So Mr. President, Economists Agree, Eh?

The latest whopper to be added to the untruths uttered by the Liar-In-Chief came during this Saturday's Weekly Address to the nation.  Obama, talking about his jobs bill in the Senate that his own majority party blocked last Thursday, said "...this jobs bill can help guard against another downturn here in America.  This isn’t just my belief.  This is what independent economists have said.  Not just politicians.  Not just people in my administration. Independent experts who do this for a living have said that this jobs bill will have a significant effect for our economy and middle-class families all across America.  But if we don’t act, the opposite will be true — there will be fewer jobs and weaker growth."

Oh, really Mr. President?  It is a good thing I caught a glimpse of what economists think in a Bloomberg article ten days ago with a typically misleading heading for the left leaning rag that it is: Obama Jobs Plan Prevents 2012 Recession In Survey Of Economists.  The article itself was of not much value to me as nothing much that left wing Bloomberg says ever impresses me, however the table showing the consensus of economists at the end of the article was very revealing:

============================================================
                                                   Table of Forecasts
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                           GDP     GDP     Jobs (thous)     UR Change
                           2012     2013     2012    2013     2012    2013
============================================================
Median                0.6        0.2        275      13        -0.2     -0.1
Count                   34         30          28       28          28      26
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Action Eco          0.0        0.0           0         0          0.0     0.0
AIG                     0.7        0.1        250     100        -0.5    -0.2
Aletti                   0.4        0.0         n/a      n/a          n/a     n/a
Anderson Eco     0.5        0.5        500     500         -0.5     n/a
BBVA                 1.3        0.9        900     900         -0.8    -0.7
BNP Paribas        0.5      -0.3        500    -300          n/a     n/a
Clearview Eco     0.8       0.8        750     750         -0.5    -0.5
DB                       0.0       0.0            0         0          0.0      0.0
Econoclast           0.0       0.0            0         0          0.0      0.0
Euler Hermes       0.0     0.0              0        0           0.0     0.0
Fact & Opinion    0.5     0.5          500  1,000         -0.1    -0.3
Faifield                 n/a     n/a          300     200         -0.2    -0.3
Fannie Mae          0.7     0.0          500         0           0.0     0.0
Goldberg Inv        n/a     n/a          150     100           n/a     n/a
Goldman Sachs    1.5     n/a           n/a      n/a           n/a     n/a
Guerrilla               1.5    -1.0          200       0           -0.2     n/a
H. Johnson            0.2     0.3            25      45           0.2     0.2
JP Morgan            0.1      n/a          n/a     n/a            n/a     n/a
MacroEco             1.3     n/a           n/a     n/a            n/a     n/a
MacroFin              1.5     1.5       1,000   1,000        -1.0    -1.0
Manulife               1.5     0.5       2,000     700         -1.0    -0.3
Mizuho                 0.2     0.0           n/a      n/a           n/a     n/a
Moodys                 2.0     1.0       1,000        0          -1.0    -0.4
NFIB                    0.0     0.0               0        0           0.0     0.0
Niagara                 1.0     0.1          125        0           0.0     0.0
Nord                     0.4     0.5            n/a     n/a          -0.2    -0.4
Parsanec               0.5     0.5        1,100     700         -1.0    -0.5
Pierpont                0.3     0.0            50         0          -0.2     0.0
Raymond James   0.3     0.2          350       25          -0.5    -0.1
SPSU                    0.9     0.1          110        0            0.0     0.0
SocGen                 1.7     0.8              1        1           -0.4    -0.2
State Street           1.2    -1.0          340    -370          -0.2     0.3
Standard Charter  1.0     0.5          600      300           0.0     0.0
Unicredit               2.0     n/a          n/a      n/a            n/a     n/a
W Hummer           0.2     0.2         150     200           -0.1    -0.1
J Forest                 1.0     1.0          n/a      n/a           -1.0    -0.5
============================================================

Let's see.....

The administration estimates that the bill will create about 1.9 million jobs.  With the exception of a few economists who have enough integrity not to venture a wild assed guess based on faulty (because you cannot model human behavior, especially when the administration in charge is actively destroying the free market system) econometric models, the range of estimates for what the nearly half a trillion dollar bill would create in the way of jobs is huge: from job losses of 30,000 to job gains of 2.7 million.  The median estimate of new jobs estimates is 288,000 over two years at an approximate cost of quarter of a million dollars per job!  Even if those jobs were created, stimulus can at best create temporary jobs that are hugely expensive - not the productive type that free markets create.

With wildly varying estimates, I don't know about you but that is no consensus in my book.

While at the subject of jobs, the Labor Department reported that there were 108,000 newly created jobs in September.  Exactly 28 years ago, a year after the deep 1982 recession, economy added 1.1 million jobs in September 1983.  The difference between then and now isn't the magnitude of the recessions but the policies the U.S. pursued to restore growth.  Under Reagan, tax rates were cut, loopholes were closed, regulations were eased, and government was in retreat.  Today, we've had a spending and regulatory boom, the threat of higher tax rates, and a hostile, antibusiness political climate.  Policies have consequences, Mr. President.