Recovery Act Dashboard - PublicDashboards.com
El Dorado Hills, Calif. – VisualCalc, a provider of web-based analysis software and the creator of PublicDashboards.com (http://www.PublicDashboards.com)
The Recovery Act Dashboard highlights key details of the American Recovery Act that was just passed by the U.S. Congress. This new public dashboard helps expose important information associated with the act that might otherwise go undetected; for example:
• Individual tax cuts are the largest component of the American Recovery Act, accounting for $246.9 billion of the plan. Healthcare reforms are second, at $107.6 billion, while individual aid packages are third, at $70.5 billion.
• The Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO’s) baseline (pre-Recovery Act) estimate for the federal deficit by the year 2019 was $423 billion. The February 2009 estimate for the 2019 deficit, which incorporated the Recovery Act, was $422 billion. The CBO’s latest estimate, from March 2009, is that the deficit will grow to $1,189 billion by the year 2019.
• From a state perspective, California stands to benefit the most from the American Recovery Act, receiving a projected $4.8 billion in spending on infrastructure and housing, and 396,000 newly created and protected jobs. New York is second in spending and third in jobs, at $3.7 billion and 215,000, respectively;
There are two new dashboards covering the California budget crisis and the proposed 2009-10 Governor’s Budget. One of the dashboards focuses on General Fund revenues and expenditures, and their impact on the state’s reserve and budget gap. The second dashboard is concentrated on overall budget revenue sources and expenditures. As with the Recovery Act Dashboard, these new public dashboards highlight key facts associated with the Governor’s proposed 2009-10 budget, including:
• Under the current workload (status quo) budget, California’s reserve at the end of the 2009-10 fiscal period is projected to be a deficit of $39.6 billion. The December 1 special session proposals are projected to reduce this deficit to $17.2 billion. Factoring in all the proposed budget solutions is expected to create a $2.2 billion positive reserve at the end of the 2009-10 fiscal term.
• California state expenditures per capita increased from $1,725 in 1990-91 to $3,661 in 2007-08. However, they actually declined over the last year, to $3,554 in 2008-09, and, under the proposed budget, are projected to drop even further in 2009-10, to $3,495.
• Spending categories accounting for the largest projected expenditures are K-12 Education, at $40.7 billion, and Health & Human Services, at $38 billion. The top two projected revenue sources are Personal Income Taxes, at $48.8 billion (up from $47.8 billion in 2008-09), and Sales Taxes, at $38.1 billion (an increase of $4.8 billion from 2008-09).
These three new dashboards will be incorporated into VisualCalc’s public dashboard website: http://www.PublicDashboards.com. PublicDashboards.com contains a set of interactive dashboards covering a variety of topical issues, including the U.S. housing market, inflation and gas prices, the environment, education statistics, employment trends, and health-related data. PublicDashboards.com organizes detailed, complex data related to these issues into interactive, easy-to-use charts and graphs called indicators. These visual indicators help users identify trends or issues that might otherwise go undetected. In addition, these indicators enable users to perform deeper analysis into the underlying data. With a simple point-and-click, users can filter and drill-down into any of the indicators to customize their view of the data.
“These three new economic dashboards focus on issues that are at the top of today’s news,” said Amit Mazumdar, CEO of VisualCalc. “With their graphical, easy-to-understand format, these free dashboards help the public sort through all the complexity surrounding these important economic topics, and immediately grasp the latest data, assumptions and projections.”
Organizations that track or communicate information related to any of these topics – including public or commercial websites and online or print media – are welcome to include links to these public dashboards on their websites. These links can be found on the PublicDashboards.com website.
Photo:
http://www.prlog.org/
