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One way to fight a coronavirus recession: $1k for every American

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Re: One way to fight a coronavirus recession: $1k for every American

#11

Post by tjr225 »

maratd wrote: post #8
tjr225 wrote: post #3

Am I way out of band or does that seem like a comically small amount of money for the average American? I live in an extremely low COL area and live well within my current means. Assuming my work dries up and I don't have any savings, 3k$ would buy me two months tops. Just to give you an idea of how cheaply I live: Mortgage is ~800$/mo, Car is a paid off 2006 Toyota Highlander, Student loan minimums of ~400$/mo, My w…

I think this is a profoundly bad idea. It's just as dumb as the fed trying to prop things up. You're not going to solve this problem with money, but with a strong response to the root cause, the pandemic. That said ... > My wife and I have a newborn, which currently isn't very expensive but we all still need to eat I imagine you would get $3k since there are 3 of you.

> I imagine you would get $3k since there are 3 of you.

* facepalm * I'll edit to clarify.

Re: One way to fight a coronavirus recession: $1k for every American

#12

Post by CubsFan1060 »

maratd wrote: post #8
tjr225 wrote: post #3

Am I way out of band or does that seem like a comically small amount of money for the average American? I live in an extremely low COL area and live well within my current means. Assuming my work dries up and I don't have any savings, 3k$ would buy me two months tops. Just to give you an idea of how cheaply I live: Mortgage is ~800$/mo, Car is a paid off 2006 Toyota Highlander, Student loan minimums of ~400$/mo, My w…

I think this is a profoundly bad idea. It's just as dumb as the fed trying to prop things up. You're not going to solve this problem with money, but with a strong response to the root cause, the pandemic. That said ... > My wife and I have a newborn, which currently isn't very expensive but we all still need to eat I imagine you would get $3k since there are 3 of you.

$2500. Kids were worth $500 I guess.

Re: One way to fight a coronavirus recession: $1k for every American

#13

Post by vearwhershuh »

This is how we should manage the money supply, and it should be monthly. Direct, debt free issuance of a citizens dividend to every US citizen. Coupled with a wind-down of the debt bubble. Maybe take Steve Keen's idea and require that a certain portion of the payment be used to extinguish any debts.

Unfortunately whenever a president starts talking about this, he has a tendency to be shot.

Re: One way to fight a coronavirus recession: $1k for every American

#14

Post by simonh »

vkou wrote: post #4

This is not going to help. The people who need the most help are the people who are going to be homeless in a month. 1k will buy them a second month. This thing will not blow over in two months. What would help, is for mortgage and rent payments to be suspended as long as the state of emergency lasts. Not deferred[1], suspended. When economic activity stops, we have to stop rent-seeking from bleeding everything out o…

Then what happens to the people who's income depends on those rent payments. I think an approach like this makes sense. The problem is immediate cash flow for people. This is cash flowing to people. It may not be enough, but it's moving in the right direction. We're not going to re-engineer the economy in the next few weeks.

Re: One way to fight a coronavirus recession: $1k for every American

#15

Post by Gunax »

I too think this is silly. Everyone wants to use this disaster to achieve the policy goals they wanted anyway. Republicans want to use it as an excuse for tax cuts. Democrats want to expand public healthcare and benefits. Everyone is trying to attach riders for domestic violence victims or pork spending or whatever pet issue they have.

And now the Ubi folks want this.

Nothing changes. Same BS.

Re: One way to fight a coronavirus recession: $1k for every American

#17

Post by tomp »

I've been railing against this idea as uniquely stupid for the past few days.

1. For people who are living "paycheck-to-paycheck", this won't even matter. How far does $1000 get you in the US? A better policy would be a general amnesty on rent and interest payments for a few months, and temporary free healthcare.

2. For industries where it's a demand shock (e.g. travel), no amount of helicopter money will restart the demand. A better solution would be helping the companies directly, to the extent the government wants to help them survive, by e.g. tax write-offs or delays, emergency credit loans, or my favorite, emergency equity (the free-market solution, if your company cannot survive because of your poor panic, you don't deserve to own (all of) it).

3. For industries where it's a supply shock (face masks, hand sanitizers, possibly soon but hopefully not food), some kind of coupon-based rationing (with the government paying the producers directly) would be a better solution, providing just the necessities for survival and ensuring there's minimal waste.

Re: One way to fight a coronavirus recession: $1k for every American

#18

Post by Gunax »

vearwhershuh wrote: post #13

This is how we should manage the money supply, and it should be monthly. Direct, debt free issuance of a citizens dividend to every US citizen. Coupled with a wind-down of the debt bubble. Maybe take Steve Keen's idea and require that a certain portion of the payment be used to extinguish any debts. Unfortunately whenever a president starts talking about this, he has a tendency to be shot.

Let's make it 10k per month, then we can all be wealthy.

Re: One way to fight a coronavirus recession: $1k for every American

#19

Post by danenania »

maratd wrote: post #8
tjr225 wrote: post #3

Am I way out of band or does that seem like a comically small amount of money for the average American? I live in an extremely low COL area and live well within my current means. Assuming my work dries up and I don't have any savings, 3k$ would buy me two months tops. Just to give you an idea of how cheaply I live: Mortgage is ~800$/mo, Car is a paid off 2006 Toyota Highlander, Student loan minimums of ~400$/mo, My w…

I think this is a profoundly bad idea. It's just as dumb as the fed trying to prop things up. You're not going to solve this problem with money, but with a strong response to the root cause, the pandemic. That said ... > My wife and I have a newborn, which currently isn't very expensive but we all still need to eat I imagine you would get $3k since there are 3 of you.

A strong response to the pandemic will leave millions of people with no income. Many have zero in savings. These issues are tightly coupled: we can't expect people to make the right choices for everyone if doing so threatens their survival.

Re: One way to fight a coronavirus recession: $1k for every American

#20

Post by cscurmudgeon »

paxys wrote: post #16

America's immediate priority needs to be public health, not the stock market. The economy will recover, dead people won't.

The stock market is not a magical abstract thing that has no impact on people's lives.

It has an indirect and huge impact on all of us.

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