The New 2009 $250 Stimulus Check: Inciting Spending by the Retired

While treated as a backburner part of President Obama's humungous stimulus bill, the $250 checks being sent out to those on the two versions of Social Security will be sent out in May of this year. All of that was announced unceremoniously a few days before the writing of this article by Vice President Biden rather than President Obama himself. That might make this next round of stimulus in our sagging economy feel like filler--and Congressional Republicans said as much beforehand. It's obvious that if there's going to be any stimulus checks, having the money go toward those who need it the most is what makes it more gratifying and the most tolerable of adding to the national deficit. Nevertheless, as with last year's stimulus checks that went to everybody, the philosophical question of what you can actually do with $250 will have to be asked.

The simple answer is that $250 is...well, $250. The complex answer is that many people on Social Security (or primarily SSI), on disability or veterans benefits are already hurting financially and are more apt to funnel that $250 into paying bills rather than using it to stimulate the economy. In other words, it could be the same as last year's slightly bigger stimulus check and not really make that much of a difference in making consumerism ring the cash register bell.

Or, the situation could be different because of a different mindset.

At least the situation of giving money to those in the retirement age bracket will create an interesting experiment to see what older people spend money on. As many that'll place that $250 into the energy companies while trying to pay a heat bill--or in the coffers of the credit card companies while abjectly shoveling one's self out of debt--others will be spending it on something that actually does uphold consumerism. In a stigmatized world, the picture would be a blue hair hitching a bus to their local Native-American-owned gambling casino and placing the money on the slot machines. More stigmas would be the image of an older person watching a hip TV show with the hippest of commercials and the elder turning invisible because he or she doesn't exist in the mind of Nielsen ratings or TV advertising.

The reality is that some of those retired people getting the stimulus check will spend it on hip (no, not hip replacement) products advertisers still don't have a clue those over 34 were buying. That means everything from the worst in snack foods to the latest video games. In fact, it's a good bet you know at least one older person who buys more products for the 18-34 set than the younger demographic does. More well-off older people aren't afraid to spend their money on mainstream products that really don't make them any healthier, yet keep the economy humming along in its status quo mode. No doubt those on SSI do the same when they can afford it.

Whether they'll use that $250 check to spend money on those same products now would be interesting to find out if anybody's paying attention and creates a public report later this year. Generally, the consensus is that those on SSI, disabled benefits or our nation's veterans are mostly and perpetually suffering financially. But when there's such a strong personal feeling of greediness behind credit card companies, energy companies and every other service people have to pay through the nose for, is it realistic to think that even some of those seniors would use that $250 to pay off debts or other bills?
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Based on over-generalized accounts from the stimulus checks last year and the first one in 2001, most people spent their check on things purchased in electronics stores where the temptation to buy something technological never wavers in the hearts of many Americans. Yet since those last two stimulus checks went to all age brackets rather than just seniors, there's still that above-mentioned assumption that the seniors getting this check will need it to use on their expenses. Even Vice President Biden made the statement that those getting this check are mostly financially struggling because of fixed incomes and the rising costs of all things needed to live decently.

Yes, if you talk to older people, they complain about the sense of greed in corporations as much as everybody else. It's more of a sharp change in the direction of America for them when many of them grew up assuming nothing like that was happening or would happen in America. That's why the assumption older people will put the $250 into bills may have to be assumed to be wrong this time around based on the growing discontent that people are being fleeced. Naturally, it'll depend on how desperate those older people are in obtaining money to pay off a bill or a credit card debt. We nonetheless could be surprised that through an act of defiance, seniors will mostly spend the $250 on something they want rather than giving it to that new mindset of greedy corporations.

As much as that might hurt some seniors in becoming temporarily solvent, it'll do exactly what the economy needs in getting people to spend in the retail market. It might become the new form of protest in pumping money back into the avenues of retail rather than gas companies, our utilities or credit card companies profiting from the stimulus than they already have. Doing that would help save a lot of foot traffic and arm strength holding up picket signs in D.C. where an inevitable protest of the wide economic schism could occur down the road.

So if you're in an electronics store later this summer and see a person in their 60's or 70's buying a Wii system or an iPod, consider that it might be an eye-opening result of that $250 stimulus check and a new defiance in bringing back a temporary and miniscule slice of the American Dream where corporations don't become an obstacle.

Chances are there won't be another stimulus check made available for a long, long time if ever...which only gives the use of it as a monetary protest all the more of an adamancy...

Source:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/03/26/seniors.stimulus/