[burger]

But the price tag for the federal government could have been vast — stretching easily into the tens of billions of dollars. Over the course of negotiations that 8 percentage point increase was reduced to 6.2 percentage points.

At what point do these people realize that interest rates are basically zero and it's going to take trillions of dollars to keep the economy afloat if we actually have to isolate to the same extent as China? Tens of billions is a drop in the bucket compared to what we'll need to stay anywhere close to the same level. Hopefully at some point they realize this, because we could easily be looking at something far worse than 2008-2009. Shutting down for months would rival the great depression!

I agree.  This bill is an okay start, but it's like 5% of what's needed.  Unemployment insurance is not going to help business owners who go bankrupt or contractors or people who don't have jobs now.  What Congress needs to do is start sending checks to every American, or pretty soon large numbers of people won't even be able to afford food.  The job losses are already starting.  And some people are going to have to miss work or even quit to take care of kids who are out of school now (day care will soon become a thing of the past, also).  Before long lots of non-essential businesses will be shutting down either by fiat, like italy, or because people stop going out and spending money.  Unemployment is going to skyrocket. 

Yeah, we could come up with a byzantine means tested program so that we don't send checks to the rich, but there is no time for that now.  They can always claw back excess payments with targeted taxes later on.  Just start sending out the checks.

[burger]

But the price tag for the federal government could have been vast — stretching easily into the tens of billions of dollars. Over the course of negotiations that 8 percentage point increase was reduced to 6.2 percentage points.

At what point do these people realize that interest rates are basically zero and it's going to take trillions of dollars to keep the economy afloat if we actually have to isolate to the same extent as China? Tens of billions is a drop in the bucket compared to what we'll need to stay anywhere close to the same level. Hopefully at some point they realize this, because we could easily be looking at something far worse than 2008-2009. Shutting down for months would rival the great depression!

I agree.  This bill is an okay start, but it's like 5% of what's needed.  Unemployment insurance is not going to help business owners who go bankrupt or contractors or people who don't have jobs now.  What Congress needs to do is start sending checks to every American, or pretty soon large numbers of people won't even be able to afford food.  The job losses are already starting.  And some people are going to have to miss work or even quit to take care of kids who are out of school now (day care will soon become a thing of the past, also).  Before long lots of non-essential businesses will be shutting down either by fiat, like italy, or because people stop going out and spending money.  Unemployment is going to skyrocket. 

Yeah, we could come up with a byzantine means tested program so that we don't send checks to the rich, but there is no time for that now.  They can always claw back excess payments with targeted taxes later on.  Just start sending out the checks.