No Such Thing as Shovel Ready : The Supply Side of the Recovery Act

Since 2008, support for effective fiscal stimulus has been premised on the belief in the existence of hundreds of billions of dollars worth of what became popularly known as ― shovel-ready projects. These infrastructure construction and improvement projects would simultaneously lower unemployment, provide value to taxpayers, stimulate private sector growth, and begin in 90 days or less. The U.S. media picked up on this expression with over 4,000 news stories on ― shovel-ready projects appearing between November 2008 and March 2009.Under the commission of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, we conducted a first-of-its-kind study, sending interview teams across the country to ask businesses, nonprofits, and local governments just what the stimulus program accomplished. Researchers interviewed representatives of 85 different organizations, drawn from a random sample in five different metropolitan areas, and learned about their experiences applying for and receiving contract and grant funding under ARRA.Our effort seeks to understand how the stimulus affected the decision making of managers of firms and nonprofits that received funds and to use that understanding to assess the theoretical underpinnings of ARRA