Biden Feels Strongly About This Form Of Stimulus Money
At his Wednesday press conference, Biden spoke about Build Back Better, a large-scale piece of legislation based on his campaign promises that the president has been hoping to get Congress to pass for months.
Biden indicated there are “two really big components that I feel strongly about,” and went on to explain that “one is the childcare tax credit.” The credit he is referring to is the expanded Child Tax Credit, which passed Congress in March as part of the coronavirus relief legislation that Biden signed into law early on after taking office.
That relief legislation, called the American Rescue Plan Act, authorized $1,400 stimulus checks for all eligible adults and dependents and provided additional relief to parents in the form of an enhanced Child Tax Credit worth $3,600 per child under age 6 and $3,000 for children ages 6 to 17. The American Rescue Plan Act facilitated the delivery of half of the total credit amount by having the IRS make payments of $250 or $300 per month into Americans bank accounts from July through December of 2021. The remainder of the credit can be claimed when filing 2021 taxes.
Th president wanted to renew the expanded Child Tax Credit in Build Back Better, as well as to accomplish a number of other tasks including providing subsidies for community college tuition. He referred to both the tax credit and the community college plan as “massive things,” which he campaigned on.
The Deadline For Claiming The Child Tax Credit Is December 31st
The IRS began depositing the first of six monthly cash payments into the bank accounts of eligible parents in July, offering another kind of stimulus assistance to some families .
According to a study conducted by the left-leaning advocacy group Economic Security Project using Census data, families received an average of $423 in their first CTC payment. From July through December, eligible families received up to $1,800 in cash, which was paid in six equal amounts over the course of six months. The help was made possible under President Joe Bidens American Rescue Plan, which includes an expanded CTC.
Families meeting the eligibility criteria received $300 a month for each child under the age of six and $250 for children aged six to seventeen. According to numerous families interviewed by CBS MoneyWatch, the additional funds would be used for child care, back-to-school supplies, and other necessities. While progressives and some Democrats lobbied Congress to maintain the enhanced CTC, it appears to be on hold for now. This means that there will be no CTC payments made in January or thereafter.
How Much Is The Third Stimulus Check
This third round of stimulus checks includes a $1,400-per-person direct payment. This amount tops off the $600 payment most eligible folks have already received as part of a previous COVID-19 relief package Congress passed at the end of December 2020 for a total of $2,000 in stimulus payments per person. So how much should your stimulus check be? Find out with our stimulus calculator!
The stimulus payments are one part of Bidens much larger COVID-19 relief plan that also expands the Child Tax Credit, extends unemployment benefits for people who have lost their jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic, increases the Child and Dependent Care Credit, and provides more aid for renters and landlords.4 Yep, its a mouthful. Well take a closer look at what else is included later.
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Heroes Act Approved By House Of Representatives
On Friday, the US House of Representativesapproved legislation for the HEROES Act – a $3 trillion bill for a second relief package which would follow on from the $2.2 trillion CARES Act signed off in March. It proposes to give $1 trillion to state and local governments and a further $200 billion in payments to essential frontline workers. The 1,815-page bill also includes a new round of direct payments to Americans to help stimulate the economy. It narrowly passed the House on a vote of 208 to 199 but Republicans, who control the Senate, have opposed it, saying I will have no chance of moving forward even though they are in support of some parts of the bill, such as providing state and local governments with additional funding.
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said that voting on a new, bipartisan coronavirus bill would take place in the final week of May with 27th-28th the most likely date.
What Was The Timeline For The Third Stimulus Check
Once the bill moved through all the hoops, eligible people started seeing their stimulus payments before March was over.5 The IRS and U.S. Treasury have been quick with delivering past stimulus checksDecember 2020s payments reached most folks by direct deposit within a week of then President Donald Trump signing the legislation.6
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If You Could Use Another Stimulus Check Right Now
You don’t have to wait for Biden and Congress if you need more cash to get you to the other side of the coronavirus crisis. Here are some ways you might find money on your own.
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Cut the cost of your debt. Credit card spending has been on the rise during the pandemic. If you’ve been relying heavily on your plastic, the interest is bound to get expensive. Take control of your debt and pay it off more rapidly by rolling all of your balances into a lower-interest debt consolidation loan.
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Reduce your insurance costs. Because many people have been driving less frequently during the pandemic, many car insurance companies have been handing out discounts. If your insurer has been stingy, it’s time to find yourself a better deal. A little comparison shopping could help you save hundreds on homeowners insurance, too.
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Refinance your mortgage. If youre a homeowner and haven’t refinanced your loan in the last year, you could be missing out on big savings. The typical mortgage rate is under 3% again, and mortgage data and technology provider Black Knight recently said 13 million homeowners still have an opportunity to save an average $283 a month through a refi.
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Grow your spare change in the stock market. Stocks have been setting new records, and you don’t have to be rich to get in on that action. A popular app allows you to invest in a diversified portfolio just by using “spare change” from everyday purchases.
Fourth Stimulus Check Likely Biden Says Payments Are ‘making A Difference’
President Joe Biden says the third round of stimulus checks, currently being distributed by the IRS, provided a financial lifeline to people who are still struggling as the pandemic maintains its grip on American life.
“Weve already sent more than 160 million checks out the door. Its making a difference,” the president told Congress in his big speech last Wednesday night. “For many people, its making all the difference in the world.”
Does that mean Biden wants the relief to continue? Lawmakers, advocates and millions of citizens are urging him to have the tax agency send a fourth stimulus check, and maybe additional ones beyond that.
Here’s where things stand.
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Biden Signed The Bill Stimulus Package Update 2022
President Biden has signed the bill. Also, Democrats are changing their tune on the next stimulus package and what theyre going to do to help out millions of struggling Americans and three 7 million families have fallen back into poverty and what Congress plans to do about it. I have all the details for you on this topic.
As this information continues to change very, very rapidly right now, it is so incredibly busy with so many things going on right now. I do all the research so that you dont need to I spend hours and hours reading all kinds of different things, and I distill it down into the shortest possible topics that I can deliver right here on the site.
Thank you so much to all of you for the very nice messages on that one topic from yesterday, which, by the way, thank you for all the nice messages on all the topics. But specifically, that topic yesterday where I talked about Snap benefits, and I even called that 1800 number so we could hear the automated system and how to connect with your local office to apply for benefits or to even ask your local representatives some questions about Snap benefits. I saw some really nice messages on that topic and I even saw some of you reaching out saying, hey, I think I might be eligible for these benefits. Maybe I should apply. Yes, you should apply.
Will Congress Send Another Stimulus Check
While previous waves of the virus, have been associated with a discussion of another round of stimulus checks, it does not look like one is on the horizon. This comes as many households feel with the effects of historic inflation and the vast majority of economic programs to support households have expired.
Anyone who is laid off will have no federal pandemic unemployment programs to rely on or eviction moratoriums to protect them from losing their homes. Additionally, the last child tax credit payment was sent on 15 December, and since Congress has not passed the Build Back Better bill, families will most likely not see a payment in January.
To date, the President has only used executive authority to extend the student loan moratorium through 1 May.
I think this makes student loan pause the longest lasting pandemic policy for households. Outlives stimulus checks, higher UI benefits, child tax credits. Perversely, it’s the only one of these with absolutely no means test or income limit. Right? Strange policy priority IMO.
Jason Delisle
In response to this scant benefit landscape, Oregon Senator Ron Wyden said he is worried about many vulnerable Americans” especially those “with young children falling between the cracks. Sen. Wyden also noted that that .
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Support For A Fourth Check Keeps Growing
More than 80 mostly Democratic members of Congress have signed letters urging President Joe Biden to approve a fourth stimulus check. Seven members of the House Ways and Means Committee a congressional panel with significant influence over government spending recently became the latest to join the cause.
In their letter to Biden, the Ways and Means members said a fourth stimulus check and a fifth would keep an additional 12 million people out of poverty.
The lawmakers don’t recommend a specific dollar amount for the new payments. But other members of the House and the Senate have called for $2,000 checks, and so does a Change.org petition now signed by 2.3 million citizens.
Though the economy is recovering, there are signs many Americans still need help. Friday’s jobs report from the government showed 9.3 million people are unemployed, far more than the 5.8 million who were out of work in February 2020, before the pandemic struck.
And, a new study from the University of California, Berkeley finds almost 6 million renters owe close to $20 billion in back rent with a national moratorium on evictions set to expire June 30.
Fourth Stimulus Check Update: Is Another $1400 Stimulus Check Coming
Some Democrats are calling for recurring stimulus checks until the coronavirus pandemic is over, pushing for the measure to be included in President Joe Bidens infrastructure and jobs plan.
Roughly one month after the Biden administration signed off on a third stimulus check of $1,400 for eligible Americans, advocacy groups and congressional Democrats have pivoted their efforts toward providing a fourth direct payment, arguing that the critical relief must continue.
And some Democrats are until the coronavirus pandemic is over, pushing for the measure to be included in President Joe Bidens infrastructure and jobs plan.
We urge you to include recurring direct payments and automatic unemployment insurance extensions tied to economic conditions in your Build Back Better long-term economic plan, a group of lawmakers wrote in a letter to the president.
But with a growing number of GOP senators urging the president to shrink his $2 trillion infrastructure proposal and Sen. Chris Coons , a Biden ally, signaling an openness to work with Republican colleagues on a smaller bill, the presence of a fourth stimulus check is likely to hit a slew of hurdles on Capitol Hill, where Democrats already have razor-thin margins.
Senate Republicans recently put forward an $800 billion infrastructure proposal, but Cornyn said he would support a plan that focuses on transportation and broadband.
Image: Reuters
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We Will Likely Learn The Wrong Lessons From The Stimulus
The lessons we draw from the response to the COVID-19 recession are important, because theyll almost certainly shape how we respond to the next economic downturn. In the wake of the Great Recession, policymakers shot too low. Now, they appear to have shot too high. If this were the story of Goldilocks, wed be poised to get things just right next time but politics is not a fairy tale, and its very possible that well overcorrect whenever another recession hits.
In many ways, were still figuring out what the lessons are as the pandemic still isnt over. And its, of course, hard to disentangle what could have happened had the governments response not been so aggressive. One clear lesson of the COVID-19 pandemic, though, is that Americas social safety net wasnt prepared to deal with a crisis of this magnitude, which is a big part of the reason why the response had to be so massive.
Our social safety net wasnt ready to catch everyone who needed it, so it was very difficult to figure out who really needed relief and when the tap should be turned off, according to Sinclair. Rickety state unemployment insurance systems couldnt be recalibrated to replace peoples incomes, so many people ended up being paid much more after they lost their jobs. It wasnt easy to target direct payments to people in specific income brackets, so the payments went out to some families who didnt need them.
Santul Nerkar is a copy editor at FiveThirtyEight.
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Stimulus Update: Why Are States Giving Out A Fourth Stimulus Check
It all started back when the American Rescue Plan rolled out. States were given $195 billion to help fund their own local economic recovery at the state level.1 But they dont have forever to spend this moneystates have to use it all by the end of 2021, so the clock is ticking here. Some states have given out their own version of a stimulus check to everyone, and others are targeting it at specific groups like teachers. And other states? Well, they havent spent any of it yet.
Some states like Colorado, Maryland and New Mexico are giving stimulus checks to people who make less than a certain amount of money or who were on unemployment. So far, California is the only state to give out a broader-sweeping stimulus check.2 Other states like Florida, Georgia, Michigan, Tennessee and Texas are putting the money toward $1,000 bonuses for teachers.
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President Trump Has Signed A Bill Authorizing A $600
A second stimulus check is finally on the way. After a nearly week-long political guessing game, President Trump has signed the massive COVID-relief and government spending bill recently passed by Congress. The $900 billion bill that includes, among other things, a second round of stimulus checks , $300-per-week unemployment benefits, renewed funding for Paycheck Protection Program small business loans, money for COVID-19 vaccines and testing, extended tax breaks, and much more.
The legislation doesn’t provide the $2,000-per-person second stimulus checks the president pushed for after Congress passed the bill. However, more money may be on the way. In a statement released before the stimulus bill was signed, the president said “the House will vote to increase payments to individuals from $600 to $2,000” on December 28 . He also said “he Senate will start the process for a vote that increases checks to $2,000.” Whether that happens remains to be seen. However, if payments aren’t increased to $2,000, Americans will still receive the $600 second stimulus checks authorized by the bill already signed by the president.
Stimulus Check Scams And Hoaxes
Of course, popular demand for widely distributed stimulus payments, and the confusing political maneuvering that goes into crafting stimulus bills, creates an information gap that’s easily exploited by scammers.
Even with the first wave of stimulus checks in 2020, we saw bogus email messages that pretended to be from the IRS, promising “an important update on your Covid relief fund.” But they just took you to phishing sites that wanted your Social Security number and other sensitive bits of information.
Following the second stimulus bill at the beginning of 2021, those email phishing attempts were joined by scam phone calls demanding your personal details so that you could be “cleared” to receive more stimulus checks.
In March, as President Biden’s American Rescue Plan was making its way through Congress, new phishing emails promised the moon: a $4,000 stimulus check, a boost in the minimum wage, free meals and, best of all, priority treatment that let you skip lines at COVID-19 vaccination sites.
Most recently, cruel pranksters have been passing around posts on Facebook that a fourth stimulus check worth $2,500 is coming by the end of July. Don’t believe it, and don’t believe the phishing websites that claim to register you for child-tax-credit advance payments.
In fact, most parents and legal guardians don’t need to do anything to get the payments they’ll just show up in your mailbox or bank account.
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