Can be avoided by the long term success that a permanent tax cut would produce. The entire stimulus of gaining a single check in the mail is simply not going to cut it. A story from The Wall Street Journal writer John B. Taylor goes more in depth with the numbers associated.

The argument in favor of these temporary rebate payments was that they would increase consumption, stimulate aggregate demand, and thereby get the economy growing again. What were the results? The chart nearby reveals the answer.

The upper line shows disposable personal income through September. Disposable personal income is what households have left after paying taxes and receiving transfers from the government. The big blip is due to the rebate payments in May through July.

The lower line shows personal consumption expenditures by households. Observe that consumption shows no noticeable increase at the time of the rebate. Hence, by this simple measure, the rebate did little or nothing to stimulate consumption, overall aggregate demand, or the economy.

These results may seem surprising, but they are not. They correspond very closely to what basic economic theory tells us. According to the permanent-income theory of Milton Friedman, or the life-cycle theory of Franco Modigliani, temporary increases in income will not lead to significant increases in consumption. However, if increases are longer-term, as in the case of permanent tax cut, then consumption is increased, and by a significant amount.

Having your income permanently "increased" through a tax cut would give you the ability to plan ahead more appropriately. Whereas the one-time failure that the former checks from the last stimulus offered only a glimpse into that month or so on having the money. What in the world do you plan on doing with the money that just happened to land in your mailbox? Like many people, you probably just paid bills with it. Because while that check is temporary, those bills are always going to be there. To lessen or eliminate them now is what many though, thus consumption didn't go up at all. And going by the graph, actually went down towards the end of the 2008!

That is definitely no surprise at all either. People are scared. With the new liberal President with little experience, they're even more scared on what will occur on the days following his swearing in.