She who is always wrong™ may want to check on what her September April call-ups are doing. Here’s Adam Ozimek in McArdle’s space pointing out four things upon which just about all economists agree, and among them he lists the virtues of the stimulus:
Economists may differ on whether the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act was worth the cost overall, but they are in solid agreement that as of the end of 2010 it lowered the unemployment rate. Very few disagreed with or were uncertain about this. In contrast, a significant number questioned whether the recovery act was worth the cost. Importantly, in the space for comments, Stanford’s Pete Klenow emphasized what Scott Sumner and others would say is the central issue: “how much was it offset by less aggressive (than otherwise) unconventional monetary policy?” But even stimulus skeptics should keep their criticisms in perspective: economists strongly reject the idea that stimulus is to blame for our economic woes.
In addition, economists strongly agree that the bank bailouts also lowered the unemployment rate. Of course as Austen Goolsbee commented: “the fact it was necessary doesn’t mean we should be happy about it.”
McArdle, canny as she is, has been careful not to go too far into the weeds on this one.
She doesn’t seem to have said that stimulus as a concept could only fail — as some notables (cough-cough, Mitt) on her side of the aisle have done and continue to do. But she has consistently said that only a Platonic ideal of a stimulus had a hope, and that any real world attempt is a waste of time.