Government "spending" vs. "recirculation"

[johnd83]

2. I've always thought of money flowing through resistive pipes

Money naturally pools and stops without an external force. The government has the ability to apply pressure to the money to make it flow faster (tax and spend...). The same M2 can buy a lot more if it is moving faster through the economy. The money doesn't vanish during a recession, it just slows down.

The irony is that tax and spend has the direct effect of pushing money faster through the economy, meaning everyone benefits. There is obviously a point of diminishing returns, but we are nowhere near that right now.