Ethanol Subsidies Show Why Washington Is Broken

11 Dec, 2010 by William Teach

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Interesting revelations from the Investors Business Daily

Here’s the bottom line for the ethanol tax credits additive to the White House-GOP tax compromise:

– $6 billion in subsidies for 2011.

– $10 per extra gallon of ethanol.

– $14 million per extra job.

– $1.2 billion to attract one extra Senate vote.

In a season of giving in Washington, the ethanol lobby may come away with even more than it hoped for and its ardent defenders sought.

What does it all boil down to?

(Iowa State University’s Center for Agricultural and Rural Development) director Bruce Babcock said in an e-mail that each 100 million gallons of ethanol creates 70 jobs. Thus, 600 million gallons would result in 420 jobs, or about $14 million per job.

Wow. That sounds gggggggreat! We’ll spend enormous amounts of The People’s money to prop up an industry that produces a fuel that is not even close to as powerful as gasoline, uses immense amounts of water to produce, causes food prices to rise, and, oh, let’s not forget, it puts out just as much, if not more, CO2, that pesky natural gas needed for life that the climate alarmists complain about.

And we’ll spend the money simply to garner one Senate vote. Out in the private sector, we would call that a……..bribe!

Crossed at Pirate’s Cove. Follow me on Twitter @WilliamTeach. sit back and Relax. we’ll dRive!