The COVID-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc on the United States economy, creating a big hole in the job market probably on the scale of the Great Depression. There have been many reports about people without jobs for months now. It is dreadful to see single mothers with children facing eviction and having difficulty putting food on the table.

The scenes of thousands of cars waiting in line at the North Texas Food Bank in Dallas, Texas, which distributed more than 600,000 pounds of food among about 25,000 people on a single Saturday in November last year, looked disheartening and scary. Millions of Americans are suffering, and they need government help.

The $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill passed by Congress on March 10 is the US administration's response to the calamitous deterioration of livelihoods in the country. Yet as much as I loathe the Republicans' history of halfhearted empathy toward the working class, I am critical of this bill, because it will create perhaps the biggest hole in the federal budget.

This relief amount is much higher than necessary, especially since the Congress has already passed five bills totaling about $4 trillion. At a time when it appears the US has started to contain the spread of the novel coronavirus－as indicated by the dramatically declining numbers of infections and deaths－does it make sense to issue massive numbers of welfare checks?

It seems the US is intent on spending out of the pandemic rather that vaccinating out of it. Read the story>>