Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has denied that Australia's unemployment rate would have been higher without the government's $42 billion economic stimulus.
"I don't accept that," he told reporters in Devonport while campaigning in northern Tasmania on Friday.
There was a wealth of economic expertise to say the stimulus was not well-managed, he said, naming Reserve Bank board member Warwick McKibbin and others.
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Mr McKibbin had described the stimulus as "a panicky move".
His comments came just days after Nobel Prize-winning economist Josef Stiglitz told the Sydney Morning Herald that Labor did a 'fantastic job' of saving Australia from the global financial crisis.
"We supported the first modest package which did come at the height of the crisis," Mr Abbott said.
"We opposed the (later) $42 billion stimulus because we knew back then that it was too much too soon."
The government has said the stimulus saved 200,000 jobs, which Mr Abbott calculated at $250,000 per job.
"All of us want to save jobs, but you have got to ask yourself the question, did it really need $250,000 per job?"
Mr Abbott cited Reserve Bank governor Glenn Stevens to back his assertion.
Mr Stevens had said it was more of a North Atlantic financial crisis than a global one, except for the six to eight weeks of late 2008 when the banking system was under serious strain, the opposition leader said.
The stimulus was slated to last longer than World War I to deal with a crisis that lasted six to eight weeks, he said.
