One year into the $787 billion spending spree that is the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, we still have high unemployment, low investor confidence, and a ballooning federal deficit which threatens future economic growth. But despite all this, we should be happy that Obama’s stimulus has been funding work at our alma mater:
Examples of the highlighted research include a study of the relationship between depression and heart disease at Emory University; obesity research at Cornell University that tests a variety of strategies for encouraging better nutrition and eating habits…
The problem with the report cited in the article is that it tries to defend the stimulus by providing examples of the beneficial research that has been conducted with stimulus funds. This shouldn’t come as a big surprise to anyone. If you throw billions of dollars of grant money to top universities, is there any doubt that they might crank out some good research? The point of the stimulus was to use government expenditure to jump start the American economy after the 2008 financial crisis, not to fund solar power and obesity research.
Maybe the Cornell researchers concluded that eating less results in less obesity? Who knows.
