A quick look at the GOP coronavirus stimulus package makes one thing clear: Republicans still value the rich and corporations over the neediest Americans.
According to Common Dreams, the Republican plan is being called “heartless,” “cruel,” and “appalling” for its focus on large businesses and complete denial of money for the poorest members of society:
“The Senate GOP’s newly unveiled trillion-dollar economic stimulus package … would completely deny direct cash payments to the poorest Americans while cutting taxes for corporations, dishing out tens of billions in bailout funds to major industries, and restricting paid leave benefits that were just signed into law this week.”
Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO, expressed his outrage on Twitter:
The Senate GOP package is an utter disgrace. It gives free money to corporations, ignores the health crisis and does nothing to keep people working or help the unemployed. The labor movement will oppose this Main St bailout of Wall St with everything we have. #COVID19
— Richard Trumka (@RichardTrumka) March 20, 2020
Daniel Hemel of the University of Chicago Law School, also pointed out just how inequitable the Republican legislation is:
I don’t know how else to describe this but wantonly wicked. The poorest get zero; low-income households get half of what middle-income households get; and a kid counts for 40% of an adult https://t.co/YUdyY04Yug
— Daniel Hemel (@DanielJHemel) March 19, 2020
And Kyle Pomerleau, an economist and resident fellow at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, estimates that some 64 million tax filers earning less than $50k wouldn’t receive the full rebate amount of $1,200/$2,400:
“For a single filer, income must be at least about $23k to get the full $1,200. For married couple filing jointly, [adjusted gross income] must be about $47k to get the full $2,400.”
Some Republicans have even suggested the bill isn’t fair to all American taxpayers, with Sens. Mitt Romney (UT) and Josh Hawley (MO) calling the plan “regressive”:
Relief to families in this emergency shouldn’t be regressive. Lower-income families shouldn’t be penalized
— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) March 19, 2020
But perhaps most galling is the massive list of goodies being given to large multinational corporations. The New York Times notes the GOP stimulus bill “includes a raft of temporary changes to the tax code that would reduce the tax liability of large corporations, many of them overriding provisions in the 2017 tax overhaul that were meant to raise revenue to offset corporate rate cuts.”
And then there’s the clawback of paid-leave benefits which were a feature of another coronavirus relief bill President Donald Trump signed earlier this week. The Times reports that limits would be placed on paid leave under the Republican stimulus plan:
“Shielding small business owners from any costs of paid leave for workers affected by the virus—and limiting how much pay those workers could receive if they are forced to stay home.”
The GOP bill seems unlikely to pass the House without major revisions.
Featured Image Via NBC News
