After more than a month of wiring the first batch of checks electronically, the Internal Revenue Service began sending the checks out by mail, based on the last two-digits of the recipients' Social Security numbers.

If your Social Security number ends between 00 and 18, congratulations! You've probably either gotten your check or it's in the mail!

If your Social Security number ends with 99, my condolences. You probably won't get your check until mid-July.

For the record - and to answer a common question of readers who keep calling in - the schedule goes like this: If your Social Security number ends in 19-25, your check should be in the mail; 26-38, the week ending June 6; 39-51, the week ending June 13; 52-63, June 20; 64-75, June 27; 76-87, July 4; and finally 88-99 the week of July 11.

The staggering of these checks - which range from $600 for a single taxpayer to $1,800 for, say, a taxpaying couple with two kids - could be one reason we're not seeing a dramatic pickup in our stagnant economy. To qualify for the full rebate, taxpayers need to make less than $75,000 per individual or $150,000 per couple.

The checks were intended for us to spend, spend, spend so that retailers could ring up more sales and manufacturers - at least whatever manufacturers are still left in this country - could get more orders and hire more employees.

So far, that massive burst of spending hasn't happened. And there are several reasons why the stimulus may not produce any major economic boost.

For one thing, the effects of inflation could sharply erode the value of the rebate checks. With gas going for $50 per tank or higher and a supermarket basket full of goods amounting to far more, a good chunk of the $600 could be eaten up by the necessities of life.

"You can expect to see a lot of the rebate money going into gasoline, most of which is imported from overseas, so the stimulative impact on the economy will be less than what it could have been," said Stephen Conroy, economist at the University of San Diego.

In addition, most Americans may choose to use the rebate checks to pay down their bills.

On average, Americans owe $2,342 per person on their credit cards alone, according to TransUnion, a Chicago-based credit tracking firm. Credit card usage has been climbing since the housing market went south, since homeowners can no longer use their equity to finance major purchases.

According to TransUnion, the areas that relied most heavily on adjustable rate mortgages are the areas where consumers are using their credit cards most heavily to finance their debts. The rebate checks could help Americans pay off a portion of their bills.

That won't stimulate the economy in the short run, although it might be better over the long term.

"Our nation has been living on debt under the label of consumerism for far too long," said Scott Spiker, chief executive officer of First Command Financial Services. "When we have an economy that's just based on spending more money, we get into trouble."

If you want to see how some of your fellow Americans are spending their rebates, check out www.howispentmystimulus.com, a Web site by New York copywriter Rudy Adler. Around 300 people have written to tell what they are spending their money on, complete with photographs.

Adler's bloggers might not represent how most Americans will spend their money, but it's noteworthy that many of them are using the money to either build their savings and investments or pay off credit cards, student loans, mortgages, medical bills, rents or other debts.

"I think I'll keep my money in savings," wrote Kate Scott, a banker in Minneapolis. "Or maybe in my mattress.... It's probably a better interest rate than any bank is offering anyway."

Other people used the money for food, medicine and other necessities. An elderly couple used their money for prescription drugs. A father spent his rebate on speech therapy for his autistic child, which his insurers had declined to pay for.

On the other hand, dozens of people spent the money on big-ticket electronics, trips or extravagances. A 28-year-old San Diego administrative assistant with the screen name Eriness wrote that she used her rebate to go skydiving.

Amy W., an office manager in Arizona, will use the money to come to San Diego's Comic-Con in late July, where she and her fiance can "have a nice vacation and some fun, and buy stuff we don't need!"

Will this spending stimulate the economy? Maybe. Maybe not. Much of the money is being spent on imported goods, which will do little to help the domestic economy.

A woman with the screen name of Seadove wrote that all of the clothes she bought with her rebate came from Southeast Asia, Central America and Africa. "Does that stimulate our country?" she asked.

Others planned to stimulate the economies of France or Mexico by using the rebates for foreign travel.

For those lucky people who have enough money they don't need to pay bills, buy necessities or save for retirement, San Diego attorney Stanley Zubel has a suggestion for what to do with the rebate: Give it away.

"Before you splurge on that new high-definition TV or some other consumer item, consider switching from the shopping channel to the Third World hunger channel," he said. "There you'll be treated to scenes of Haitian children eating dried mud cakes because they can't afford rice."

Zubel said that unless Americans are truly in need, they should consider giving their money to agencies involved in hunger relief overseas. Half a dozen people on Adler's blog shared that sentiment, sending their money to such charitable groups as food banks or microlending organizations.

"The tax rebate is bad policy: this should be going toward rebuilding our infrastructure or helping the poor," said Bill, a teacher in Columbus, Ohio. "So we sent our rebate to a food bank, where it should have gone in the first place! It's not like we couldn't have used the money, and of course the car went into the shop this week for the miraculous coincidence of $1,200 worth of repairs, but it was the right thing to do."

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