Get your stimulus tax dollars back! Making investment moves on the 2009 stimulus package
Though it is still far too early to ever know what parts of the stimulus package will be funded while others lie dormant the prospect of earning your tax dollars back through investing in a new stimulated economy seems attractive. Billions of dollars will be spent on consumer products for both government and industry and tax breaks could inevitably prop up businesses that might have otherwise gone under.
I’ve become quite fond of one website which lays it all out there. StimulusWatch.org is excellent, it shows every local project that could be immediately funded by stimulus dollars and breaks them down by city and state.
Even through more than 1000 pages of the stimulus bill it is impossible to track where every dollar might eventually land. Many stimulus driven programs and government jobs will be created through the backdoor of different grant programs both established and new.
But one thing is certain. Piling through the data on the StimulusWatch website will give the gambling investor some insight as to how to properly invest and grab some of their future tax dollars back.
Just in my own small town of roughly 150,000 people there are $148 Million worth of potential projects that could be covered. From new astroturf football fields to most likely be completed by a local firm to a project requiring $205,000 to buy Microsoft office suites for school PCs there is surely something for everyone.
By using the search function on the site I found that there are 14 projects to equip law enforcement officers with Tasers. The company TASR which sells “non-lethal” stun guns will receive as much as $2,442,594 from the stimulus package alone if these projects were to be funded. For comparison TASR is now valued at roughly $300 Million, and last year sold $30 Million worth of TASERs in the current quarter. An additional $2.4 Million direct to the bottomline without any additional employment costs or production costs could certainly help their bottom line.
Also to be considered is the average $13 per week tax break that most American’s will receive as a result of this stimulus. The amount seems small, and that was the idea as huge lump sum stimulus payments in the past (cough, the $155 Billion stimulus last year) were sent to creditors rather than to merchants.
Thinking marginally $13 per week may be spent on a CD, perhaps on a pizza or may keep some smokers smoking through a $.61 tax hike on cigarettes. Marginally these small amounts of money are huge (obviously) and could keep many businesses in business.
Take a look through stimuluswatch.org and do let me know if you find anything interesting in your city or town, post your comments below.
