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This chart, from "The Job Impact of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan" , a report by two Obama administration advisors, was getting a lot of comment late last week on the financial blogs. Mostly on whether or not the numbers could be believed. (Thanks to Calculated Risk for extracting the chart image.)Frankly, I doubt very much that these numbers can be believed. This is a sales job by an incoming administration, in a realm where even unbiased prognostications beyond six months have been overwhelmingly wrong. But let's assume for the moment that this chart is dead accurate. Something leapt out at me that seems to have escaped comment elsewhere -- namely, that in four years' time, the "unstimulated" and "stimulated" forecasts converge. In 2013, there would be essentially no difference between "doing nothing" and the lavish stimulus plan.Which means, the entire (admitted!) purpose of the stimulus plan is to reduce unemployment for the four years of the Obama administration.Now, at its peak (late 2010), this plan is forecast to reduce unemployment by 1.8%...about 2.2 million jobs, according to the report. The median full-time wage in the U.S. for hourly workers seems to be about $25,000 per year . So, just to hand all those folks a $25,000 paycheck would cost $55 billion a year, or $220 billion over four years, which is less expensive than the Obama plan. (And this assumes that we need to create 2.2 million jobs for a full four years, whereas looking at the chart indicates that the Obama plan will create fewer than that for most of the duration.)Which means, the Obama plan is a particularly wasteful way to get a temporary drop in unemployment.Now, I don't mean to belittle the prospect of 2.2 million people having jobs rather than facing unemployment. Unemployment is brutal, and I wouldn't wish it on anyone. But I do mean to belittle the notion that this "stimulus" plan is about solving fundamental problems...except, perhaps, Obama's fundamental problem of getting re-elected in 2012.