I saw this story on Instapundit, it appears that minorities are not benefiting from the stimulus dollars.
From The Associated Press: WASHINGTON – Hispanic and black businesses are receiving a disproportionately small number of federal stimulus contracts, creating a rising chorus of demands for the Obama administration to be more inclusive and more closely track who receives government-financed work.
Latinos and blacks have faced obstacles to winning government contracts long before the stimulus. They own 6.8 and 5.2 percent of all businesses, respectively, according to census figures. Yet Latino-owned business have received only 1.7 percent of $46 billion in federal stimulus contracts recorded in U.S. government data, and black-owned businesses have received just 1.1 percent.
That pot of money is just a small fraction of the $862 billion economic stimulus law. Billions more have been given to states, which have used the money to award contracts of their own.
Although states record minority status when they award contracts to businesses, there is no central, consistent or public compilation of that data, according to Laura Barrett, director of the Transportation Equity Network. She and other minority advocates are calling for complete and publicly accessible demographic information on all contracts and jobs financed by the stimulus. [MORE]
I say blame this on the hasty and haphazard way the stimulus was constructed and disburse. Remember back to the beginning of 2009, when Obama was doing his best Chicken Little impersonation, Obama demanded that the stimulus be passed NOW, NOW, NOW! There was not analysis of where the money was most needed; there was no analysis of who could benefit the most. One would imagine that even with all the cronyism written into the stimulus, Democrats would have at least carved out something for their most loyal voting block … blacks, but no. As usual Democrats simply harvest the votes from blacks and other minorities and then go about pushing their liberal agenda.
The article goes on to state that the Federal government blames state governments for the lopsided numbers. However, here too we must blame haste. There was no time for state government to access where the money was most needed. In addition, many parts of the stimulus money came with strings attached and those strings demanded that the money be spent in areas that were predetermined without full knowledge of how the recession was to unfold.
Reading this article left me with a sense of bitter betrayal. We all know that so many blacks and minorities voted for Obama because he was black. Right or wrong, they felt that having one of their own running the show would or could somehow translate into a better addressing of their concerns. Sadly, like so many who fell for the allure of Hope and Change, blacks and minorities are going to learn the hard way that putting a black face on the same old liberal policies will not bring better results.
Via: Instapundit
Via: Associated Press
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3 comments:
This seems to be a problem associated with two things: the maount of paperwork required to do government work (from my discussions with small biz owners, mostly in excavating), and the new requirement that only union shops can apply for contractor jobs. Lots of minority and other small businesses are not unionized.
I've said all along that BO was just "Massa" with a black face. I could smell his BS a mile away and would not fall for the Hoax and Chains crap, my vote meant too much for me to throw away on a pile of manure like that. One of these days, our folks will get tired of being b*tch-slapped by the Dems and get the hell off the "plantation" once and for all. When we finally stop begging for scraps at Massa's back door and learn some self-reliance and self-sufficiency, we will be just fine.
This really hits a nerve with me, but not because of the minority angle. It's because I own a very small business and frankly, we are for all intent and purposes locked out of being able to get Gov contracts, let alone stimulus ones. The paperwork and application process is forbidding and overly burdensome. The large firms have staffs that do nothing but prepare and work these applications. I get emails daily from FedMarket and others about paying them thousnads of dollars just to help me get a federal listing. It does not help that a "small" business is defined to be 100 employees or less and up to, what 8 million in annual sales. I wish! Instead these contracts go to the same network of good ole boys that can put together the best dog and pony show.
And if a minority does get the contract, often times they are hiring non-minorities to do the work, so it does not benefit minorities as much as it does minority "owned" companies. It's a shell game. Unfortunately in my state (maybe fortunately) you cannot claim to be a woman or minority owned business unless the owner is Licensed to do the work. So for trades that require a license, no way to play the "owned" game, wile others do it all they can. I could go on and on...
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