[Federalist] As President Joe Biden prepares to jam a $1.9 trillion COVID-19 spending package through a Democrat-controlled Congress without GOP buy-in, more than $1 trillion of Congress’s previous coronavirus spending is still sitting unused.
While some in Congress would argue that much of this money is scheduled to be spent eventually, at least a trillion American dollars are leftovers unspent by the industry or institution they were originally designated to help. According to the Committee For A Responsible Federal Budget, 60 percent of these remaining funds were authorized in the Response and Relief Act, which hurriedly passed in late December of 2020, but some date back to the CARES Act in March.
Despite this leftover money, congressional Democrats are moving forward to draft and eventually pass Biden’s $1.9 trillion "American Rescue" plan. According to Biden’s draft of the plan, which passed the Senate last week, $350 billion should be sent to states to aid with school reopenings as well as vaccine distribution, COVID-19 testing, and paying frontline workers. An additional $130 billion is requested to give to schools and higher educations institutions "to help them reopen and operate safely or to facilitate remote learning," very similar requirements as those in the unused Safe Schools and Citizenship Education grant in the CARES Act. Biden’s plan also suggests $20 billion be used to fund a national vaccination program. All of these areas still have unused billions from previous spending packages sitting around.
| It’s just bookkeeping (sorry Raj — I mean along the lines of paper profits in the stock market until a position is sold) until actual people cash actual checks. No doubt the same thing will happen again if the third stimulus bill actually passes, and in the meantime it might encourage everyone to spend less on other things because the numbers promised to be spent are truly scary. . |
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