Government buys one lawnmower, claims it created or saved 50 jobs

[luckyme]

In June, the federal government spent $1,047 in stimulus money to buy a rider mower from the Toro Company to cut the grass at the Fayetteville National Cemetery in Arkansas. Now, a report on the government’s stimulus Web site improbably claims that that single lawn mower sale helped save or create 50 jobs.
...
A spokesman for Toro said the 50-job figure was not accurate, making it one of a number of reports with apparent errors. In many other cases, though, claims of jobs created are simply judgment calls, often by recipients trying to follow complex federal guidelines

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/05/us...ulus.html?_r=1


Just incredible.

[pgg]

They were talking about Federal Jobs. We all know that when you mow the grass you must have the Operator, the safety officers, the perimeter safety officers, the instructors, the supervisors, the OSHA reps, the Union reps, etc on site while completing the job.

[Five-0]

What pgg said and the fact that we are talking government math here to boot.

[Aegis]

It's the damn "stimulus" grant requirements. Typical Fed bullcrap.

I was forced to do the grant for our department ($17k) and I called the DOJ Bureau of Justice Assistance grant desk to tell them that I didn't think we should apply for the grant because the money we were awarded was not enough to "create or save" any jobs. I was advised by the pencil pusher that my equipment purchases could "theoretically" save or create a job for the manufacturer or distributor of the equipment.

I told her that my signature was going to be on the grant papers and that I didn't trust the federal government to not bust me in the future and claim my grant paperwork was improper because I couldn't really show a created or saved job.
She responded that the State of Kentucky could withhold any state funds my department received if I didn't "make every effort" to obtain available federal funds! So I clarified with her that she was telling me that if I didn't go ahead and complete my grant application, that the state might punish my department by withholding local funding. She confirmed it, and I finished the grant.

I wouldn't be surprised if other agencies got the same pressure to show questionable job numbers in order to "prove" that the stimulus worked like they said it would.

[pac201]

I did a grant for 17 grand and you would've thought I was getting 17 million, all the crap that it required... it probably does create/save a ton of jobs...

[Five-0]

I did a grant for 17 grand and you would've thought I was getting 17 million, all the crap that it required... it probably does create/save a ton of jobs...

Yeah it does, at the paper mill.