I don’t think it makes sense to just bump up the stimulus payments to $2000 because a lot of the people getting them don’t need them. Even the $600 payment is going to be wasted for a lot of people. Lots of people in the stimulus income range still have their jobs and are just going to put the money in the bank rather than inject it into the economy. It would make a lot more sense to have the payments be targeted to people who are actually in financial difficulty in lower income brackets or unemployed. Certainly almost everyone has experienced some financial hardship during this time, but lots of people are not struggling and have not had to dip into financial assets like savings, 401k, sell off income property, etc. Giving $2000 to people with significant savings is just going to mean their savings will go up by $2000. Trump doesn’t care about the financial impact to the country since it’s not his money he’s giving away, but we all will have to pay that back at some point through our taxes.
In the case of checks that go to everyone, there’s not a lot of incentive not to work (No one’s going to get their $2000 windfall and stop working. That’s only 1-2 months of pretty basic living expenses most places. That was definitely their argument against the much higher unemployment comp in the spring, though.
I think it’s just a general dislike of economic redistribution. A flat $X to every American is a highly progressive economic program that redistributes from the rich to the poor. Republicans are the party of the rich, and they don’t like redistributing money from the rich to the poor.
There’s the conservative position that’s been missing under every Republican government for the last 20 years I’ve been paying attention. It’s not like the vast majority of the deficit since 2001 is caused by Republican tax cuts or anything!
My eyes can’t roll hard enough.
For many Americans, it’s not like that. Having a bigger cushion in one’s savings makes one feel safer, and better, about spending and buying things. A struggling family that’s barely getting by with just $500 in savings may not dare to splurge and buy some things that they want or need, but if their savings cushion is boosted to $2,500 by this stimulus check, they suddenly feel a lot more comfortable about buying some things now that they have some added peace of mind.
I agree, but the stimulus will be going to lots of people with very significant savings. Someone with $500 in savings is living on the edge and needs the stimulus. Someone with $500,000 in savings is just going to have $502,000 in savings after the stimulus check arrives. The income limits for the stimulus are $75k/$150k for single/married, which is relatively well off. People who are making that much money likely have significant assets they can access if they need. Not only will they likely have significant savings, but they may have a house they can sell or mortgage if they need, along with many other ways to raise money if they need. Having the stimulus go to unemployed people or people with incomes in the $40k/$80k ranges would be a much better allocation to get the money to people who need it rather than people who will dump it in their IRA.
Yeah, I think you’re overestimating the average American there. Someone making 75K a year does NOT have half a million in their savings account.
The median savings amount is $3,500, while the mean is $26,619.
With the median income for an American being around $45k, having the limits at $75k/$150k means lots of people above that median will be getting stimulus checks. Even if they have low savings, those relatively well off people will have other means to raise money that people below the median can’t do. And I would suspect that the higher the income, the more likely the person will be able to keep their job through this. Someone making $75k who didn’t lose their job doesn’t need a stimulus check regardless of how much savings they have. They may want the stimulus for free money, but they don’t need it in the same way that someone making $30k or is unemployed.
I’m leaning to thinking it would be best if the stimulus just went to households which are in the lower income brackets or have experienced some kind of job loss due to the pandemic and are in the medium to lower income brackets. People in the higher income brackets often have alternate financial sources and people who didn’t lose their jobs don’t have a critical need for a stimulus check. I’d rather $2k go to the unemployed cashier rather than $600 to the office worker who has been working from home this whole time.
I think you’re right about the punishment part, although I wonder if he’s just introducing chaos into the process for its own sake at this point because he can, and it makes him feel relevant, instead of some kind of last-ditch attempt to rile up his base.
I mean, there’s little more irrelevant than a lame-duck President inside of the last month of his term, and that has to rankle him more than a little.
It’s a power struggle. Trump is indeed mad at Mitch and the Republicans and wants to punish them. But the only reason why it would be a threat is because he has (mostly newer) Republicans who side with him, because, by and large, the Republican base seems to side with him.
He knows that his base is upset about the $600, as there are tons of memes about it. And it’s an issue most of the populace agrees with. He has nothing to lose by pushing it, even if it’s only to make it look like he was going to go for what the populace wanted.
I think this must be it because he was persuaded to go ahead and sign. The only reason I can see to do that is if the did actually care about how what he was doing could hurt the Republican chances of taking over the Senate. He really is vying for staying relevant and having power in the Republican party in the future.
Trump is a moron when it comes to most things, but he’s actually pretty good at playing people. He gets power struggles and such at an intuitive level. His strategies are not the ones anyone would normally use, but they work on a significant fraction of people.
Trump has absolutely no problem giving away other people’s money to make himself look better. In his book that is a total win. At his core the real reason Mitch is against it is because it would work, 2000 dollars on everyone’s pockets would stimulate the economy and help Biden.
All right - so, suppose the Democrats win both Georgia races - or even just one of them. Would that be enough to see the $2,000 stimulus checks through? How many Democratic defectors in the Senate can we expect? (If there were no defectors, even 50 Democratic senators would be enough, since Kamala could break the tie.)
Oh Yes, the Deficit will again become critical.
Define “lot”. Look, even if you kept your job, that money comes in real handy. Debt is increasing.
Define “lots”. The 1%ers? what? As a % of the American populace, define lots. Because 75% of Americans need that money.
More than 75 percent of Americans are currently struggling to make ends meet, and approximately half of this sample group stated “material hardship”, which means that they are hardly able to afford a place or food to survive. Approximately half of renters are paying more than one third of income for rent
So your “lots” must be quite a bit less than 25%, which means “lots” doesnt mean the same to you as it does to most people- the “most people” who need that money.
Given that it’s technically a tax cut, I don’t understand the conservative complaining about this. Or are tax cuts only necessary for the hoarding 1%?
How about this - ALL of the 2017 tax cuts shoved through in partisan fashion are set to sunset in 2025, instead of just the ones for the poors. That saves a few trillion dollars in extra deficit that the hoarders were going to hoard, and BOOM! plenty of money for Americans who are looking at eviction when the moratorium ends.
The importance of Democrats winning the Georgia races isn’t about getting enough votes to pass the $2,000 checks – a vote right now on the checks would easily get a majority and likely enough support to overcome a filibuster. But taking both GA seats is necessary to make Chuck Schumer Majority Leader, which is prerequisite to the bill being brought up for a vote at all.
Along with the piss-off-the-disloyal-Republican factor, and the raise-the-deficit-for-the-incoming-administration factor, there is also the possibility that all the Trumpers will “give back” to Trump when they get their money. He can put out another email blast to get more donations and make it clear that it is HIS name on that $2000 check, so in a sense, they really OWE him some of that money (in his warped and self-serving mind).
People who constantly ask, “What have you done for me lately?” almost never turn it around to ask, “What have I done for you lately?”
When Trump does something nice for you this one time, in his mind, you owe him forever. The converse is never true.
I disagree. The payments are not for people who have lost income per se; they are to stimulate the economy. Why wouldn’t someone who makes $75,000 use it to stimulate the economy? In many areas, $75,000 is barely middle-class. While recipients at the higher income levels might not need a couple of extra kilobucks, there is no reason to believe they would just bank it. They’re likely to spend it (and possibly more than that, spurred on by the bonus), which helps people at lower income levels.
I don’t think the major reason for the payments is to stimulate the economy. The pandemic is still going on and things are locked down; there isn’t much of an engine to stimulate right now. I think the main purpose is to keep everyone afloat until the economy can open back up, so people can start going to restaurants, shopping, etc as if nothing happened. It’s also trying to keep people from being evicted or foreclosured.