Enron accounting: Stimulus saved or created 19,500 jobs in Michigan

Let me just cut to the money quote on this state-run AP piece that I read today:

The report doesn’t distinguish the number of jobs saved from the number created by the stimulus package.

If one can't delineate between what jobs were created versus those that already existed and were saved, then of what value is the number? What that tells me is that they don't have a clue and simply designated a certain dollar value for a job and divided the stimulus money by that number and viola! For instance, the AP article in the Oakland Press indicates that $3.7 billion, Obamabucks as it were, was given to Michigan, of which $620 million was spent on these jobs (the rest is budget backfill so that Granholm can leave office in 2012 without havering to make any tough decisions). Thus, $620 million divided by 19,500 jobs = $31,795 per job. That's the number some bureaucrat put on an average job. That doesn't mean that a single job was created. Or saved for that matter. Now, for the rest of that AP piece:

About 19,500 jobs in Michigan were saved or created through the end of September with federal stimulus money, according to the state’s first accounting of how the money was spent.

About 74 percent of the jobs were at schools or related to education, according to a state report released Monday. Many of the jobs were likely teachers or others who would have been laid off without the federal money.

When you see words like "likely" appearing in what should be a substantive sentence, it means one thing: they have no clue. They don't know. These are imaginary numbers in a bureaucrats mind.

“The blow would have been much worse had that money not been there,” said Doug Pratt, a spokesman for the Michigan Education Association, the state’s largest teachers union.

Now there's a reliable source for you. The MEA. Good. Grief.

The report doesn’t distinguish the number of jobs saved from the number created by the stimulus package. But it’s likely Michigan’s high unemployment rate — 15.2 percent in August — would be worse if it weren’t for the federal assistance.

The state has lost more than 300,000 jobs in the past year.

Now we're getting at it. The state lost more than 300,000 jobs in the past year. But fear not, loyal taxpaying citizen! If we didn't bankrupt the national economy, we would have instead lost more than 319,500 jobs! Doesn't that make you feel much better about Michigan's nation leading unemployment rate for 41 straight months running??? All this Enron jobs accounting is there to provide flak for the stimulus bill that has cost jobs. No jobs were saved or created. They were lost. Gone. Blew away into the wind. Remember that the stimulus package was supposed to stop the unemployment rate at 8%! A crisis could become a calamity? Remember that? Here's how that looks (via Moe Lane):Note that the blue lines are the numbers that Obama's team came up with. So the actual unemployment rate is not only worse that what would happen with porkulus, but even worse than was predicted without it. Here is what has been happening with jobs this year:

January US jobs lost: 598,000 jobs
February US jobs lost: 706,000 jobs
March US jobs lost: 742,000 jobs
April US jobs lost: 545,000 jobs
May US jobs lost: 345,000 jobs
June US jobs lost: 467,000 jobs
July US jobs lost: 247,000 jobs
August US jobs lost: 216,000 jobs
September US jobs lost: 263,000 jobs

Total US jobs lost under Obama: 4,129,000 jobs

How's that stimulus working out???