This brief, issued on the first anniversary of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, examines the effect of ARRA stimulus funding on community health centers. It projects that the federal investment of approximately two billion dollars in the nation’s 1,100 community health centers will generate $3.2 billion in economic activity – an estimated return on investment of nearly two dollars for every dollar spent. Because health centers were able to rapidly transform the infusion of funding into new services and jobs, the ARRA investment provided significant relief to many of the nation’s hardest hit communities and has acted as an effective economic engine.
The brief is authored by Peter Shin, Brian Bruen, Emily Jones, Leighton Ku and Sara Rosenbaum.