This is a pretty straight forward thread. Those who are eligible to receive a stimulus check from the government, are you going to spend it to buy something nice, use it to pay off bills or will you put it in your savings account in case of hard times?

Seems like the whole point of the check is to go out and buy crap with it. The boring, but logical way to spend it for some people is to pay off debts. The mature and smart thing to do seems to be to sit on it and wait until needing it during hard times.

So, what are you going to do with it?

I voted for "save", though my financial situation is relatively complicated, so I could have also said "pay bills". My company owes me about $5500 dollars between expense reimbursement and tuition reimbursement, so for the moment, it'll be a drop in the bucket of my credit card bill. But, when all the shells are shifted, it'll ultimately go toward investment/savings.

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"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

Personally, I think I'm going to save it. As tempting as it would be to go out and buy a Playstation 3 or something, it looks like we're not really going to be sure how things are going to be months down the road. If food prices and gas prices continue to go crazy, there would be the possibility that I would be sitting in my house with a Playstation 3, but no power to run it because it was too hard to pay the bills...

Fortunately, I'm relatively debt free, so I don't really have that hanging over my head.

This will pay off the balance of my wifes car...why not...save a few payments.
I don't know of anyone personally that is going to blow it....IMO the governments advice is about as bad as it can get - we are in this trouble due to people making purchases they shouldn't have - so the last thing people should do is blow this...the smartest thing people with smaller incomes is to use the money to supplement their grocery/gas spending for a couple months.

I chose "only for necessities." We're planning to use the money to replace some very worn out furniture. If we didn't need it for that, we'd probably apply it toward paying off debt.

I didn't think the rebate would create the kind of stimulus the administration is counting on. But I heard a report that when we had a similar rebate earlier this decade, about 2/3 of the money was actually pumped back into the economy within six months. So maybe this rebate will have some positive impact.

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There you are!

Maybe they're counting on people who have already spent the money to 'help' the economy by actually being able to repay their creditors. This seems like the most likely scenario for the average American (credit card debt).

I'm just playing devil's advocate - I think that giving everyone in American a check for $600 is a silly idea.

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"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

No sillier than giving JP Morgan $60B. (had to say that)

They had something in the Onion about Bear Stearns that was really funny. In that section where they ask people for "points of view", they were asking about the buy out and one person said something like:

"I don't know. Don't you think it's a bad idea to give money to a company that failed at its only job which is to have money?"

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"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

that is a good one.

Did you catch Bill Maher's comment? - "I'll tell you how screwed up the economy is, if you owe $75,000 on a home and lose your job, you are a dead beat and will be put out on the streets in 90 days, if you fall behind on a million mortgages and your name is Bear Stearns - the government will pay them for you.

what if you don't *Ucking get one?????

My son owes us some money, so my wife and I will get a refund via a middle man, beleive that?
Is this whole thing all screwed or what?

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No individual can plan his own existence in their view.

So the state planners must arrogate to themselves the right to manipulate any sector of the economic system if the good of “society” or the “general welfare” is paramount.

Ipso- if the rights of the individual get in the way, the rights of the individual must be sublimated.

The Road to Serfdom
FA Hayek (interpretation)


Mortgage Backed Security survivor

I foresee that money going to moving expenses (we're getting kicked out of our apt. so they can renovate and raise the rent, blast them) and a sofa.

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To educate a man in mind and not in morals is to educate a menace to society. -Theodore Roosevelt

It's very screwed up, I too will get either nothing or very little.
LIke I say, that is one reason why they (with little fan-fare) changed the name from "tax-relief" to "economic stimulus"....people who actually pay alot of taxes get nothing or very little, people who pay barely ANY taxes get the most.

interesting - but not surprising...only 1-11 buying something frivolous...less than 10% so far.

I'll admit, when I first heard about this, I thought "Sweet, high definition camcorder, here I come!". Then the cold hand of reality totally killed my buzz.

I think polls indicate most of it will go to debt service, less than half will actually be available for spending.
But still, I'd like to thank the people of China for lending us this money.

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“ The subjects of every state ought to contribute towards the support of the government, as nearly as possible, in proportion to their respective abilities; that is, in proportion to the revenue which they respectively enjoy under the protection of the state.”

Adam Smith , The Wealth of Nations 1776

"We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we know now that it is bad economics"
FDR's second Inaugural Address