President Barack Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act—the stimulus—after less than one month in office on February 17, 2009. It succeeded in arresting a catastrophic economic free fall that had become much worse between the president’s election and his inauguration. But the slow pace of the recoverty that followed has cast “stimulus” as practically a dirty word in some circles. What has been lost in this and other political fights over the last four years is that this one law could usher in major changes in tax policy, clean energy development, education reform, and infrastructure investment.
In his new book The New New Deal, Time magazine’s Senior National Correspondent Michael Grunwald uncovers new details on the successes and failures of the stimulus, one of the most significant and least understood pieces of legislation ever to emerge from Washington. With the country set to choose in November between two radically different visions of the future of the American economy, please join the Center for American Progress for a timely and important conversation on the real story on the law that some view as an unprecedented waste of taxpayer money but one that likely saved the economy from another depression and could change the policy landscape forever.
Copies of The New New Deal will be available for purchase at the event.
Featured Author:
Michael Grunwald, Author, The New New Deal; Senior National Correspondent for Time magazine
Moderated by:
Neera Tanden, President, Center for American Progress