Stimulus & Bailout Watch Thread

[boutons_deux]

Repugs beat Trash, no payroll tax removal

[boutons_deux]

GOP coronavirus relief package to include Romney bill that would ‘fast-track Social Security and Medicare cuts’

“They will use every opportunity and every crisis—

including the mass death and economic carnage from Covid—

as cover for their sick desire to destroy our Social Security system.”

Romney’s TRUST ACT as “a bipartisan bill, co-sponsored by Senate Democrats, to help a future Congress evaluate bipartisan proposals for

protecting and strengthening

the programs that Americans count on.”

would initiate a secretive process that could result in cuts to Social Security and Medicare benefits, a longtime objective of lawmakers like the Utah Republican.

statements praising the legislation from a slew of right-wing advocacy groups, including the Koch-funded organization Americans for Prosperity.

Romney’s bill would give the Treasury Department 45 days to deliver a report to Congress on America’s “endangered” trust funds.

”restores solvency and otherwise improves each trust fund program.”

“This would allow benefit cuts to be fast-tracked through Congress,”

the TRUST ACT is “a way to undermine the economic security of Americans without political accountability.”

they are plotting to use the cover of the pandemic to slash Social Security.”

https://www.rawstory.com/2020/07/gop...medicare-cuts/

The oligarchy enriches itself and impoverishes everybody else.

America is ed and un able

[Winehole23]

article is new, the story isn't

A new study by Oxford University Professor Ludovic Phallipou concludes that all this transacting has generated $230 billion in management fees over the past decade for performance no better than an index-tracking fund. "This wealth transfer from several hundred million pension scheme members to a few thousand people working in private equity might be one of the largest in the history of modern finance," he told the Financial Times.

https://www.newsweek.com/private-equ...pinion-1519748

[boutons_deux]

WASHINGTON (AP) — AP-NORC poll:

Nearly half of Americans whose families lost jobs during the pandemic believe

the jobs will not return.

—@JonLemire

[boutons_deux]

‘A Band-Aid on a bullet wound’:

Workers are getting laid off anew as PPP runs out

Layoffs are beginning to e again across the country —

the number of new unemployment claims rose last week for the first time since March—

as coronavirus cases soar,

spurring cities and states to backtrack on reopenings only a month after appearing to turn the corner.

Those losing their jobs in late June and July are part of a wave of new layoffs from companies whose PPP money is expiring,

“It was the wrong bet. This wasn’t just a transitory event.”

22 percent of PPP recipients surveyed have laid off or expect to lay off employees after using up their PPP loan, up from 14 percent in June.

only about one in six businesses that received loans said they were confident they could pay their employees without further assistance.

The Small Business Administration,

in the spotlight since the creation of the program for the way it doled out loans,

which businesses received them (many were not small),

the lack of transparency surrounding the troubled loan program.

layoffs due to the PPP’s expiration will probably continue to grow

as the pandemic’s toll continues. not probably, but CERTAINLY
fears are growing about another hit to the economy as the PPP loans continue to expire.

“It basically says the same thing as our outlier status in the numbers of death and infections: We blew it,”

“Other countries managed to both

contain the coronavirus after three months and

also keep large numbers of workers on payrolls.

We didn’t do either.”

PPP stimulus saved between 1.5 million and 3.5 million jobs, “PPP was focused on keeping businesses alive and reducing the burden on the unemployment insurance system,”

“It did both of those, but for only eight weeks. But that’s got to be the thrust of any story here. It worked.”

Reich disagrees,

saying he does not believe the program should be considered a success,

citing the hefty premium — about $10 billion in fees — banks were paid for offering loans for which they assumed no risk,

issues that minority and women-owned businesses experienced securing loans, and

the flood of applications that overwhelmed banks and the SBA alike.

Reich pointed to Europe, where countries used a different model:

universal payroll aid in which governments paid as much as 80 percent of workers’ salaries to keep them on payroll for a longer time,

which has kept more businesses afloat and less people out of work.

The number of job#less workers in Europe in#creased by 316,000 from February through the end of May.

The rise in the U.S. over the same period was 9.8 mil#lion.

the lack of a national program of testing, contact tracing and other public health measures has haunted the PPP and other attempts at economic recovery.

“This is not just about death rates. It’s about health of the labor force, and customers coming in and not being afraid. We have to stop denying the reality.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/07/23/ppp-layoffs

[Winehole23]

CC, get your ass back in here

[boutons_deux]

article is new, the story isn't

https://www.newsweek.com/private-equ...pinion-1519748

Ain't unregulated Capitalism great for the predatory, destructive, extractive Capitalists?

[CosmicCowboy]

CC, get your ass back in here

My bad. Chilling at the lake. Just got off the jet ski and then cooked steaks for dinner. Now sipping on garrison brothers on ice.What did you want to discuss? Modern Monetary Theory in action?

[Winehole23]

My bad. Chilling at the lake. Just got off the jet ski and then cooked steaks for dinner. Now sipping on garrison brothers on ice.What did you want to discuss? Modern Monetary Theory in action?

Is that what it is?

If only Trump was willing to use it to save regular folks, what's the hold up?

[CosmicCowboy]

Is that what it is?

If only Trump was willing to use it to save regular folks, what's the hold up?

Sorry, I'm not responsible for Trump. Last time I checked all these programs came from congress, not Trump. Do you understand it differently?

[Winehole23]

Sorry, I'm not responsible for Trump. Last time I checked all these programs came from congress, not Trump. Do you understand it differently?

Defensive much? That was a rhetorical question.

It's not law til the President signs it, so your claim that Trump is clout-free is piffle.

[CosmicCowboy]

Apparently Trump is pretty clout free. His push to temporarily suspend social security withholdings (which is essentially a regressive tax) got shoved up his ass by republicans and democrats.

[ChumpDumper]

If his unemployment scheme is ignored we can start calling him a lame duck for anything but judicial appointments.

[boutons_deux]

Republicans prepare to unveil long-awaited $1 trillion coronavirus relief package

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin says the GOP is angling to reduce enhanced unemployment insurance to $200 a week.

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/7/26/21339089/senate-stimulus-bill-coronavirus-relief-aid

[baseline bum]

Republicans prepare to unveil long-awaited $1 trillion coronavirus relief package

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin says the GOP is angling to reduce enhanced unemployment insurance to $200 a week.

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/7/26/21339089/senate-stimulus-bill-coronavirus-relief-aid

Can't imagine that's going to play well in Florida with how puny their state unemployment payouts are. They probably would have been better off with the 70% payout.

[boutons_deux]

also another $1200 check, one month's rent

[ChumpDumper]

My guess it will end up higher than $200. Republicans have to publicly say bootstraps and welfare queens but know that this is maintaining a good deal of economic activity right now.

[boutons_deux]

Republican turmoil from Donald Trump has reached a whole new level of frustration in the Senate

frustration among Senate Republicans reached a whole new level of turmoil this week after Senate Majority Leader

Mitch McConnell (R-KY) told members

they could leave for the August Recess without passing a new coronavirus stimulus bill.

“Multiple GOP Hill aides involved in the stimulus negotiations tell me they feel Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows have undermined the legislative process,”


the White House zeroed out funding for testing and wanted to funnel it into paying for a new FBI headquarters.

Mnuchin is under fire because he has been willing to deal with House Democrats, while Republicans in the Senate refuse to do so.

“He’s also been given vast powers under the CARES Act on how the implementation is done,

“He can make a lot of decisions unilaterally, and that has added to the skepticism on the Hill,”

July was the third month in a row where over 30 percent of Americans weren’t able to pay their rent or mortgages on time or at all.

“Republican leaders privately admit that ​

if negotiations are a failure,

the White House and Republicans will take the political hit since they’re running the show,”

https://www.rawstory.com/2020/07/rep...e+Raw+Story%29

[ElNono]

If Democrats bend over to this (70% of previous wages and liability) they can go themselves.

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/0...benefit-381598

[baseline bum]

If Democrats bend over to this (70% of previous wages and liability) they can go themselves.

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/0...benefit-381598

Why wouldn't they? They already bent over for Trump's and Mnuchin's corporate bailout without getting a UBI and with the peanuts cut in half vs what Mnuchin was promising on TV regarding the stimulus checks.

[Trainwreck2100]

If Democrats bend over to this (70% of previous wages and liability) they can go themselves.

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/0...benefit-381598

Don't forget the "going back to work" credit, you i been working this whole time

[ElNono]

@ Teddy's plan:

"What we ought to focus on instead of just shoveling trillions out the door, we ought to be passing a recovery bill," Cruz said. "A recovery bill would be lifting the taxes and the regulations that are hammering small businesses so that people can go back to work. A recovery bill would suspend the payroll tax, which would give a pay raise to everyone in America who's working."

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/0...us-cruz-381673

---

Like a suspension of payroll taxes wouldn't disproportionately benefit large employers much more than small business, not to mention wrecking social security and medicare, which very likely would end up costing trillions in the long run too.

And this is to address an actual, specific problem which is that the federal minimum salary is and hasn't been updated since 2009.

[ElNono]

Obviously, Rafael had no problem handing out tax-cuts for the 1% on the backs of everyone else, so this isn't surprising either, tbh

[boutons_deux]

payroll tax cut is an avg of + $50K for the top end who are not in financial peril,

and peanuts for the low-end facing homelessness and hunger

[boutons_deux]

Double-dipping temp agencies get rich off COVID-19 bailouts as small businesses suffer

temp staffing companies like Employnet were among the biggest beneficiaries of small-business loans under the Paycheck Protection Program,

which is designed to help hard-hit firms keep paying their employees.

More than 11,000 such companies took in a total of between $3.6 billion and $7.9 billion, with about 4,600 of those getting more than $150,000 each.

And there was an oddity in the numbers: 174 claimed they saved 500 jobs each, the maximum under the law, at a rate seven times higher than the share of recipients overall that said they retained 500 jobs.

Many were counting workers contracted by other companies as saved jobs,

That means many temp companies were able to double dip,

getting paid twice for the same worker, once by the client and then again by taxpayers.

https://www.rawstory.com/2020/07/dou...e+Raw+Story%29