I loathe the "stimulus", but if our taxes are to be spent in such sums anyway, I think that the result should make a difference. Replace all high emissions car

I loathe the "stimulus", but if our taxes are to be spent in such sums anyway, I think that the result should make a difference. Replace all high emissions cars with electrics or hybrids. Pay off all mortgages in the country, while passing an amendment that forbids the Feds from ever doing it again (otherwise, the possibility that they'll do it again will distort the market even more than it would anyway). Set up prizes for all kinds of space or research goals, like landing on the moon, landing on Mars, first private individual on the moon, first full GWhr beamed from a solar power satellite, first tonne of machinable superconducter at room temperature, first, tenth, and thousandth tonne returned to earth from an asteroid, etc. This has the added bonus that tax money is only spent if someone makes it. Or something else. But something that matters, rather than just paying people to do a little more of what they're already doing, here or there, where they went to school with the program administrators or whatever.