Although the benefits of a costly, infrastructure-focused stimulus package based on massive gov­ernment spending may be intuitively attractive, past evidence suggests that the impact of govern­ment spending programs that are intended to encourage economic growth is very modest and unlikely to enhance recovery or deter recession. As noted above, the Japanese government imple­mented such a program during the 1990s, and the consequence was two decades of economic stagna­tion. Less ambitious infrastructure stimulus pro­grams have been implemented in the United States over the past few decades, and numerous indepen­dent and government studies have concluded that these programs had little impact on economic activity or jobs.

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