THE GREAT TEMPTATION:

Estimate of TARP losses falls to $25 billion (Jim Puzzanghera, 11/30/10, Los Angeles Times)

The projected cost of the $700-billion financial bailout fund — initially feared to be a huge hit to taxpayers — continues to drop, with the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimating Monday that losses would amount to just $25 billion.

That's a sharp drop from the CBO's last estimate, in August, of a $66-billion loss for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, known as TARP. Going back to March, the budget office estimated that the program would cost taxpayers $109 billion.

Leave it to W to design a plan that not only avoided a depression but will end up making tax payers money. The only problem is it sets too attractive an example of government intervention.

Posted by Orrin Judd at November 30, 2010 6:32 AM