5 ms·

Completely disagree that the stimulus checks were unnecessary, and I'm really curious what you think a superior solution to the COVID economy would have been.

Completely disagree that the stimulus checks were unnecessary, and I'm really curious what you think a superior solution to the COVID economy would have been. I think people take for granted that our economy could be in a much, much worse position right now given the events of 2020.

shiftpgdn 5y ago
The third one went out after the vaccine was widely available. Honestly with expanded unemployment benefit we didn’t even need the second one.
engineer_22 5y ago
After the stimulus checks I saw a lot of television boxes out at the curb when it was trash day. YMMV
Vaslo 5y ago
The stimulus checks made sense when people simply weren't allowed to work. I lean very right with my fiscal opinions and I can understand why we stimulated since government (with no choice!) created the quarantine issue, and people needed to eat. But now, with so many open jobs and no one willing to fill them, they should not only cut the stim checks but cut back on other forms of assistance to force people to go out and work and learn new skills. Until this happens, inflation will keep rising.
- TheAdamAndChe 5y ago
  Wages haven't kept pace with productivity since the 70's, largely because of a lack of leverage by employees. Inequality and stagnation have been causing significant pressures, arguably causing the surge in populism in 2016. Why not let employees have leverage for a while?
CountDrewku 5y ago
>Completely disagree that the stimulus checks were unnecessary They were completely unnecessary for a LOT of people. I can guarantee almost no one on HN needed a stimulus check. If you were working a white collar job remotely you did not need one. Those checks should not have been given to anyone that was still employed through this. It was all a political game to garner votes. >I'm really curious what you think a superior solution to the COVID economy would have been. To not shutdown businesses that needed to be physically open to survive. You really think those checks helped out all those small restaurants/bars/etc. that weren't even allowed to be open during all of this? Additionally, they sent a bunch of money to other countries so we'll get to pay for that as well.
- SantalBlush 5y ago
  >They were completely unnecessary for a LOT of people. Totally agree here. They were unnecessary for me and a lot of people I know. But if we're talking about stimulus checks as a whole, I think they were beneficial to a lot of people out there who were out of jobs or had their hours cut drastically.
  - CountDrewku 5y ago
    Right but they went out to everyone regardless of whether they were fully employed. This is unnecessary money being injected into the economy which results in inflation. Also, as someone else mentioned the people who did need the checks were also being covered by other forms of welfare by the time the last one went out and you still have people getting checks that could easily go back to work now but are choosing not to.
    - SantalBlush 5y ago
      Maybe I misunderstood your first comment. It appeared to me that you were criticizing the stimulus checks as a whole, rather than just the number or size of checks that were sent out. If we're only talking about changing the number and size of checks that were sent, I assume there was room for improvement.

shiftpgdn 5y ago

The third one went out after the vaccine was widely available. Honestly with expanded unemployment benefit we didn’t even need the second one.

engineer_22 5y ago

After the stimulus checks I saw a lot of television boxes out at the curb when it was trash day. YMMV

Vaslo 5y ago

The stimulus checks made sense when people simply weren't allowed to work. I lean very right with my fiscal opinions and I can understand why we stimulated since government (with no choice!) created the quarantine issue, and people needed to eat. But now, with so many open jobs and no one willing to fill them, they should not only cut the stim checks but cut back on other forms of assistance to force people to go out and work and learn new skills. Until this happens, inflation will keep rising.

TheAdamAndChe 5y ago
Wages haven't kept pace with productivity since the 70's, largely because of a lack of leverage by employees. Inequality and stagnation have been causing significant pressures, arguably causing the surge in populism in 2016. Why not let employees have leverage for a while?

CountDrewku 5y ago

>Completely disagree that the stimulus checks were unnecessary They were completely unnecessary for a LOT of people. I can guarantee almost no one on HN needed a stimulus check. If you were working a white collar job remotely you did not need one. Those checks should not have been given to anyone that was still employed through this. It was all a political game to garner votes. >I'm really curious what you think a superior solution to the COVID economy would have been. To not shutdown businesses that needed to be physically open to survive. You really think those checks helped out all those small restaurants/bars/etc. that weren't even allowed to be open during all of this? Additionally, they sent a bunch of money to other countries so we'll get to pay for that as well.

SantalBlush 5y ago
>They were completely unnecessary for a LOT of people. Totally agree here. They were unnecessary for me and a lot of people I know. But if we're talking about stimulus checks as a whole, I think they were beneficial to a lot of people out there who were out of jobs or had their hours cut drastically.
- CountDrewku 5y ago
  Right but they went out to everyone regardless of whether they were fully employed. This is unnecessary money being injected into the economy which results in inflation. Also, as someone else mentioned the people who did need the checks were also being covered by other forms of welfare by the time the last one went out and you still have people getting checks that could easily go back to work now but are choosing not to.
  - SantalBlush 5y ago
    Maybe I misunderstood your first comment. It appeared to me that you were criticizing the stimulus checks as a whole, rather than just the number or size of checks that were sent out. If we're only talking about changing the number and size of checks that were sent, I assume there was room for improvement.