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Okay, so, as all of us here are old enough to have jobs and many of us are US citizens I was wondering what everyone's thoughts were on this proposed tax rebate plan that President Bush wants to put in motion in hopes of fighting off a recession. For those not in the know, basically what might happen is that the IRS would send anyone who filed for taxes in 2007 and made a certain amount a check for $300 per person and around $600-$800 for those who filed as a couple. They are also talking about incentives in the form of an even bigger rebate for those who have children that are dependants.*

The idea is to get people to spend the money in order to stimulate the economy.

You can read about it here:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/01/24/economic.stimulus/index.html

I bring this up simply because I thought it'd make an interesting discussion. If it goes through and rebate checks do indeed make it to your mailbox, what would you do with the money?

Discuss:
1. Will this plan work and stiumlate the enconomy or not?
2. If you receive money would you save it?
3. If you chose to spend the money, what would you spend it on?
4. This thread's Futurama references.

*Disclaimer: Headhunter is by no means an economics guru so he may have misquoted or misunderstood something he read. Feel free to mock his foolishness accordingly.

Didn't they do this before, and didn't the government just take back that amount the next year? And if so, won't they just do it again?

On the Futurama note: 100 cups of coffee, and hopefully I'll reach hyper-zen like he did. xd

Alas, that stupid rebate won't even pay my insurance bills for one month! I'll just put it in the bank.

hmmm... extra money... that would probably go to bills, just like all the rest of the money. though we would prolly get the highest refund, my husband and i both worked this year and we have 2 little ones...

and super buick... student loans are no fun. i just finished paying mine off.. they let me make payments... for like the last 5 years.

1. I don't know if it will work or not, but I hope it does. 3nodding
2. If I receive the money I will definitely save it as I'm the only one working (among my mom, steven, and myself) and because of my poor decision a while back. 3nodding Besides I need that money to pay for all my diabetic and cholestorol meds. and supplies. xd (not to mention my college/university tution)
3. If I did choose to spend it (which I probably wouldn't considering all of the above) I would probably spend it on some new storage things for all my miscellaneous "junk" in my bedroom that has no where to go but on the floor for now. sweatdrop
4. I'll plead the fifth as I didn't watch Futurama enough to know anything about the references. confused

You're not a weirdo.

Myself, well I'm not too confident in these refunds. If I was to get 300 bucks well I'd use them for 1. getting my car inspected, you gotta take care of those hunk o' steels so you don't get stranded

2. Shopping spree. It's not that I'm some valley girl. Rather most of my clothing is between 5-10 years old. I have two pairs of jeans and the one is getting a hole near the inner thigh region sweatdrop on top of being tattered. When one of my mock neck sweaters began to unravel at the collar I cut the loose strings with scissors, it looks a little awkward. 90% of my socks have holes in them, big holes. I'd like to be able to throw away all the clothes that are tattered, holey (in the non Jesus sense), faded, so old they have sweat stains (I use deoderant, I promise, but after 12 years some white tops aren't as white...), are massively out of date, or just plain don't fit. I want an exodus of my closet. Oh and new shoes, I've had my boots for about 5 or so years and the heels have ground down so much my boots are actually, well, lopsided.

3. Treat my boyfriend to dinner (since he always pays for me) and get him a nice present to make up for the lack of valentine's day goodness he's getting this year sad

4. Buy my friend Kaity a nice baby shower gift. Prospects currently aren't good with my budget.

5. Go wild and splurge by buying Season 4 of Inu Yasha.

6. Go to White Castle between classes since it is RIGHT by my campus. Munch on some sliders so an hour later I can do nothing but moan about how I am in pain. It's what I crave.

1. No, this won't stimulate the economy at all. They tried this a few years ago with a tax rebate of $400.00 per child for every person claiming children as dependents. The result was negligible. As Lewis Black put it (sorry I'm paraphrasing here): "It's a dollar a day. All a dollar a day does is remind you how ****ed you are! At the end of the year you have $35.00 left over to get your kid a nice big box of **** for Christmas. What you want to do to stimulate the economy is you start a public works project.
That's were you find someplace that really needs something and the government pays people to build a really big ****ing thing! Doesn't matter what it is, it provides employment and when it's done people want to come see the really big ****ing thing! Soon there's a really big ****ing thing hotel, gift shop and Spa!
The people who built the really big ****ing thing have money to spend, the tourists spend money at the really big ****ing thing tourist traps and more jobs are created for said tourist traps and that stimulates the ****ing economy too!" Personally, I think he's right onto things. But my point was that no, this "stimulus" package is an ineffectual joke of an attempt to stall a looming recession that in my opinion is heading for a depression the likes of which we haven't seen since the 1930's.

That said, someone wants to give me $300.00 I'm all for it. I just refuse to delude myself into thinking that it will do anything other than stimulate the economy for the single day after the checks are mailed out and then cease to matter.

2. No, most likely it will go into the black hole of car payments that most of my money goes into. Either that or I'll throw it in the fun account and spend it piecemeal.

3. Actually, now that I think about it, there are a number of new games coming out that I want, but can't justify spending my money on... Some of that money might go towards getting MarioKart Wii, Smash Brothers Brawl and GTA IV.

4. mmmm... $300.00 would buy some good coffee... xp

A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight...

You know what's sad? I'm actually counting on that money now to load up my house on some groceries. Has anyone else noticed a major spike in food prices around the first of the year?

This rebate is a bit nicer than the one which only included people with children. I don't think it's fair to single certain people out. Still as you said, it's (less than) a dollar a day so it sure won't do any major economy spiking.

...and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.