Congress Adopts $2.3 Trillion CARES Act (SB 3548)

By MUUSJN on Monday, April 6th, 2020

(the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act)

MORE ACTION NEEDED IN THE FUTURE

Largest Fiscal Relief Bill in History Adopted March 27th

Will Protect Families, Businesses, Hospitals & States

But Not Enough to Protect All People

This Friday, March 27th, the House passed and the President signed the $2.3 trillion CARE (Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act), the largest financial relief bill in history. The purpose of this major economic package, which got high levels of support from both Democrats and Republicans, was meant to protect families, businesses, hospitals and states in the middle of an unprecedented coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. On March 18th, the $104 billion “Families First Coronavirus Response Act” was adopted by Congress. In the last few weeks, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer declared an emergency and issued several executive orders, including restoring water shutoffs; closing Michigan schools, restaurants and non-essential services. We’ve been called to stay at home and maintain a social distance from others to help control the spread of this deadly virus. Through a social justice lens, this email attempts to provide an outline of what’s in this massive bill and start to think about other policies that are needed to sustain our communities. (See pie chart at bottom of this email to see how the dollars are being allocated.)

FIVE PRINCIPLES FOR JUST RELIEF AND STIMULUS

A group of about 500 progressive organizations, including the Center for Popular Democracy, Indivisible, MoveOn, SEIU, Sierra Club and the Sunrise Movement, agreed on five “Principles for Just COVID-19 Relief and Stimulus” to contribute to a just recovery. These principles are:

  1. Health care is a priority for all people, no exceptions;
  2. Provide economic relief directly to people;
  3. Rescue communities and people, not corporate executives;
  4. Make a downpayment on a regenerative economy, while preventing future crisis; and
  5. Protect our democratic process while protecting each other.

For more information on these principles and organizations that signed on to them, click HERE.

CARE ACT PROVISIONS AND GAPS IN PROTECTING PEOPLE’S LIVES

(Click HERE for an overview of bill provisions from the Coalition on Human Needs)
  1. JOBLESSNESS – The Act expands unemployment compensation: 4 months of $600/week added to the State’s UI benefits. Includes self-employed, part-time and gig workers;
  2. CASH – Provides one time rebates of $1,200 per adult up to $75 K/individual. Poor people who didn’t file for income tax in 2018 and 2019 don’t qualify though some can still file for 2019. Some student loans can be deferred to 9/30/20 but no direct relief for student loans.
  3. NUTRITION AID – $15.5 billion for SNAP; 8.8 billion for child nutrition; $450 million for food banks; $200 million for Puerto Rico; and $100 million for Indian reservations.
  4. PAID LEAVE – The “Families First” Act provided 2 weeks of emergency sick leave and extends family and medical leave for workers of companies with less than 500 employees who need to stay home with children but NOT to care for family members with disabilities.
  5. HEALTH CARE – The CARE Act extends provides $150 billion to help hospitals and other health care providers, but it doesn’t extend COVID-19 treatments for everyone.
  6. HOUSING – Provides funds to fight homelessness, help with rental, heating and cooling bills. But it didn’t do enough to prevent more homelessness, foreclosures and evictions.
  7. CHILD CARE & CHILDREN’S SERVICES – $3.5 billion for more child care and $750 million for Head Start. Considerably more will be needed.
  8. AID TO BUSINESSES: The bill includes $500 billion to prevent business collapse. This very large sum is intended to protect workers. Executive bonuses, stock buy-backs and shareholder dividends are prohibited (as advocates demanded) but this can be waived. $32 billion in relief for airlines that can only be used for employee wages and benefits.
Click HERE for a summary and background on the bill published March 27, 2020 on Roll Call

CONCLUDING REMARKS

Deborah Weinstein, Executive Director of the Coalition on Human Needs, wrote:


“The situation we are in is very grave…Congress has taken important steps, but this is only the beginning, sadly. We are all in this together– maybe socially distant, but morally and economically connected. If we cast aside any of us — whether incapacitated, homeless, immigrant, poor — it will hurt us all. Congress may have disbursed, like all of us, but we still must work together to get out of this”.

Some of the estimates for the actual cost for this massive bill are still being calculated. However, the above Roll Call article indicates that both Republican and Democratic lawmakers say that more legislative responses to the Covid-19 virus will be necessary. This means that advocates for health care workers, the unemployed, the poor, persons with disabilities, women, LGBTQ persons, immigrants and the homeless will have much more work ahead of us

Category: News |