On Sunday, December 20, the leaders of the Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. Congress managed to agree on a new COVID-19 relief package worth $900 billion to counter the effects of the pandemic. A vote on it will take place on December 21, CNBC reports.
In addition to support for small businesses and the health care system, lawmakers agreed to provide direct payments of $600 to every adult and to every American under 18.
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey drew attention to the payments.
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$600!?…of fiat!?
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— jack (@jack) December 21, 2020
The stimulus package also contemplates keeping in place the weekly federal add-on of $300 to unemployment benefits and extending their duration. Without this provision, 12 million Americans could be left without means of subsistence after Christmas.
Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and the economic restrictions, more than 20 million Americans lost their jobs, and only about half of them had left the labor force by today.
Democrats and some Republicans are pressing for larger sums of “helicopter money” and for extending unemployment benefit programs, the receipt of which has become impossible once the statutory deadlines have expired. They expect to revisit the issue after Joe Biden’s January inauguration.
“Starting right after the New Year, Congress will begin work on supporting our plan to counter COVID-19 — for struggling families, investments in jobs and a revival of the economy. We will not waste time,” said the president-elect.
As reported, on March 27 the U.S. Senate approved the previous, larger anti-crisis package to support the economy amid the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, totaling $2.2 trillion. Under it, most adults received a one-time payment of $1,200 and an additional $500 for each child under 16.
According to Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong, part of the stimulus payments went into bitcoin.
“Helicopter money”: a way out of the crisis or another misconception of the traditional school of economics
The approval by Congress of the new stimulus package will trigger another round of “helicopter money” and will maintain an extremely high degree of Fed stimulus. In the crypto community, one can expect new references to the popular meme «Money printer go BRRR». It hints at the Fed’s printing press working at full tilt during the corona crisis. The meme laid the basis for Grayscale Investments’ advertising campaign launched in August.
As discussions of the new stimulus package were under way, the founder of Tesla and SpaceX Elon Musk reached out to MicroStrategy head Michael Saylor with a question about how he managed to move a large portion of his balance into bitcoin.
In August, MicroStrategy became the first Nasdaq-listed company to convert a portion of its capital into bitcoin. The company bought 21,454 BTC — about $250 million at the time. It now owns 40,824 BTC, and Saylor himself owns 17,732 BTC.
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