Friday, February 20, 2009

More Pennies from Heaven

According to The Kiplinger Letter, The State of Maryland is likely to receive “nearly a half a billion” for infrastructure from the economic stimulus package signed into law this week by President Obama.

The federal infrastructure largess will be “divvied up three ways: 30% each for repairs to roads and bridges. The other 40% will go for intersection and safety improvements.”

But that’s just the infrastructure portion of the bill.

Julekha Dash and Daniel Sernovitz reported in this story in the Baltimore Business Journal that the big money winner in the state is Johns Hopkins.

“One of the biggest surprises in the stimulus package — even to some Hopkins staff — is the additional $10 billion increase in NIH funding, from $29 billion to $39 billion. That is a 34 percent increase for the agency whose funding had been flat for years.

The top recipient of NIH grants, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, receives about $580 million a year in grants that support cancer research, patient safety and treatments for neurological diseases.”

Money that flows into JHU also flows indirectly into Howard County. Dr. Chi Dang, vice dean of research for JHU School of Medicine predicts “There will be a lot of jobs: I can tell you that.”

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

This deficit spending bill is nothing but a money grab. It is almost like trillions of dollars fell from the ceiling over congress like confetti, and the congress people are scooping up as much of it as possible and wildly handing it out like it is xmas or something. Just wait until it comes time for us taxpayers to pay that money back. What a freaking nightmare.

Anonymous said...

You are absolutely correct. The unfortunate thing is that the nightmare will not be confined to the taxpayers. The hyperinflation which is going to erupt is going to make the welfare recipient poorer, destroy the middle class and stifle the ability of the holders of wealth to create jobs and the quality of living to which we have become accustomed.
The pork in the stimulus package is ridiculous. Pilosi and Reid are pandering to the interests of their agendas at the expense of the economic health and wellbeing of our nation. President Obama made a huge mistake by not creating the stimulus package in the executive branch and forcing the Congress to approve it without the pork. Let's pray for the security of President Obama and VP Biden, because Pilosi is the next in line of succession.
HH