49, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

Obama never promised that unemployment would remain under 8%

So I made a rather minor deletion of the implication that he did. The citation provided (was already there) merely says that an earlier study by the White House projected that the unemployment rate would be 8% at the time. The forecast was obviously wrong, but it is similarly wrong to assert that Obama promised that unemployment would exceed this number. I think someone has succumbed to a Republican talking point. If someone wants to reinclude this number into the article I would support it as long as the proper context is given. See here: http://politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2009/jul/09/eric-cantor/Cantor-and-other-republicans-say-obama-promised-s/

Kevin (talk) 00:40, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

GREEN JOBS,INFRASTRUCTURE JOBS.

Why are'nt there any of these jobs listed. We need to start making MADE IN THE U.S.A. a priority. What are the powers that be thinking? It's scary that outsourcing,& lay offs have become the norm. PLEASE make the most of this awful time to fix public policy & get the right, qualified people to take the reins. Do not put people that have investments in & around WALLSTREET,OIL,WARTECH. or any neg. solutions to this country's problems. I think we lost sight of what & who was watching the store while we were being told "ALLS OK". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.69.226.150 (talk) 12:37, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

ARRA redirect

I edited this page so that "ARRA," in all capitals only, redirects here. If someone disagrees with this decision, please feel free to redirect it back to the clunky Arra disambiguation page. Midtempo-abg (talk) 05:56, 7 February 2010 (UTC)

Where are the archives?

There should be five of them but they are not linked from this page. Maybe someone with better Wikipedia editing experience than me can put an archive link on the talk page. Midtempo-abg (talk) 05:56, 7 February 2010 (UTC)

I found Archives 3 through 5. They're at Talk:American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009/Archive 3, Talk:American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009/Archive 4, and Talk:American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009/Archive 5, though not linked on this page. My guess is that some earlier threads have been archived elsewhere. The archiving is being done by the MiszaBot. I've posted a query at User talk:Misza13 to see if we can untangle the situation. JamesMLane t c 17:51, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

When the editor set up the archiving, they must have copied the settings from another page because they started with "counter=3" [2] which is why there is no 1 and 2. I've shuffled them all two places to the left. –xeno^talk 18:02, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

Xeno, thanks for fixing this. The consequence of the initial mistake is that all the reports of bot edits in the talk page history up until now are inaccurate. For example, in this edit the bot says that a particular thread is being archived at Archive 4, but that thread is now in Archive 2. Maybe we should put a note at the top of Archive 3, noting that some threads listed as being there might really be in Archive 1? JamesMLane t c 18:46, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

That sounds fine. Use the {{notice}} template. –xeno^talk 18:53, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

Paragraph addition

Multiple anons have been adding the following paragraph:

On February 12, 2010, the Bureau of Labor Statistics published job loss data showing a clear about-face in that measure of economic recovery, which data has been presented in a monthly chart by Organizing for America comparing jobs lost during the last year of the Bush Administration and the first year of the Obama Administration.<ref>"Road to Recovery", source: Bureau of Labor Statistics, 02/12/2010.</ref>

The source is not BLS, and, as it is Organizing for America, it's not a reliable source. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 09:01, 23 February 2010 (UTC)
Nor is it relevant to this article. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 09:03, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

OK, someone found the BLS source quoted by Organizing for America. Still, the opinion of Organizing for America that it shows an improvement and that ARRA is responsible is not reliable nor that of economists. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 16:03, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

OFA is notable and a reliable source, without regard for its mission. Do you claim they are mistaken or lying when they write (at "Road..." above): "According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, the Recovery Act is already responsible for as many as 2.4 million jobs through the end of 2009" or "Economists on the left and the right have stated that the Recovery Act has helped avert an even worse economic disaster."? If so, the burden is upon you to show clearly why. -12.7.202.2 (talk) 17:35, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Of course OFA is not a reliable source for anything other than possibly courtesy hosting of otherwise unavailable government information. They are part of the Democratic Party. The CBO could be quoted in this section, regardless of OFA, but OFA's interpretation of what they actually said is censored. Including the second proposed quote is absurd. My stating that "economists on the left and the right agree that the Recovery Act was harmful to the US" would also be as accurate, and as relevant. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 17:44, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Granted, at least for the non-notable Arthur Rubin, but OFA has rendered a useful service by making so visible what would otherwise be just a bunch of numbers. For the record, here's the link to the data: "Employment, Hours, and Earnings from the Current Employment Statistics survey (National)". There's no distortion by OFA. -12.7.202.2 (talk) 17:58, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

I'd give them credit for the graphic (once verified — they are a political party, after all), but the commentary is not supported by the data or graphic, and has no part in this or any other Wikipedia article, except one on OFA. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 18:48, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

The graphic matches the data so use it with all the OFA verbiage cut out. -12.7.202.2 (talk) 20:22, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Rubin, I think you're imposing a bit of a double standard here. The page currently references an ad funded by the Cato institute. I don't think the add is much of an improvement. At least the OFA statement is based on data. If there was a turn around in employment and someone attributes the change to a policy, it's perfectly acceptable to say, "job losses have declined ever since the passage of the stimulus and OFA claims this proves the bill is having an impact." True, OFA is a political group, but so is Cato and a bunch of other groups cited in other articles. As long as we're reporting it as a specific group's viewpoint, we're following Wikipedia policy. Citing a more established and independent group's viewpoint would be preferable, but I don't think citing OFA's view violates any policies. --Bkwillwm (talk) 02:46, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

There is no claim that the OfA view is the view of economists. The statement that there has been an improvement is "based on data", although an interpretation of the data. There is no evidence presented that the claim that ARRA is involved is based on data or the views of economists. As I said above, the CBO statement, if accurately quoted by OfA, should be in the section.

The OfA statement should be in "political views", rather than "views of economists"; and the OfA is a notable political organization. As should any comments from the corresponding organization in the Republican Party.

The Cato Institute ad claims to be the view of economists, and it being published makes it verifiable that it is claimed to be the view of (some) economists. It is not presented as evidence of the truth of the opinion, as the OfA paragraph was.

— Arthur Rubin (talk) 16:11, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

The OFA website claims to be the view of the CBO, and data from BLS, both of whom employ economists, is presented to back it up. Both being published makes it verifiable that it is claimed to be the view of CBO, backed up by BLS data. If the Cato Inc ad is not presented as evidence of truth of the C.I. opinion (by dint of number supporting it), why present it? I think you need to take a long, slow look in the mirror while counting to 1000. -12.7.202.2 (talk) 16:54, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

The problem is that it's all synthesis. Even the wording is laughable... "a clear about face?" I also received the tweet from Barack Obama's perpetual campaign site, that doesn't mean it merits inclusion. The BLS statistics are just that, stats. Who makes the case that the ARRA is the reason for less job losses? What if I got a tweet from Dubya that said TARP is the reason? That's why you need economists to make that case(most probably would state TARP had more to do with it). As for the CBO report. They make a case based on models that the ARRA stimulus spending has theoretically saved or created 1.5 million jobs. Even know the report makes more of a case that any Keynesian spending creates and/or saves jobs as a product of increased GDP, I still SUPPORT it's inclusion. MookieG (talk) 19:49, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Resolving the dispute through better organization

The section is now titled "Assessments by economists", which creates two problems. First, although the BLS data and OFA interpretation thereof constitute assessments (as in judging the effects of the Act), Arthur Rubin argues that they're not assessments by economists, and so don't belong in this section. Second, if that information is omitted, everything else in the section dates from early 2009, and isn't assessments (in the sense of retroactive evaluations) but rather recommendations based on projections.

It doesn't seem to me that any of the comments above would be countered if the section title were changed to "Recommendations by economists", so I'll do that. The section relates solely to the debate in early 2009 and should stay that way. Thus, I agree with Arthur Rubin in not including the BLS/OFA material in that section.

Now that a year has gone by, however, we should have a separate section about developments since the Act took effect. Such a section could include the BLS/OFA material; the last paragraph of the current CBO section, which concerns a later CBO report from October 2009, as opposed to estimates provided by the CBO during the legislative debate; and other similar material. For example, I think that some right-wing sources have contended that the bill made no difference. There's recently been publicity about requests for stimulus funds by Republicans who voted against the bill but who now say that it will provide jobs in their districts. Such a section wouldn't be limited to economists' views, so we can avoid bickering about whether anonymous BLS staffers qualify as "economists". JamesMLane t c 19:10, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

Much improved, thanks. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 20:38, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

OFA image

I've removed the image as a clear copyright violation, with fair use failure also clear. If someone were to generate the graph separately from the BLS data, making no mention of the OFA web site, and upload it with the appropriate licensing, that would be an allowable image, although its relevance to the article would be questionable. The OFA image could only be used if there were a claim (in the article) that the image is misleading. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 16:01, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

I already made a chart using the BLS data. I put it back in the article.--Bkwillwm (talk) 03:34, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

But your caption says "based on OFA ...", which makes it a derivative work, and hence not fair use. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 09:25, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

The chart uses the same (public) domain as the OFA chart and the same standard format. I did not modify the original image at all; I started from scratch. A copyright is not given for the exclusive right to display a particular set of data. If you really think this image violates OFA's copyright, tag it as a non-free image. That's the process for resolving copyright claims, not removal from an article, especially when it's dubious that it is non-free.--Bkwillwm (talk) 14:05, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

Well, I believe I only removed the OFA image, rather than yours. However, your image is not germane to the article; OFA's image is germane to their statement, while yours doesn't really support a statement about ARRA. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 14:27, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

Bkwillwm's chart certainly isn't a copyvio. It's appropriate for the article because it presents the data that are being used by one side to support an argument in favor of ARRA. If there's a prominent right-wing spokesperson who's argued, from the same data, that the continuation of job losses shows that ARRA was a failure, then we can report that opinion, too. JamesMLane t c 16:40, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Oddly enough, that would be an argument for inclusion of the OfA graphic, but not for Bkwillwm's. If, for example, there were a reliable source for the color-scheme argument made against Bkwillwm's chart, that would be reason to include the OfA chart. We don't know that OfA's conclusion is based on the data, rather than on their chart (which, in turn, is based on the data). Still, I won't remove Bkwillwm's chart from the article, although I may continue to argue against inclusion. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 17:36, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Spending breakdown

The detailed spending breakdown listed in this article adds up to an amount which is substantially greater than the actual amount authorized in the Act. The total listed under each category (excluding subcategories) is $813.2 billion instead of $787 -- $26.2 billion too high. This needs to be corrected, but I'm not sure where to go to get the correct information. 71.189.61.14 (talk) 19:05, 22 May 2009 (UTC) wikime08, 5/23/09

tax increase listed as a tax cut?

The article contains the following under the heading "tax cuts for corporations:"

$7 billion: Repeal bank credit: Repeal a Treasury provision that allowed firms that buy money-losing banks to use more of the losses as tax credits to offset the profits of the merged banks for tax purposes. The change would increase taxes on the merged banks by $7 billion over 10 years.

The $7 billion in question is counted towards the article's assertion of $51 billion in tax cuts for corporations. But by my reading, it should count the other way, as a tax increase on corporations, offsetting $7 billion of tax cuts, for a total of $37 billion in cuts.

0nullbinary0 (talk) 11:24, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Nice source on Tarp waste

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/signs-stimulus/story?id=11163180 Cheers Weaponbb7 (talk) 13:06, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

The Daily Beast

Is this a RS when certain economists exclusively used it for their message? I dunno, but three other economists went to HuffPo to voice their opposition. Is it now notable (a better argument) and can we find better RS's? I didn't look too hard at the content, I just went and reverted the removal of decent text with sources lacking an edit summary. Now I have an interest. Any thoughts? †TE†Talk 08:10, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure whether the source is reliable; if it isn't, the section must be removed, per WP:BLP. In fact, even if it were reliable, it still might not be BLP-reliable. I've tagged as {{vc}}, but I believe it probably should be removed, except for statements made by individual, already notable, economists. where it might be considered a "courtesy link". — Arthur Rubin (talk) 08:49, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

The Daily Beast is a comparatively new venture but I don't see why it should be considered unreliable. Note that its principal is Tina Brown, former editor of The New Yorker and Vanity Fair; this is not coming from a bunch of high-school kids who decided to put out an online magazine. The issue isn't whether it reliably reports that the stimulus was helpful but too small, because it's not being cited for that fact. Per WP:NPOV, we report facts, including facts about opinions, provided the opinions are from prominent spokespersons, and this collection of highly regarded economists certainly qualifies. The opinion is attributed to them, not stated as fact. Thus the only issue is whether, given the appearance of the piece in The Daily Beast, we can be reasonably confident that the economists involved did indeed express that opinion. The answer is clearly Yes. JamesMLane t c 21:36, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

That is the critical question, but I'm not as confident as you that that is the answer. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 22:56, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

I would agree on the opinion thing, as it's attributed. I still wish MSM would pick it up. †TE†Talk 23:24, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Keep wishing, TE. The corporate media are fixated on wondering if the Republicans will win either house of Congress this fall. They have as much interest in reporting progressives' criticism of the stimulus as they did in reporting progressives' criticism of the fairy tales Saddam's arsenal of WMD's.

As for reliability, there's room for a certain amount of case-by-case analysis. If The Daily Beast reported seeing a smooch involving a Republican politician and a woman not his wife, we might want to tread carefully. In this instance, though, quite a few prominent economists are named as signers. If the letter were a fake, concocted by The Daily Beast for some unspecified purpose, surely the MSM would've jumped on that -- because someone would have complained, and while the media aren't big on careful economic analysis, they would love to report a clothesline spat over whether Nobel Laureate X really did join in this statement. The absence of such a ruckus is very good confirmation. JamesMLane t c 03:02, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

Addendum: We now have partial confirmation from Fox News. They didn't report the whole manifesto in detail, but Chris Wallace, in questioning John Boehner, said that "a number of top economists say what we need is more economic stimulus." [3] Boehner's response was not to assert that their signatures on the letter had been faked, but to say that he didn't need to listen to economists. (!) I'm going to remove the tag on this statement in the article. JamesMLane t c 18:35, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

Deletion

I do not understand why my edit was deleted. Anybody care to reword it or help me figure out what the problem was? Everything was sourced by a reliable source. Dwightschrute1010 (talk) 04:14, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

your edits are very opinionated and are drawing conclusions from sources in a POV way rather then using the sources to state facts. i am canadian, i have no interest in american politics, and i can see this. thanks for coming here to discuss rather then just revert warring though. cheers WookieInHeat (talk) 04:23, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

oh and please refrain from using the cnsnews.com news article, blogs are not a WP:RS for such subjects. WookieInHeat (talk) 04:26, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Okay I understand your reasoning...I'm trying to ask for help in rewording it to make it less POV. Do you mind helping or giving suggestions? ~ Dwightschrute1010 (talk) 04:28, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Using "many" and "according to some" tend to hint at the presence of opinionated statements rather than encyclopedic ones. Saying that such-and-such led to high national debt is encyclopedic provided there is a reliable source, but your phrasing saying that "many believe that the stimulus did not work" is inherently an opinion without saying who these "many" people are, and saying that "it will cripple the country" without saying who are these people saying it is unencyclopedic. Also, it is the responsibility of the person adding the content to ensure that it is in line with our content policies, not the person removing said content (see WP:BURDEN). --kurykh 04:31, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

like i said, i really have no interest in the topic, otherwise i would give you a hand. i did come across this article while browsing through your sources though, it seems to be more subjective analysis and less opinion based then your previous references. maybe you could work on summarizing its contents? WookieInHeat (talk) 04:46, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

NPOV

The last sentence of the part discussing Developments under the Act, does not seem neutral especially "only 2%" ... thoughts?66.254.227.193 (talk) 06:38, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing that out; I edited that section to give a more balanced presentation of the source article. Abrazame (talk) 05:17, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

Tax cuts vs. tax credits

I've noticed that the section titled "tax cuts" doesn't actually list any reductions in tax rates, but rather lists a large number of tax credits, as well as a few temporary bracket shifts. It is my understanding that the terms "tax cut" and "tax credit" are not interchangeable, but are very different entities. A "tax cut" usually implies a reduction in the rate of taxes assessed on income, whereas a "tax credit" is more like a subsidy- it's the waiving of taxes on money used for specific purposes as a way for a government to promote certain activities. The listing of "tax cut," "tax credit," and "tax deduction" as separate articles (with very different descriptions) on Wikipedia is a testament to the preciseness with which the language is used.

To avoid implying one thing when we mean another, I propose replacing the phrase "tax cuts" where it is found in this article with something more NPOV, like "tax code modifications" or "tax changes." This would also resolve the problem listed below, of having measures that result in an increase in the taxes paid listed as "tax cuts." TBSchemer (talk) 02:56, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I have a better idea. Tax credits and temporary tax holidays could both be described as "tax incentives." That would be far more accurate than "tax cuts." TBSchemer (talk) 21:52, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

"Tax incentives" is POV because it implies that the tax provisions will provide incentives for some sort of desired behavior. I think "tax cuts" was perfectly fine, but since you object to it, let's just use the completely objective term "tax provisions" in the headings. The elaboration of the detail of how specific tax laws would be affected can be left to the body of the article. JamesMLane t c 12:44, 9 November 2010 (UTC)

"Provisions" is not merely objective, it's ambiguous. By "incentives" they don't mean they gave money blindly and hoped it would incentivize a certain use, they mean that a credit was offered for a certain act or behavior, for example trading in for an energy star appliance, insulating a home, buying a hybrid car or installing solar panels. They gave such a credit not in advance of this action, they gave it upon confirmation of the action. That some modifications may have resulted in an increase here or there is irrelevant to the fact that the billions apportioned to that section of the Act paid for tax reductions. If you want to know whether these acts or behaviors were incentivized by these credits, you should look at the incidence of the acts and behaviors preceding the Act, as one does with the "Cash-for-clunkers" stimulus. It's not words that are POV, it's whether the facts support those words. "Cash-for-clunkers" incentivized auto purchases; this stimulus stimulated. Did these incentives incentivize? How about finding reliable sources to that regard? Considering we're, what, 2/3 of the way through this particular aspect of stimulus, I'd say we're beyond, as JamesMLane casts it, "implying something will exhibit some sort of behavior" and can identify how people who enjoyed the tax incentives in question did behave. Abrazame (talk) 08:51, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

But once again, none of these are reductions on the tax rates which are assessed. To call them "tax reductions" with no further explanation is misleading for the reasons that: 1.) No base tax rates have changed. 2.) Only people who engage in certain behaviors see any effect on the taxes that they end up paying. 3.) Most of these behaviors involve spending money, meaning taxpayers do not see a reduction in the money they keep. They're just being incentivized to pay it out in a different way. In order to describe these tax provisions as incentives, we don't need any evidence that the incentives worked. All we need to know is that tax benefits are being offered to people who carry out certain behaviors, which is already in the article. That's the definition of a tax incentive. Using precise language to describe exactly what these are would be the most NPOV way to write the article. Deliberately obscuring the details through excessively vague language, or using language that normally implies something else are both POV. TBSchemer (talk) 04:41, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

It's not accurate to present all the tax changes under the heading of "tax incentives". Although some of the relevant provisions are indeed intended as incentives, some of them, such as the change in the AMT floor, are clearly not intended to incentivize anything because they don't relate to anyone's behavior. Others relate to behavior but almost certainly aren't intended as incentives -- at least, unless we have a reliable source, we shouldn't say or imply that the expansion of the child tax credit is intended to encourage pregnancies, or that the favorable tax treatment of unemployment compensation is intended to encourage joblessness, or that the increased opportunity to use current losses to offset prior profits is intended to encourage corporations to lose money.

"Tax provisions", "tax reductions", "tax cuts", and "tax changes" are all accurate and neutral. I don't read "tax cuts" as implying changes in the marginal rates, but if some people object to that, there are plenty of alternatives. Yes, "tax provisions" is ambiguous as to whether the provisions were incentives or not -- that's because some were and some weren't. Still, if for some reason you object to that, isn't "tax changes" accurate and neutral? If you consider it important to highlight the incentive aspects, beyond what's obvious from reading the summaries of the provisions, you could certainly add a paragraph after the summary listing, noting the incentive aspects and presenting whatever data are available about how people did behave. JamesMLane t c 07:11, 7 December 2010 (UTC)