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The Bush Administration's "Jobs and Growth Plan" tax cut took effect in July 2003. The president's Council of Economic Advisors predicted his tax cuts would result in the creation of 5.5 million jobs by the end of 2004. All but two states (Hawaii and Wyoming) failed to meet job growth projections, and the nation as a whole fell short by 3.1 million jobs (see background documents for methodology and CEA documents). While tax cuts are often regarded as an appropriate economic stimulus during an economic downturn, the administration's actions were poorly designed to create jobs and offer an improved economy. This is why in February of 2003 10 Nobel laureates and 450 other economists issued a statement saying that the then-proposed Bush tax proposal would fail to help the economy in the short run and would damage it in the long run by deepening federal deficits. The shortfall in jobs suggests that these economists were correct in their assessment. The job market in nearly every state has failed to fully recover from the recession that started in March 2001. Twenty-nine states have fewer jobs than when the recession started. Most of the states that have more jobs than before the recession have not seen those jobs grow as fast as the working-age population grew in that period. In total, 47 states had job losses or job growth so slow that it failed to keep pace with the growth in working-age population. Alaska and the District of Columbia failed to produce the jobs predicted for the Bush Administration's tax plan, but their job creation did outpace the growth in working-age population. [more]