Senate Democrats on Sunday night followed Rahm Emanuel’s famous advice to never let a crisis go to waste. They filibustered a bill that had been negotiated by senators of both parties to provide relief for tens of millions of people whose livelihoods are in jeopardy and whose small businesses are failing.
The most important aspect of any legislative response to the coronavirus crisis is to help businesses maintain their payrolls. Employers are making the decision to lay off their staffs every day, and the longer Washington hesitates in its response, the deeper the economic effect of the virus will be.
After a weekendlong negotiation, the Senate produced a bill that would have granted the relief for which people are desperate. The bill would have increased the amount an eligible individual could receive for unemployment insurance and expanded the number of households that would receive individual payments from the government to cover immediate costs.
With demand drying up as a result of government-mandated quarantines and social distancing, it is essential that the government provide support so companies can continue to pay workers, even if those workers have to stay home to help diminish the spread of the virus. This ensures that when the COVID-19 virus threat is finally lifted, the U.S. economy can recover in short order because workers have work to return to.
Importantly, the bill had extended loans to businesses that would be forgiven as long as employers retained their employees for the duration of this crisis. This bill would have extended those preferences to employers who rehired employees they had to let go after Feb. 15 as a result of the coronavirus disruptions. This is exactly the kind of support businesses need to weather this economic crisis.
Unbelievably, this bipartisan product was blown up by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who disrupted the negotiations to make a number of unrelated demands, such as demanding forgiveness of student loans. This is a particularly craven move as many people who are suffering from the coronavirus-related closures and disruptions are service workers, working in leisure and hospitality jobs that don’t require college degrees. While their futures remain uncertain and their employers are making layoff decisions by the day, Pelosi is demanding a subsidy be paid to upper-class, well-educated elites.
Unemployment data is released every Thursday, and this week, it is expected that the number of people filing for unemployment insurance will grow by millions. Yet Democrats in Congress are dithering over their liberal priorities.
The negotiated Senate bill provides a strong signal that policymakers can work together to soften the blow of the coming economic downturn. Getting checks immediately to families and supporting businesses so they can extend the important lifeline of a paycheck to their employees is essential at a time when not much else is known about how this period is going to play out.
The economy can rebound when the virus threat is finally lifted, but it requires decisive action. The people who stand to be hurt most by industry-wide collapses are the workers caught beneath a business when it fails. That is why policymakers must act now to support employers so they can keep workers on their payrolls while we weather this crisis together. Using these bills as vehicles for political wish lists is not just brazen, it is unforgivable at a time when the nation’s public and economic health hangs in the balance.
Mattie Duppler (@MDuppler) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. She is the senior fellow for fiscal policy at the National Taxpayers Union. She’s also president of Forward Strategies, a strategic consulting firm.
