Authored by Eliot Kaplan
Earlier today President Trump signed into law the CARES Act, an estimated $2 trillion economic stimulus package. The full text may be found: https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/748/text. The key aspects are:
- $250 billion to make unemployment insurance available to more categories of workers and to extend the duration of unemployment benefits from 26 weeks to 39 weeks and increase benefits $600 a week for four months.
- $301 billion in direct payments to households.
- $349 billion in loans to small businesses, with the amount spent on payroll, rent or utilities converting into grants that don’t have to be repaid.
- $500 billion for loans, loan guarantees or other aid to businesses, states and municipalities—including the possibility that the government will take direct equity stakes in distressed companies. Of the total, $29 billion is set aside for airlines, and $17 billion for national security businesses, such as Boeing. The remaining $454 billion would go to backstop losses in lending facilities by the Federal Reserve.
- $32 billion in grants to cover employee wages at airlines and other air carriers.
- $150 billion in direct aid to states, distributed according to population size. A city could apply to receive aid directly, which would reduce the amount available to the state.
- $221 billion in a variety of tax benefits for businesses, including deferral of payroll taxes for the rest of the calendar year and permitting businesses to claim deductions using today’s losses against past profits to more quickly claim refunds.
- $340 billion in supplemental spending, including $117 billion for hospitals and veterans’ care, and $25 billion for public transit.