As a part of the bad news surrounding politicians of all stripes these days in the United States, it should come as no surprise that the $787 billion stimulus package is viewed as a failure by a majority of people polled.  That being said, despite the heavily reported negatives surrounding it like various amounts of fraud and waste, the truth is that the package did what it was supposed to, and the economy is actually improving because of it.

I've read estimates that say in a huge spending bill, or any huge amount of spending by private interests, you will generally see somewhere in the area of 7 or 8 percent waste.  In the case of the stimulus we're seeing that figure come under 7 percent, which by any standard is pretty damn good, because quite frankly there will always be people down the line who try to scam any system, no matter what you do.

Let's take a short trip down memory lane and examine exactly what the stimulus package was and still is.  One third of the package were tax cuts to middle income Americans which, unlike the Bush tax cuts for the rich, were actually paid for in the package.  The other third of spending was to bailout the states desperate for help to stabilize their budgets and save the jobs of teachers and police officers, as well as making sure states could afford to pay unemployment benefits.  Independent studies have estimated that the number of jobs saved or created are somewhere between 1.6 to 1.8 million jobs, with more to come as the spending continues.  The final third went to infrastructure and ready to go projects across the country, including investment in the green industry so that the United States could be a producer of green technology instead of just a consumer.

Now that you have that under your belt, head on over to this article over at the New York Times and take a look at the article on why the stimulus actually worked.

UPDATE:  The President spoke today about the successes of the Recovery Act, saying that the stimulus saved the economy from the worst of the crisis and will continue to help ease the suffering of Americans while the economy begins to grow again.  Watch his remarks below: