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from the a-billion-here-a-billion-there-pretty-soon-you're-talking-about-real-money dept.
Biden signs $1.9 trillion stimulus bill, making $1,400 checks and child tax credit official:
President Joe Biden on Thursday signed the $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package, which includes a third stimulus check, for up to $1,400, and an expanded child tax credit. The IRS and Treasury will begin to send the new stimulus checks as soon as this weekend, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Thursday at a press briefing.
The bill signing comes just one day after the amended bill passed in the House by a vote of 220-211. The House initially passed the bill on Feb. 26, and the Senate approved it last week, albeit with some changes.
[...] Democrats had been pushing to get the stimulus package signed into law before current unemployment benefits expire March 14. Biden was originally scheduled to sign the bill on Friday, but it got moved forward after Congress sent the final bill to the president more quickly than anticipated, Psaki said on Thursday.
The stimulus package, called the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, includes changes made by the Senate last week, such as reducing income limits for the third stimulus payment and lowering proposed weekly unemployment benefits from $400 a week to $300 a week (though they'd extend through Sept. 6 rather than the end of August). The Senate also dropped a federal minimum wage increase from the legislation, but proponents say they'll reintroduce that at a later date.
How to watch President Biden's national address tonight.
House passes $1.9 trillion Covid relief bill, sends it to Biden to sign:
[...] Here are the proposal's major pieces:
- It extends a $300 per week jobless aid supplement and programs making millions more people eligible for unemployment insurance until Sept. 6. The plan also makes an individual's first $10,200 in jobless benefits tax-free.
- The bill sends $1,400 direct payments to most Americans and their dependents. The checks start to phase out at $75,000 in income for individuals and are capped at people who make $80,000. The thresholds for joint filers are double those limits. The government will base eligibility on Americans' most recent filed tax return.
- It expands the child tax credit for one year. It will increase to $3,600 for children under 6 and to $3,000 for kids between 6 and 17.
- The plan puts about $20 billion into Covid-19 vaccine manufacturing and distribution, along with roughly $50 billion into testing and contact tracing.
- It adds $25 billion in rental and utility assistance and about $10 billion for mortgage aid.
- The plan offers $350 billion in relief to state, local and tribal governments.
- The proposal directs more than $120 billion to K-12 schools.
- It increases the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefit by 15% through September.
- The bill includes an expansion of subsidies and other provisions to help Americans afford health insurance.
- It offers nearly $30 billion in aid to restaurants.
- The legislation expands an employee retention tax credit designed to allow companies to keep workers on payroll.
(Score: 2) by linuxrocks123 on Monday March 15 2021, @11:53PM
As sibling poster has stated, people want to use dollars to pay debts to the government. That is their intrinsic value.
You're moving the definitional goal posts here. Your original claim was that hyperinflation would result if people realized dollars didn't have "real" value. But dollars do have "real" value to people because they can use them to pay their taxes. Attempting to quibble over the definition of "intrinsic value" distracts from the point that dollars have real enough value that people can and do use them for a purpose other than trade, which is the only value dollars need to have to negate your original claim.
By the way, any fool can see that an actual dollar bill has no industrial or consumptory value. Everyone knows they are fundamentally tokens created by society as a convenient value store. The thing you think is a secret isn't, so there's no "big lie" here. What, did you think you were the only human who ever lived who was intelligent enough to realize dollar bills were made out of paper?
I was very careful with my language. I said "no new dollars were created". Yes, fiscal policy can affect the money supply, although the Federal Reserve can use monetary policy to dampen that if it wants. But the actual number of dollars issued by the Federal Reserve, either through printed physical notes or through the electronic balance sheets at Federal Reserve Banks, does not change through this.
"Printing money" would be the Federal Reserve issuing Federal Reserve Notes to finance the purchase of first-issue Treasuries. It's prohibited by law from doing this; instead, it purchases Treasuries on the secondary market when it wants to expand the money supply.
Did you just make that up? I'm almost certain that's not true and that the reserves have to be actual cash held in a vault or electronic cash held at the nearest Federal Reserve Bank. Given the function of the reserve requirement, it really wouldn't make sense to allow anything else to be used. The reserve requirement is literally zero right now anyway, so it doesn't matter at the moment, but I really think you're wrong about this.
https://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/reservereq.htm [federalreserve.gov]