issue: Politics

COVID-19 is unraveling the issue of surprise billing in America

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Back in December, Congress failed to reach an agreement on “surprise billing” legislation. A surprise bill is when patients get an out-of-network bill from a provider at an in-network facility.

Lawmakers couldn’t decide if an arbitration model — where billing disagreements would be sent to a third-party review board — or if a benchmark model — where payments would be based on a set benchmark price — was best.

Now in the era of Covid, this failure is coming home to roost.

Federal law requires private health plans to cover all Covid-19 testing. But because there is no set benchmark price labs can charge whatever they want as long as they list it publicly. Most labs charge around $100 for a Covid-19 test, some unscrupulous labs are charging as much $2,315 for the same test.

Patients, of course, will ultimately bear the cost through higher premiums. Furthermore, the failure to ban surprise bills means that out-of-network labs can balance bill the patient on top of the fee they charge their health plan. Balance billing is when an out-of-network lab or hospital first bills insurance but because there is no agreed upon price, then balance bills any remaining balance the insurer refuses to pay back to the patient.

Labs aren’t the only ones inflating costs to exploit the Covid-19 emergency. Some hospitals are billing patients hundreds of thousands of dollars for treating the disease, even though hospitals that take federal bailout dollars are supposed to be barred from balance billing patients. This is because even if the hospital takes federal funding, if the doctors that work there are out-of-network, they (or their staffing companies) can send surprise bills to patients.

But there are some policy levers that could help:

Bar billing above what Medicare pays. Medicare initially was paying $50 per Covid test. But because supply was lagging, it upped its reimbursement to $100 to encourage more testing. It seems to have worked — supply for Covid tests is roughly aligned with demand. Congress should limit all labs that take Medicare payments from billing private insurers above the rates set by Medicare.

Ban surprise Medical bills. Congress could resume negotiations over a comprehensive package to ban surprise medical bills. My preferred approach is a benchmark price for out-of-network services tied to Medicare prices. Tying the benchmark to in-network prices or median charges has perverse incentives to increase in-network prices. Is it politically difficult? Yes. But it’s necessary to both protect patients and to stop the exponential growth of health care costs in the U.S.

Consider a global budget. Hospitals do have a revenue problem. That’s mainly because many stopped doing lucrative “elective” procedures to concentrate on handling the surge of Covid-19 patients. But hospitals that have a “global” budget are better positioned to weather the Covid storm. A global budget is a fixed amount of money all payers in a region agree to pay hospitals to deliver care to a defined population. All Maryland hospitals, for example, and more recently rural hospitals in Pennsylvania, use global budgets to pay for medical care. This model eliminates incentives for hospitals to jack up prices for Covid-19 services to compensate for the loss of normal revenue. A recent analysis in JAMA outlines why these hospitals will be better positioned to bounce back from Covid-related economic hardship. While moving to a global budget will be difficult, it makes more sense now than ever and policymakers should not let the moment pass.

Read more here.

America’s COVID-19 Debacle: A Chronology

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Updated on October 21, 2020.

As the coronavirus pandemic enters its 10th month, the United States continues to lead the world in deaths and infection rates. The hard truth is America ranks dead last when it comes to responding effectively to COVID-19.

As of mid-October, more than 222,000 Americans have been killed by the virus, some 70,000 more fatalities than second-ranking Brazil. The United States accounts for about one-fifth of global deaths. We have more than 8.2 million confirmed cases of COVID-19, and the number is rising as the pandemic’s “third wave” spreads throughout the Midwest and mountain West, and in rural America. 

Since the United States is rich and technologically advanced, and spends far more than other countries on health care, there can only be one explanation for our abysmal showing against the coronavirus pandemic: An epic failure of political leadership, especially at the top.

The Trump administration’s manifest inability to contain the pandemic has cost tens of thousands of preventable U.S. deaths and prolonged the nation’s worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. More than 50 million Americans have filed for unemployment, countless small businesses have gone under, and national output has plummeted. 

COVID-19 deaths have been concentrated among the elderly in nursing homes; front-line health workers and those in “essential” industries like meat packing; and, poor and minority communities where people are more likely to make medical conditions that make them more vulnerable to the virus. 

The crisis also has aggravated the nation’s pre-existing economic inequities. Layoffs have been heaviest in low-paid hospitality and service jobs, while many office workers with college degrees have been able to keep working remotely. Even as the economy has contracted, the stock market keeps rising, widening the nation’s wealth gap. 

Millions of K-12 students suffered acute learning losses when public schools closed last spring, and many disadvantaged children also lost access to school meals. Many schools remain closed this fall, putting a heavy burden on parents forced to stay home to look after their kids and help them keep up with their studies online. 

No one expected the United States to escape the ravages of COVID-19 unscathed. But the enormous scale of our human and economic losses was not inevitable. Other countries have managed the COVID-19 crisis far more effectively. For example, South Korea, which reported its first case of infection on the same day as the United States, reports less than 400 deaths and about 22,000 cases.  

In fact, the COVID-19 crisis has posed a kind of “governance stress test” to countries around the world. It is casting a remorseless light on the quality of each country’s political leadership and the competence of its national government. 

Comparing America’s performance with that of other countries, the political scientist Francis Fukuyama concludes that President Donald Trump proved incapable of rising to the challenge:  

“It was the country’s singular misfortune to have the most incompetent and divisive leader in its modern history at the helm when the crisis hit, and his mode of governance did not change under pressure. Having spent his term at war with the state he heads, he was unable to deploy it effectively when the situation demanded. Having judged that his political fortunes were best served by confrontation and rancor than national unity, he has used the crisis to pick fights and increase social cleavages. American underperformance during the pandemic has several causes, but the most significant has been a national leader who has failed to lead.”

Now, with an eye to this November’s election, President Trump and his party seek to convince Americans the debacle they have been witnessing throughout 2020 is a mirage. In a surreal spectacle, speaker after speaker in the Republican National Convention extolled Trump’s “decisive action” against COVID-19, while Trump himself bragged about ordering an “unprecedented national mobilization” against the “China virus.” 

In fact, the mobilization of national will and resources our country needed never happened. The president’s negligence and disdain for taking elementary precautions against the disease, like wearing a mask, has contributed to outbreaks in the White House itself, infecting him and his family and many top staffers.

Even now, with the rate of infection surging again, it’s painfully clear that President Trump has no plan to contain the disease. Instead he’s fighting it with happy talk and promises that a vaccine is just around the corner. He and his party have given higher priority to adding another conservative Supreme Court justice than to passing a major COVID-19 relief bill to check the disease, boost our sputtering economy and maintain unemployment benefits.

The Progressive Policy Institute believes the 2020 presidential election should be a referendum on Donald Trump’s handling of the gravest national crisis he has faced as president. To help voters distinguish fact from fiction, PPI has assembled this comprehensive chronology of key events and milestones in the COVID-19 crisis. As it continues to unfold, we will update this instant historical record as necessary. If readers think we have missed any important events or information, please notify Kate Hinsche at khinsche@ppionline.org.

*Note: The main source for each entry can be found by clicking on the date.

COVID-19: Chronology of a Debacle

2017

JANUARY 12 – Speaking at Georgetown University, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of the National Institute on Allergy and Infectious Diseases, urges the incoming Trump administration to be prepared for outbreaks of viral diseases. “If there’s one message that I want to leave with you today based on my experience, it is that there is no question that there will be a challenge to the coming administration in the arena of infectious diseases.” 

JANUARY 13 – Outgoing Obama administration officials run a crisis simulation for President-elect Trump’s national security team on how to react to the outbreak of a deadly respiratory disease. The incoming administration is also given a 69-page playbook with best practices for handling global pandemics.

MAY 11 – Dan Coats, Director of National Intelligence, reports to Congress about threats to the United States, including global pandemics. 

MAY 27 – In his first budget, President Trump proposes a $1.3 billion cut in the Center for Disease Control (CDC) for 2018. In each year of his presidency, President Trump has proposed similar cuts to the CDC’s funding. (2019) (2020) (2021)

 

2018

FEBRUARY 13 – DNI Coats again warns Congress about the threat of a global pandemic.

APRIL 10 – Tom Bossert, White House homeland security advisor, resigns at the request of National Security Advisor John Bolton. Bossert had repeatedly called for a comprehensive biodefense strategy against pandemics and biological attacks. 

MAY 7 – Speaking at Emory University to mark the 100th anniversary of the 1918 influenza pandemic, Luciana Borio, the National Security Council’s Director of Medical and Biodefense preparedness, warns “The threat of pandemic flu is the number one health security concern. Are we ready to respond? I fear the answer is no.” 

MAY 8 – President Trump calls for cuts in emergency funds for Ebola and other pandemics, as well as the State Department’s Complex Crisis Fund for “emerging or unforeseen crises.”

MAY 10 – As part of his effort to “streamline” the National Security Council, Bolton disbands the Directorate for Global Health Security and Biodefense and removes its director, Rear Admiral Timothy Ziemer. 

OCTOBER 19 – “In a move that worries public health experts,” the New York Times reports, “the federal government is quietly shutting down a surveillance program for dangerous animal viruses that someday may infect humans.” 

 

2019

JANUARY 29 – DNI Coats again warns Congress that the United States remains “vulnerable to the next flu pandemic or large scale outbreak of a contagious disease that could lead to massive rates of death and disability, severely affect the world economy, strain international resources, and increase calls on the United States for support.”

JULY 28 – DNI Coats, who had publicly differed with President Trump over Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, steps down.

SEPTEMBER 15 – The President’s Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) warns that an influenza pandemic could cause enormous health and economic losses. 

OCTOBER 1 – The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issues a draft report on a series of exercises code-named “Crimson Contagion.” The report warns that the federal government is “underfunded, underprepared and uncoordinated” to fight an influenza pandemic. 

DECEMBER 31 – China reports the outbreak of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) to the World Health Organization.

 

2020

JANUARY 

JANUARY 6 – The CDC issues a travel notice for Wuhan, China following reports of the outbreak of a new infectious disease.

JANUARY 10 – Chinese state media reports first death in China due to the novel coronavirus. 

JANUARY 18 – HHS Secretary Alex Azar warns President Trump of the possibility of a pandemic stemming from the outbreak in China. 

JANUARY 21 – The CDC reports the first coronavirus case in the United States: An unidentified Washington State man, in his early 30s who recently had traveled to Wuhan. 

JANUARY 22 – In an interview in Davos, Switzerland, President Trump dismisses concerns about the coronavirus, saying “We have it totally under control.”

JANUARY 22 – White House officials turn down an offer to buy millions of N95 masks manufactured in America, according to the manufacturer. 

JANUARY 24 – President Trump congratulates Chinese President Xi on his handling of the outbreak in Wuhan, tweeting: “The United States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency.”

JANUARY 29 – White House advisor Peter Navarro circulates a memo outlining the risks of coronavirus contagion. It estimates that, in a worst-case scenario, a pandemic could claim up to 500,000 U.S. lives and cost close to $6 trillion.

JANUARY 30 – Amid serious outbreaks in Italy and China, the World Health Organization (WHO) declares COVID-19 a global public health emergency. 

JANUARY 30 – HHS Secretary Azar again warns President Trump of the possibility of a pandemic. The New York Times reports, “Mr. Azar was blunt, warning that the virus could develop into a pandemic and arguing that China should be criticized for failing to be transparent.”

JANUARY 30 – In a press conference, President Trump assures Americans have little to worry about: “We think we have it very well under control. We have very little problem in this country at this moment — five — and those people are all recuperating successfully.”

JANUARY 31 – President Trump issues an executive order ostensibly banning travel to and from China. 

 

FEBRUARY 

FEBRUARY 2 – “We pretty much shut it (coronavirus) down coming in from China,” President Trump tells Fox News’s, Sean Hannity.

FEBRUARY 6 – COVID-19 claims its first U.S. victim: Patricia Dowd, 57, of Santa Clara, California. This fact isn’t disclosed until after an April 21 autopsy. 

FEBRUARY 8 – Labs receiving coronavirus tests from the CDC start to complain that they don’t work properly. The problem isn’t resolved until weeks later when the FDA waives rules against tests developed elsewhere.

FEBRUARY 10 – President Trump continues to express confidence in China’s management of the pandemic. He tells governors at the White House that President Xi of China feels “very confident” because “by April or during the month of April, the heat, generally speaking, kills this kind of virus.”

FEBRUARY 23 – Navarro sends a second memo to President Trump, warning of the “increasing probability of a full-blown COVID-19 pandemic that could infect as many as 100 million Americans, with a loss of life of as many as 1-2 million souls.”

FEBRUARY 24 – “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA,” President Trump tweets.

FEBRUARY 26 – President Trump introduces the White House coronavirus task force, even while continuing to minimize the danger: “The flu, in our country, kills from 25,000 people to 69,000 people a year… And again, when you have 15 [COVID-19 victims], and the 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero, that’s a pretty good job we’ve done.”

FEBRUARY 27 – “It’s going to disappear. One day it’s like a miracle, it will disappear,” President Trump declares in a White House briefing with African American leaders.

FEBRUARY 29 – Stung by criticism of White House inaction, President Trump tells the press: “We’ve taken the most aggressive actions to confront the coronavirus. They are the most aggressive taken by any country and we’re the number one travel destination anywhere in the world, yet we have far fewer cases of the disease than even countries with much less travel or a much smaller population.”

 

MARCH

MARCH 1 – First reported U.S. COVID-19 death in Washington State. The unidentified patient was a man in his 50s with serious health problems. 

MARCH 2 – President Trump predicts that a COVID-19 vaccine is imminent. “I’ve heard very quick numbers, that of months.” This contradicts Dr. Fauci’s repeated warnings that a vaccine may not be available for a year or a year and a half. 

MARCH 6 – At a press briefing, President Trump boasts about his understanding of the coronavirus: “I like this stuff. I really get it. People are surprised that I understand it. […] Every one of these doctors said, ‘How do you know so much about this?’ Maybe I have a natural ability.” 

MARCH 6 – “Anybody that wants a test can get a test,” President Trump asserts after touring the CDC headquarters in Atlanta.

MARCH 6 – The Coronavirus Preparedness and Response Supplemental Appropriations Act — Congress’s first response to the pandemic — becomes law. It provides $8.3 billion in emergency funding for federal agencies to combat coronavirus.

MARCH 9 – In a tweet, President Trump again compares COVID-19 to the flu: “So last year 37,000 Americans died from the common Flu. It averages between 27,000 and 70,000 per year. Nothing is shut down, life & the economy go on. At this moment there are 546 confirmed cases of CoronaVirus, with 22 deaths. Think about that!”

MARCH 10 – Following a meeting with Republican Senators, President Trump again praises his administration’s handling of COVID-19: “It hit the world. And we’re prepared, and we’re doing a great job with it.”

MARCH 10 – In a televised address to the nation, President Trump asserts, inaccurately, that Americans won’t have to pay for COVID-19 treatment.

MARCH 11 – In a press briefing, President Trump again downplays the danger of COVID-19. “The vast majority of Americans, the risk is very, very low. Young and healthy people can expect to recover fully and quickly if they should get the virus.”

MARCH 11 – President Trump announces increased travel restrictions for 26 European countries. In practice, however, the order is riddled with loopholes that create long lines for some and zero screening for others. 

MARCH 11 – WHO upgrades COVID-19 from a public health emergency to a global pandemic.

MARCH 11– News reports say that the United States has tested just over 7,000 people for the coronavirus, compared to 222,395 tests conducted in South Korea. Both countries reported their first COVID-19 case on the same day.

MARCH 13 – Asked by a reporter if he would “take responsibility for the failure to disseminate larger quantities of tests earlier,” President Trump replies, “I don’t take responsibility at all.”

MARCH 15 – 33 states plus the District of Columbia close their public schools.

MARCH 16 – President Trump announces self-isolation guidelines for Americans to follow for the next 15 days.

MARCH 16 – President Trump denies understating the danger of COVID-19: “I’ve always known this is a real — this is a pandemic. I felt it was a pandemic long before it was called a pandemic.”

MARCH 17 – U.S. COVID-19 death toll exceeds 100.

MARCH 18 – Congress passes a second relief bill, the Families First Coronavirus Response Act. It provides close to $3.5 billion for coronavirus testing, 14-day paid leave for workers affected by the pandemic, and removes work requirements for food stamps.

MARCH 19 – President Trump touts, without evidence, chloroquine, and hydroxychloroquine as a potential cure to COVID-19. 

MARCH 22 – In a flurry of tweets, President Trump voices frustration over governors’ handling of the pandemic. The public, however, expresses far more confidence in their governors than the president in national polls.

MARCH 23 – The first nine states implement stay-at-home orders (Washington, Oregon, California, Louisiana, Illinois, Ohio, New York, Massachusetts, and New Jersey).

MARCH 23 – The media reports that 48 states plus the District of Columbia have closed their public schools for the rest of the academic year.

MARCH 24 – In the daily coronavirus task force briefing, President Trump imagines the U.S. economy reopening in a matter of weeks: “I would love to have the country opened up and just raring to go by Easter… I think Easter Sunday — you’ll have packed churches all over our country.” 

MARCH 25 – In the daily briefing, President Trump claims the United States leads the world in testing. “We have tested, by far, more than anybody…There’s nobody even close. And our tests are the best tests.” On a per-capita basis, however, the United States ranks low on tests. 

MARCH 25 – U.S. COVID-19 death toll passes 1,000.

MARCH 26 – Twelve more states implement stay-at-home orders (Idaho, Colorado, New Mexico, Michigan, Wisconsin, Kentucky, Indiana, West Virginia, Hawaii, Connecticut, Vermont, and Delaware).

MARCH 26 – U.S. cases surge to 82,404, overtaking both Italy and China to make America the world’s leader in reported COVID-19 infections. 

MARCH 27 – Congress passes its third and largest aid bill, the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act. The CARES Act provides $2 trillion to aid businesses and workers, procure medical supplies and equipment, and expand Unemployment Insurance. 

MARCH 28 – In signing the CARES Act, President Trump claims that the Inspector General charged with oversight of the bill requires his permission before reporting to Congress. 

MARCH 30 – Nine more states implement stay-at-home orders.

MARCH 31 – President Trump concedes that COVID-19 “is not the flu. It’s vicious. When you send a friend to the hospital… And you call up the next day, ‘how’s he doing?’ And he’s in a coma? This is not the flu.” 

MARCH 31 – U.S. COVID-19 death toll surpasses 5,000.

 

APRIL

APRIL 3 – President Trump tells the public that COVID-19 is retreating. “I said it was going away – and it is going away.”

APRIL 3 – New York City COVID-19 deaths surpass the number of Americans killed on 9/11. 

APRIL 3 – The U.S. Chamber of Commerce reports that 24% of small businesses have closed due to the coronavirus lockdown and predicts another 40% could close soon.

APRIL 3 – In response to the CDC’s recommendation that Americans wear facial masks, President Trump declines to lead by example, saying, “I don’t think I’m going to be doing it.”

APRIL 4 – U.S. COVID-19 death toll passes 10,000. 

APRIL 6 – Twelve more states issue stay-at-home orders, bringing the total number to 42.

APRIL 6 – The United States overtakes Spain’s COVID-19 death toll with 13,298 fatalities, the second-highest in the world behind Italy.

APRIL 7 – President Trump ousts Glenn Fine, the DOD Inspector General picked to oversee the implementation of the CARES Act.

APRIL 9 – The United States overtakes Italy’s COVID-19 death toll with 19,802 fatalities, becoming the world leader in COVID-19 mortality. 

APRIL 14 – President Trump halts America’s contribution to WHO funding and calls for an investigation into the agency’s role in ”severely mismanaging and covering up the spread of the coronavirus.”

APRIL 14 – U.S. COVID-19 death toll passes 30,000. 

APRIL 17 – In a series of tweets, President Trump encourages protests against Democratic governors’ social distancing restrictions: “LIBERATE MICHIGAN,” “LIBERATE MINNESOTA,” “LIBERATE VIRGINIA.

APRIL 17 – The BLS reports that national unemployment grew 0.9% in March, to 7.4 million unemployed or 4.4%. 

APRIL 19 – U.S. COVID-19 death toll passes 40,000. 

APRIL 21 – Tests from autopsies performed in early February come back positive for coronavirus, revealing COVID-19 deaths before the CDC reported the first U.S. fatality on March 1.

APRIL 21 – The White House removes Rick Bright, Director of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA). Bright had said the president’s claims for the curative powers of chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine “clearly lack scientific merit.”

APRIL 23 – In a fourth relief bill, Congress approves $484 billion in additional funding for small businesses, hospitals, and coronavirus testing.

APRIL 23 – President Trump is widely ridiculed for musing in a task force briefing that COVID-19 might be treatable with disinfectants and sunlight. “I see the disinfectant, where it knocks [the virus] out in a minute… is there a way we can do something like that, by injection inside or almost a cleaning?”

APRIL 24 – Georgia becomes the first state to start lifting restrictions and reopening some businesses.

APRIL 28 – U.S. COVID-19 death toll surpasses the official tally (58,300) of Americans who died in the 1955-1975 Vietnam War. 

APRIL 29 – The Bureau of Economic Analysis reports that the U.S. economy shrank at an annual rate of 4.8% in the first quarter of 2020.

 

MAY

MAY 1 – President Trump announces his intention to replace Christi Grimm, the Inspector General of HHS, who released a late April report documenting shortages of medical supplies and testing delays.

MAY 4 – Media reports say that almost 20 states have begun to lift social distancing restrictions. 

MAY 5 – Trump announces he’ll wind down the coronavirus task force by the end of May so that the White House can focus on restarting the economy.

MAY 5 – U.S. COVID-19 death toll passes 70,000. 

MAY 6 – President Trump again expresses impatience about opening the economy. “We can’t have our whole country out. We can’t do it. The country won’t take it. It won’t stand it. It’s not sustainable.”

MAY 10 – Two White House employees test positive for COVID-19.

MAY 11 – The BLS reports that the unemployment rate in April has ballooned to 14.7% with 20.5 million unemployed, much higher than at the peak of the 2008 Great Recession. 

MAY 11 – President Trump castigates Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf for “moving slowly” to reopen his state as protestors rally. 

MAY 18 – President Trump admits he has been taking daily doses of hydroxychloroquine, which has yet to be proven effective and may even be harmful to those who contract coronavirus.

MAY 21 – President Trump, after conducting a Michigan factory tour without a face mask, explains, “I wore one in this back area, but I didn’t want to give the press the pleasure of seeing it.”

MAY 26 – U.S. COVID-19 death toll passes 100,000.

MAY 26 – 36 states have reopened or are in the process of reopening.

MAY 28 – The total number of new jobless claims surpasses 40 million.

 

JUNE

JUNE 2 – Trump suggests GOP move convention to Jacksonville, FL after N.C. Gov. Roy Cooper refuses to allow packed arenas.

JUNE 3 – According to a new study from the University of Minnesota, the malaria drug hydroxychloroquine does not prevent people from contracting COVID-19.

JUNE 6 – 35.4 million Americans are receiving unemployment benefits.

JUNE 8 – Following an easing of lockdown conditions in many parts of the country, infections are rising in 21 states.

JUNE 11 – U.S. COVID-19 cases surpass two million.

JUNE 11 – News outlets report that more than 20 European countries have reopened their schools. Most U.S. schools remain closed.

JUNE 16 – In an op-ed, Vice President Mike Pence dismisses reports about a “second wave” of coronavirus infections and boasts that the Trump administration is “winning the fight against the invisible enemy.”

JUNE 17 – Vice President Pence tells governors that an apparent rise in U.S. coronavirus outbreaks stems from an increase in testing.

JUNE 19 – Gov. Andrew Cuomo wraps up 111 consecutive days of widely praised coronavirus briefings as COVID-19 hospitalizations in New York have dropped below 1,000 for the first time since March 18.

JUNE 19 – Nine Texas mayors write a letter to the states’ residents, urging them to wear masks. Coronavirus cases in Texas continue to surge and the number of hospitalizations has been climbing since May.

JUNE 20 – Disregarding warnings from administration health officials against large public gatherings, Pres. Trump resumes mass campaign rallies in Tulsa, with 6,200 people in attendance.

JUNE 21 – President Trump complains that more COVID-19 testing is increasing the number of confirmed U.S. cases. “When you do testing to that extent, you’re going to find more people, you’re going to find more cases, So I said to my people, ‘Slow the testing down, please’,” he says at the Tulsa rally. 

JUNE 22 – Two members of President Trump’s campaign advance team, who attended Trump’s rally in Oklahoma, test positive for coronavirus. 

JUNE 22 – New data confirms that COVID-19 cases are growing in 29 states.

JUNE 23 – President Trump again insists that more tests are to blame for the increase in coronavirus infections. 

JUNE 23 – At a Congressional hearing, Dr. Fauci says U.S. health officials see a “disturbing surge” of infections in some parts of the country, as Americans ignore social distancing guidelines.

JUNE 23 – Texas tallies more than 5,000 new cases in a single day for the first time. “The coronavirus is serious. It’s spreading,” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott told a local television station.

JUNE 23 – President Trump addresses a crowd of student supporters at a tightly packed megachurch in Phoenix. Trump appeared without a mask, flouting a Phoenix rule that came into force less than 72 hours earlier.

JUNE 26 – VP Pence’s Coronavirus task force hails states for “safely and responsibly” reopening their economies. Yet Texas and Florida officials reimpose restrictions on bars and restaurants amid record levels of new cases and tightening hospital capacity.

JUNE 30 – The E.U. bloc will allow visitors from 15 countries, but the U.S., Brazil and Russia were among the notable absences from the safe list.

JUNE 30 – New York Times data confirms 40,041 U.S. COVID-19 cases.

 

JULY

JULY 2 – Daily number of new COVID-19 cases in the U.S. tops 50,000 for the first time, the largest single-day total since the start of the pandemic.

JULY 2 – The unemployment rate declines by 2.2 percentage points to 11.1 percent, and the number of unemployed persons falls by 3.2 million to 17.8 million.

JULY 2 – GOP 2012 presidential candidate Herman Cain is hospitalized with COVID-19 a week after attending the Trump rally in Tulsa, where many attendees were not wearing masks. 

JULY 5 – President Trump dismisses the impact of COVID-19 and says that while the testing of tens of millions of Americans had identified many cases, “99 percent” of them were “totally harmless.”

JULY 7 – Pres. Trump insists U.S. colleges and universities should remain open for the fall semester, citing several European school openings, “We’re very much going to put pressure on governors and everybody else to open the schools, to get them open.” 

JULY 8 – The U.S. reports more than three million coronavirus cases, with all but a handful of states struggling to control outbreaks of COVID-19.

JULY 10 – The United States reports 68,000 new cases, setting a single-day record for the seventh time in 11 days.

JULY 10 – Hong Kong shuts down its school systems, reporting more than 1,400 cases and seven deaths.

JULY 11 – Disney World reopens its gates in Orlando, Florida.

JULY 11 – President Trump appears with a face mask for the first time in public, five months after administration officials recommended that all Americans wear face masks in public.

JULY 12 – Florida reports a record 15,300 new coronavirus cases, by far the most any state has experienced in a single day.

JULY 13 – The media reports that at least 5.4 million Americans have lost their health insurance during the pandemic. 

JULY 13 – In an apparent attempt to undermine Dr. Fauci’s credibility, a White House official releases a statement saying that “several White House officials are concerned about the number of times Dr. Fauci has been wrong on things.”

JULY 17 – India reports one million coronavirus cases and 25,000 deaths. Researchers at MIT estimate that by the end of 2021, India could have the world’s worst outbreak.

JULY 17 – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announces new restrictions on gyms, restaurants and beaches. 

JULY 19 – During a Fox News interview, President Trump again asserts COVID-19 is going to disappear, “I think we’re gonna be very good with the coronavirus. I think that at some point that’s going to sort of just disappear.”

JULY 20 – U.K.’s Oxford University COVID-19 vaccine shows positive results in first phase of human trials.

JULY 21 – European Union leaders agree on a $857 billion spending package to rescue their economies from ravages of COVID-19. 

JULY 21– At his first coronavirus-related news conference in weeks, President Trump admits that COVID-19, “will probably, unfortunately, get worse before it gets better. Something I don’t like saying about things, but that’s the way it is.” 

JULY 23 – U.S. surpasses 4 million reported coronavirus cases

JULY 23 – Trump cancels Republican convention activities in Jacksonville. 

JULY 30 – Second-quarter GDP plunges by worst-ever 32.9% amid virus-induced shutdown.

JULY 30 – Herman Cain succumbs to COVID-19.

 

AUGUST

AUGUST 3 – Trump criticizes Deborah Birx after she warns the U.S. that the coronavirus outbreaks are “extraordinarily widespread.”

AUGUST 5 – Twitter temporarily restricts the Trump campaign’s ability to tweet false COVID-19 claims.

AUGUST 6 – U.S. records more than 52,000 new COVID-19 cases and 1,388 virus-related fatalities.

AUGUST 6 – Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine tests positive for the coronavirus.

AUGUST 26 – Under pressure from the White House, the CDC issues new guidance saying that people who do not exhibit symptoms after being exposed to someone with coronavirus, “do not necessarily need a test.” 

 

SEPTEMBER

SEPTEMBER 9 – Media reports revelations from Bob Woodward’s new book Rage that President Trump purposely minimized the dangers posed by the coronavirus: “I wanted to play it down. I still like playing it down because I don’t like to create panic,” Trump told Woodward.

SEPTEMBER 9 – “The president never downplayed the virus,” White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany tells the media. 

SEPTEMBER 12 – Media reports that Michael Caputo and Paul Alexander, Trump-appointed officials at the Health and Human Services Department, pressured CDC to “revise, delay and even scuttle weekly reports on the coronavirus that they believed were unflattering to President Trump.”

SEPTEMBER 16 – Caputo takes a leave of absence from HHS after posting a Facebook video accusing government scientists of working to defeat President Trump. Alexander announces his departure from HHS.

SEPTEMBER 18 – Olivia Troye, a top adviser to Vice President Pence and member of the White House coronavirus task force, says the task force recognized by mid-February  that the virus posed a big threat to the United States. “But the President didn’t want to hear that, because his biggest concern was that we were in an election year.”

SEPTEMBER 18 – CDC reverses its August 26 guidance and encourages people exposed to someone with coronavirus to get tested, whether they show symptoms or not. 

SEPTEMBER 22 – The U.S. COVID-19 death toll passes 200,000, accounting for 21% of global deaths.

SEPTEMBER 25 – The number of confirmed U.S. cases passes seven million.

SEPTEMBER 28 – Twenty-one states report increases in cases as health experts warn of a surge in fall pandemic surge.

SEPTEMBER 29 – Seven former commissioners of the federal Food and Drug Administration accuse the Trump administration of distorting science and “eroding public confidence” in the agency. 

SEPTEMBER 30 – Olivia Troye tells NPR that CDC Director Robert Redfield has faced “very challenging dynamics, at times when you’re changing the wording and guidances to fit a narrative, to play down the severity of the virus or cases.”

SEPTEMBER 30 – In the same interview, Troye says President Trump’s refusal to wear a mask in the White House sets the tone for staff: “Even in the West Wing, …you were looked down upon when you would walk by with a mask.”

 

OCTOBER

OCTOBER 1 – White House communications director Hope Hicks tests positive for the coronavirus.

OCTOBER 1 – President Trump hosts a post-debate fundraiser at his golf club, where few attendees wear masks.

OCTOBER 2 – President Trump and First Lady Melania Trump test positive for COVID-19. Later that day the president is taken to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. 

OCTOBER 2 – Media reports that the official U.S. unemployment rate fell to 7.9% in September. However, the labor force participation was 61.3%, two points lower than in February. 

OCTOBER 4 – President Trump temporarily leaves Walter Reed Hospital for a car ride by supporters stationed outside the hospital.  

OCTOBER 5 – Several Secret Service agents anonymously criticize the president’s “joyride,” saying it exposed members of his security disease to the virus. “He’s not even pretending to care now” said one agent. Said another, “That should never have happened. The frustration with how we’re treated when it comes to decisions on this illness goes back before this though. We’re not disposable.”

OCTOBER 5 – President Trump’s medical team confirms that he will be returning to the White House this afternoon. “Feeling really good! Don’t be afraid of Covid,” the president tweets.

OCTOBER 5 – A Cornell University study identifies President Trump’s Twitter feed as the “single largest” transmitter of false information about COVID-19. Graham Brookie, Director of the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab, reaches a similar conclusion: “There is no doubt that Donald Trump is by far the largest spreader of specific and important types of misinformation today.” 

OCTOBER 6 – Stephen Miller, President Trump’s top immigration policy adviser, tests positive for COVID-19. 

OCTOBER 6 – The stock market plunges after President Trump tweets that he has instructed his representatives to cease negotiations with Democrats on a new COVID-19 relief and stimulus bill. 

OCTOBER 6 – NIH scientist Rick Bright resigns in protest over President Trump’s handling of the pandemic. “In this Administration, the work of scientists is ignored or denigrated to meet political goals and to advance President Trump’s re-election aspirations,” Bright charges.

OCTOBER 6 – In the Vice Presidential debate, Democratic nominee Kamala Harris says of President Trump’s handling of the pandemic, “The American people have witnessed what is the greatest failure of any presidential administration in the history of our country.” Vice President Pence responds by crediting Trump with “The greatest national mobilization since World War II.”

OCTOBER 7 – In a scathing letter, former CDC director Bill Foege – called the “Babe Ruth of public health” – calls on CDC Director Robert Redfield to publicly acknowledge the administration’s failure to level with the American people over COVID-19. “Don’t shy away from the fact this has been an unacceptable toll on our country. It is a slaughter and not just a political dispute.”

OCTOBER 8 – Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell admits he hasn’t been to the White House since August 6th, “because my impression was their approach to how to handle this was different than mine and what I insisted that we do in the Senate, which is to wear a mask and practice social distancing.”

OCTOBER 10 – The government reports a third consecutive day with over 50,000 coronavirus cases, the most since August. 

OCTOBER 11 – On NBC’s Meet the Press, Bill Gates says, “We are running the worst testing system, in terms of who gets access to it, of any country.”

OCTOBER 12 – Dr. Fauci warns COVID-19 is “on a trajectory of getting worse.” The latest data shows infections increasing in 31 states. 

OCTOBER 15 – The New York Times reports show that the autumn coronavirus surge is hitting the Midwest, mountain states and rural communities especially hard. “Of the 100 counties with the worst per-capita outbreaks in the last seven days, more than half are home to fewer than 10,000 people.”

OCTOBER 16 – More than 70,000 new cases of the coronavirus were reported today, the highest single-day increase since July. At least nine states set single-day case records, with Midwest and Mountain West states driving the surge. 

OCTOBER 19 – The Washington Post reports on Dr. Scott Atlas’s attempts to hijack the White House coronavirus task force. “Atlas shot down attempts to expand testing. He advanced fringe theories, such as that social distancing and mask-wearing were meaningless and would not have changed the course of the virus in several hard-hit areas. And he advocated allowing infections to spread naturally among most of the population while protecting the most vulnerable and those in nursing homes until the United States reaches herd immunity, which experts say would cause excess deaths, according to three current and former senior administration officials.” 

OCTOBER 19 – A new Yahoo News/YouGov poll shows that Joe Biden has a built a 19-point lead over President Trump on who would do a better job of handling COVID-19. 

OCTOBER 19 – In a call with campaign staff, President Trump asserts that voters no longer want to hear what U.S. health officials have to say about the pandemic. “People are tired of hearing Fauci and all these idiots,” said. “Every time he goes on television, there’s always a bomb, but there’s a bigger bomb if you fire him. But Fauci is a disaster.”

OCTOBER 20 – Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, defends Fauci in an NPR interview. “Tony Fauci is probably the most highly respected infectious disease expert in the world – he’s also a terrific communicator – and I think the public has actually been greatly benefitted by hearing his unvarnished, unflinching descriptions of what’s happening with this pandemic.”

OCTOBER 26 – More than half of US states report their highest single day of new cases in October.

OCTOBER 30 – US surpasses 9 million coronavirus cases, only two weeks after hitting the 8 million case milestone.

 

NOVEMBER

NOVEMBER 6 – White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows tests positive for coronavirus.

NOVEMBER 7 – Joe Biden is projected to win the electoral college by all major news organizations, but Trump refuses to concede.

NOVEMBER 9 – Pfizer announces vaccine candidate is 90 percent effective in early trials.

NOVEMBER 16 – Early data shows Moderna vaccine candidate is 94.5 percent effective.

NOVEMBER 20 – Biden coronavirus advisory board member says lack of shared information between Trump and Biden’s team is ‘dangerous,’ as Trump continues to block the Biden transition process.

NOVEMBER 20 – Donald Trump, Jr. tests positive for the coronavirus.

NOVEMBER 23 – The General Services Administration officially designates Joe Biden as the president-elect, beginning the formal transition of power.

 

DECEMBER

DECEMBER 1 – US closes out a record-breaking month for coronavirus cases and hospitalizations.

DECEMBER 7 – President Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani is hospitalized after testing positive for coronavirus. The 76-year-old has spent the past month traveling around the country as part of his legal efforts to challenge the November election.

 

Forget the ‘veepstakes’ — Biden should make history with finance picks

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

As COVID-19 takes its toll across a divided nation, bad economic news is pouring in from every corner of the country. Vice President Biden has been here before. He campaigned with President Obama in 2008 as the U.S. economy and Wall Street collapsed. This time, however, it’s Biden’s turn to pick a running mate.

Should he claim victory in November, Biden has pledged to build a top-notch Cabinet that “will look like the country.” That’s important, as diverse voices produce better policy outcomes for everyone.

After promising last month to pick a woman to be his running mate, the former VP has recently gone further, saying he ”would consider announcing some Cabinet members before the election.” While naming actual nominees now would be politically fraught, he should instead pledge to fill some of the high-ranking economic and financial posts – for the first time – with minorities.

The list of high-ranking administration jobs that have yet to see an African American, Latino, Asian or Native American includes secretary of the Treasury, as well as the chairs of the National Economic Council (NEC) or the Council of Economic Advisors (CEA). Most influential of all is chair of the Federal Reserve System, which has been occupied by a woman, Janet Yellen, but never a person of color. Nearly every demographic has been confirmed in some or all of the above-mentioned jobs — men, women, old, young, rich, poor, rural, urban and white. That leaves one glaring exception.

Why is this important, beyond making history and breaking barriers?

First is to acknowledge the reality of demographics. With families of color soon to constitute the majority of the U.S. population, having a Cabinet that better reflects society is a no-brainer. Additionally, while global chronic wealth and income inequality have become a defining issue of our times, and the current crisis is sure to exacerbate it, the truth is, race defines inequality in the United States.

According to the Urban Institute, “In 1963, the average wealth of white families was $121,000 higher than the average wealth of nonwhite families. By 2016, the average wealth of white families ($919,000) was over $700,000 higher than the average wealth of black families ($140,000) and of Hispanic families ($192,000).”

Next is policy. While the agenda will ultimately be the president’s to set, the economic and political actualities of 2021 will most likely entail stimulus schemes and a re-boot of Trump’s tax bill that favored the wealthy and big business. This reality would heighten the importance of having minority representation in the executive posts whose most important function is counseling and devising new policies.

From homeownership and access to capital to retirement, history is rife with well-meaning policy efforts that had unintended consequences because policymakers failed to fully consider how people of all backgrounds would ultimately be impacted.

Prosperity Now (formerly CFED) finds that “more than half of the $400 billion provided annually in federal asset-building subsidies…flow to the wealthiest 5 percent of taxpaying households. Meanwhile, the bottom 60 percent of taxpayers receive only 4 percent of these benefits and the bottom 20 percent of taxpayers receive almost nothing. Black and Latino households are disproportionately among those receiving little or no benefit. Unless key policies are restructured, the racial wealth gap—and wealth inequality in general—will continue to grow.”

As the old saying goes, “personnel is policy.”

Finally, in this day and age, despite any semblance of parity, there are simply too many experienced, successful and knowledgeable women and men of color spread across banking, finance and academia for this streak to continue. To think otherwise is to be ill informed. We simply need the will to make change a priority.

Amid the coronavirus outbreak, the Biden campaign can’t lose focus of the bigger picture. A commitment to an inclusive Cabinet would reflect the spirit of Biden’s campaign. Pledging to start addressing economic justice with the top decision makers at one or two of the top economic and financial policy setting institutions makes sense. The fact that these top tier (and most influential) posts have never been led by a minority is a shame. Pledging to nominate minorities to these positions is an idea whose time has come.

This piece was originally published on The Hill. 

How a Startup Tax Credit Can Spur Re-Employment

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

As federal and state governments outline plans for reopening the economy, lawmakers will have to grapple with the challenge of getting tens of millions of Americans back to work as quickly as possible.

More than 47 million Americans have filed for unemployment since the pandemic began, with the unemployment rate at 13.3 percent in May.

The economic damage has been inflicted on both the employer and worker sides of the labor market. A mass of businesses have filed for bankruptcy as a result of the lockdown, with the American Bankruptcy Institute finding a 48 percent increase in commercial Chapter 11 filings in May compared to last year.

And many laid off workers will not be able to return to their former jobs. As many as 25 percent of jobs may never come back, Joseph Brusuelas, chief economist at consulting firm RSM, recently told Politico.

Part of the problem is that even businesses that survive the downturn are going to be wary about expanding to fill the market gaps left by their defunct peers. Small businesses, which are naturally less risk-tolerant than their large counterparts and have access to fewer resources, will be especially cautious about growth.

That’s why simply “reopening the economy” won’t put everyone back to work. We also need a strategy for incentivizing existing small businesses to swiftly scale up and make room for rehiring the unemployed.

U.S. policymakers need new tools for revitalizing entrepreneurship and leveraging its potent job-creating abilities. To that end, the Progressive Policy Institute (PPI) has proposed a new Startup Tax Credit that incentivizes entrepreneurs to quickly increase employment at their small companies, giving even existing companies a startup-like boost.

Modeled on the Earned Income Tax Credit, the Startup Tax Credit would be a refundable tax credit tied to the number of employees and payroll at a small business.

Read more here.

Gary Pearce: Protests and Politics Echo 1968

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Gary Pearce on Politics and Public Policy in North Carolina

2020 feels like 1968.

Peaceful protests erupt into looting and burning. Police battle demonstrators in the streets. Black Americans vent their rage and frustration.

In 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King’s assassination in Memphis lit the fires. This year, it was the death of George Floyd at the hands of policemen in Minneapolis.

In 1968, the nation was already divided by the Vietnam war – and protests against the war. This year, our nerves were already rubbed raw by the Covid pandemic, the economic meltdown, stay-home orders – and protests against the orders.

Then, as now, there was the sickening sense that the floor under American society was collapsing.

1968, like 2020, was a big election year. 1968 ended 36 years of Democratic dominance in Washington, since FDR’s election in 1932. It ushered in an era – more than half a century now – dominated by a Republican Party dependent on white Southerners and dedicated to the proposition that government is the problem, not the solution.

In 1968, an anguished President was trapped inside the White House by protesters chanting, “Hey, hey, LBJ, how many kids did you kill today?” Four years after winning a historic landslide, he withdrew as a candidate for reelection. His dream of a Great Society slipped away.

Today inside a White House again surrounded by protesters, an angry President lashes out at critics, the media and political opponents. Four years after winning a historic upset, he fears his dream of a smashing reelection victory fueled by a rising economy is slipping away.

In 1968, Democrats’ election hopes were shattered when their national convention in Chicago exploded in violence. This year, the Republican convention will be in Charlotte, assuming the city and state can come to terms with the Republican Party and President Trump over Covid precautions.

They also must consider the risk that Charlotte could attract a volatile mix of protesters against racism, “tyranny”-protesting Reopeners and camo-clad white nationalists waving Confederate flags and wielding assault weapons.

We don’t want Charlotte to be to 2020 what Chicago was to 1968.

Then, the violence in Chicago and the riots nationwide set off a white backlash that helped elect Richard Nixon President. George Wallace, running as a third-party candidate, fanned the flames.

Nixon benefitted from Democratic disarray, Roger Ailes’ TV genius and Strom Thurmond’s Southern Strategy. Republicans began their rise in North Carolina and the South. In 1972, North Carolina elected a Republican governor and a Republican Senator named Jesse Helms.

It almost didn’t happen. Vice President Hubert Humphrey, the seemingly hapless Democratic candidate, nearly caught Nixon in the final days.

Former North Carolina Governor Terry Sanford and his chief political adviser, Bert Bennett, helped lead Humphrey’s national campaign. Bennett said years later that Humphrey would have won with another week.

But he didn’t. Nixon won and promised to “bring us together.” But he didn’t. The Vietnam War dragged on, and our racial divide persists today.

Politics, like life, rarely moves in a straight line. We don’t control events; they control us.

Even people with power – Governor, President, police chief, protest organizer – are no more in control than a ship in a storm is in control of the winds and waves.

A few months ago, we thought this election would be about impeachment and a roaring, soaring economy.

Then a virus kills 101,000 Americans and puts millions out of work.

A white policeman keeps his knee on a black man’s neck for almost nine minutes even after the victim pleads “I can’t breathe.”

An angry protester throws a firebomb.

History pays no attention to human intention.

Gary Pearce writes on policy and politics in North Carolina, and is a guest writer for the Progressive Policy Institute. You can learn more about Gary by visiting www.NewDayforNC.com.

Congress must fill the leadership void

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

President Trump is promising a swift and seamless economic recovery if only the states will hurry up and lift their stay-at-home orders. “Those jobs will be back and they’ll be back very soon,” he said, reacting to last month’s horrendous spike in unemployment.

This is fantasy. Besides ignoring the health hazards of prematurely reopening the economy, Trump is raising false hopes among millions of U.S. workers whose jobs have vanished in the COVID-19 crisis.

In fact, getting everyone back to work once the pandemic is contained will be a huge challenge. It will happen in stages, not all at once, and it will require a well-focused national push to help less-educated and low-wage workers find new jobs, skills and careers.

Unfortunately, the Trump administration seems as woefully unprepared to grapple with this urgent task as it was to check the pandemic’s spread. That means Congress will have to deliver what we need: A full-scale, full-employment initiative in which the federal, state and local governments work in tandem with the private sector to upskill displaced workers, match them to openings in fast-growing sectors and lower obstacles to starting a business.

Read the full piece here.

Blog: Finally, It’s the Right Time for Infrastructure Week

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

As Congress passes its historic multi-trillion spending package, people across the country, as well as investors in our beleaguered financial markets, will breathe a sigh of relief. But the truth is, this “Phase 3” response to the pandemic-induced economic shutdown may just be the beginning of what we need to avert a savage recession or even depression.

Some experts, including St. Louis Federal Reserve President James Bullard warned that the nation’s GDP could fall by upwards of 50 percent in the second quarter alone. The first numbers showcasing the fallout dropped this week, with historic unemployment claims more than doubling economist’s worst fears at 3.3 million for the week.

Although it’s called a “stimulus” bill, the package is actually aimed at several urgent goals: Expanding the nation’s medical capacity to fight the contagion and treat its victims, putting money in Americans’ pockets and keeping businesses small and large from going under.

That’s essential, but we also need more of the traditional kind of stimulus intended to juice the economy. What comes next is for Congress and the Trump administration to address real stimulus- actions that use policy to activate increased economic activity.

For that -there is no better, more popular and bipartisan use of taxpayer funds than upgrading the nation’s transportation, communications and other infrastructure. And now, with unemployment spiking, it’s the right time to act at last on all those calls we hear every year during “Infrastructure Week” for a massive surge in public investment in our economy’s backbone.

Infrastructure Week has become a bad joke in Washington. It comes with great fanfare, wins praise from a bipartisan chorus of lawmakers and labor as well as business leaders — and then passes without anything changing. Perhaps now, with interest rates at nearly zero and lawmakers committed to spending whatever it takes to keep our economy afloat, infrastructure’s moment has finally come. And we should think big- upwards of one trillion dollars big.

Why? Because infrastructure investment yields the biggest bang for your buck when you have a higher jobless rate. The reason is what economists call the “multiplier effect,” which is basically a measure of how big a boost in economic output we get from each dollar spent. Creating new jobs and putting unemployed people back to work produces the strongest multiplier effect.

For example, take these estimates of multiplier effects from an economic scenario from S&P Global in 2016 on infrastructure investment (full disclosure- I was a co-author of the paper with Chief U.S. Economist Dr. Beth Ann Bovino):

“…an additional $150 billion in spending (spread evenly over eight quarters) would be fully returned to the economy within the first two years… and at least $189.5 billion to GDP in just the first few years. Additionally, this injection of funds would create roughly 307,000 infrastructure-related jobs in the first two years. Aside from the near-term boost, the country’s productive capacity and output would also likely increase once the infrastructure is built and absorbed into the economy-which means the investment would likely add jobs long after the initial effects have subsided…”

So what can numbers like this tell us about what would happen if we invest today, under the extraordinary circumstances of escalating unemployment? Well, in general, we can reasonably expect the unemployment rate to soon be higher than the 4.9% rate when the paper was written (October 2016), and general economic conditions to be softer. So those GDP returns and job estimates (proportional to the amount invested) could be on the lower end from what we might expect looking forward.

In a low unemployment scenario, which was the reality until the coronavirus hit, there’s too little slack in labor markets to generate high multiplier effects. In this scenario, you have lower overall output because you are essentially moving workers to infrastructure jobs from other jobs, as opposed to creating brand new ones and moving workers from unemployed to being employed.

Some immediate logistical problems come with quick action; for instance, can we even invest now at a time when most folks are forbidden from going to work? The answer is obviously no, but with a caveat. Infrastructure projects tend to have very long, multi-year lifecycles, with planning from engineers, environmental impact studies and permit bottlenecks, before the first shovel can even hit the ground. Additionally, it will take a long time- perhaps years- to work off the significant economic damage that is coming our way.

With even some of the longer estimates for how long it will take for life to return to “normal” running over 3 months, passing a trillion-dollar investment package soon still makes sense.

When looking for economic silver linings in a time of dour forecasts, and multiple trillion-dollar spending barely raises an eyebrow, it seems as good a time as any for a legitimate “Infrastructure Week”.

Statement: New Business Preservation Act Provides Much Needed Capital to Startups

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Today, Senators Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Chris Coons (D-DE), Tim Kaine (D-VA), and Angus King (I-ME) introduced the New Business Preservation Act. The legislation would  create an Innovation and Startups Equity Investment Program in partnership with states and private investors, providing vital capital during the coronavirus pandemic to new startups.

Startups play a critical role in the American economy, powering productivity gains and creating nearly 3 million jobs annually. Unfortunately, due to their nature, many new businesses do not have adequate assets on hand to survive an emergency such as coronavirus, with an average time to turn a profit of nearly three years.

The New Business Preservation Act would provide much needed financial resources to startups during the pandemic. Specifically, the New Business Preservation Act would allocate an initial $2 billion to the program for participating states to invest alongside private venture capital companies in new businesses outside of the Silicon Valley, New York, and Boston venture capital hubs. Importantly, special consideration is given to businesses created by women and persons of color, who face additional barriers in accessing investment capital.

As the U.S. economy continues to suffer due to the coronavirus pandemic, the New Business Preservation Act provides relief to America’s startups. The Progressive Policy Institute urges Congress to swiftly pass this legislation.

Marshall for The Daily Beast: “Who’s Cheering for Bernie Sanders to Win Monday? Young Lefties-and Donald Trump”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Senate Republicans turned President Trump’s impeachment trial into a farcical exercise in partisan whitewashing. That leaves the job of canceling Trump’s reality show presidency to U.S. voters.

A heavy responsibility thus lies on Democratic caucus and primary voters as they start selecting their party’s nominee next week. If they make the wrong choice, it means four more years of Trump’s corrosive assaults on reason, democracy, and basic human decency. For many, the right choice will require setting aside their ideological druthers and picking the candidate most likely to beat Trump in the Electoral College.

It’s hard to know at this point which candidate is most electable. It’s easier to say who isn’t—and Sen. Bernie Sanders tops the list. Despite the devotion he inspires among young left-wing activists, the self-avowed socialist is too far outside the U.S. political mainstream to be considered anything but the longest of long shots against Trump.

Read the full op-ed here.

Mandel for RealClearPolicy: “Do Subprime Auto Loans Threaten the U.S. Economy?”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

With partisan divisions as deep as ever, both sides can agree on one thing: Everybody wants to avoid another financial crisis. And forecasters have recently identified subprime auto loans as an existential threat to the economy.

The headlines are eye-catching and scary: “A $45,000 Loan for a $27,000 Ride: More Borrowers Are Going Underwater on Car Loans,” “Underwater: Consumers Are Treating Cars A Lot Like Houses During The Subprime Mortgage Crisis,” and more of the same. But is it true? Are subprime auto loans the new financial cancer threatening households and the economy, much like the subprime mortgage crisis did in 2007?

No.

Worries about subprime auto loans — which offer higher interest loans to riskier borrowers — are ill-founded and based on misleading data and faulty analogies, our new research finds.

Read the full op-ed here.

Ritz for Forbes: “New CBO Report Projects $13 Trillion Deficit Over 10 Years”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Projections published today by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office confirm that the federal government is on course to spend $1 trillion more than it raises in revenue in Fiscal Year 2020. Trillion-dollar deficits continue as far as the eye can see, with CBO estimating a 10-year deficit of over $13 trillion.

Legislative changes since August have increased projected deficits by more than $500 billion, according to CBO. More than 90 percent of the increase comes from a package of irresponsible tax cuts added to a year-end spending agreement passed in December. But most of the change was offset by a decline in the projected interest rates and other technical changes, leaving 10-year deficit forecasts “only” $160 billion more than they were in August 2019.

What’s driving these deficits? Primarily the growth in federal health-care and retirement programs caused by our ageing population. Federal spending on Social Security, Medicare, and other health programs is projected to grow from 11 percent of gross domestic product today to 14 percent in 2030. All other non-interest spending, meanwhile, is projected to shrink as a percentage of GDP. Revenue won’t keep up with these costs, in large part because the Trump administration keeps charging tax cuts upon tax cuts to the national credit card. If anything, CBO’s projections are overly optimistic because the agency is required to assume most of these tax cuts expire in 2025 as they are scheduled to under current law.

Read the full piece here.

Ritz for Forbes: “What Bernie Sanders Isn’t Telling You About Social Security”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

In recent days, Sen. Bernie Sanders and his campaign surrogates have accused former Vice President Joe Biden of being dishonest about his views on Social Security. Although much has been written about Biden’s position, far less scrutiny has been applied to what Sanders proposes to do with the nation’s largest federal spending program. That’s a problem, because Sanders’ agenda isn’t honest about Social Security’s financial condition and would gravely harm the young voters powering his presidential campaign if enacted.

Here are the facts: both Biden and Sanders, as well as nearly every other Democrat running for president in 2020, have proposed to expand Social Security benefits during the campaign. Nobody is championing benefit cuts in this election. The only real difference among the candidates’ proposals is for whom benefits would be expanded. Biden has targeted his benefit expansions to low-wage workers and window(ers), two groups of older Americans that are statistically more likely to be left in poverty by our retirement system. These are the folks who need Social Security the most. Sanders, meanwhile, has proposed across-the-board benefit increases that would increase benefits for even the wealthiest retirees regardless of need.

Unfortunately, no one is talking about the elephant in the room: Social Security doesn’t even have the capacity to pay out the benefits already scheduled. Every year since 2010, the program has spent more money on benefits than it has raised in payroll taxes.  The U.S. Treasury is currently covering that shortfall, because it borrowed from previous surpluses and is now paying that debt back. But once those funds are exhausted in 2035, Social Security would be legally required to cut benefits across the board by roughly 20 percent. Even Sanders has acknowledged the program has “been adjusted before, and adjustments will have to be made again.”

Read the full piece here.

Ritz for Forbes: “Democrats Finally Debated The Deficit. What Did They Say?”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Two days ago, I noted there had been little mention in the Democratic debates of the trillion-dollar deficits being run up by the Trump administration. That discussion finally started last night after moderator Abby Phillip asked Sen. Bernie Sanders how he would finance his proposals to double existing federal spending. Several candidates weighed in, offering insight into how their management of the federal budget would differ from one another, as well as with President Trump.

Sanders rejected the premise of the question and insisted that his Medicare-for-All plan would actually reduce total health-care spending in the United States. The reality, however, is that – despite embracing almost every tax hike imaginable – Sanders hasn’t come up with a credible plan to finance even half of the more than $50 trillion in additional spending he’s proposed over the next 10 years. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who has made enacting a federal wealth tax one of the central pillars of her campaign, said that some of the revenue from this tax could be used to pay down the growing national debt.

The problem here is that Warren – like Sanders – has already pre-committed every dollar of her wealth tax (and other revenue proposals) to new spending. Major federal programs, including Social Security and Medicare, are facing growing shortfalls due to our ageing population and the Trump administration’s reckless tax-cut and spending policies. As a result, the next president will likely inherit a 10-year deficit of almost $17 trillion. How could Warren or Sanders hope to pay for the promises our government is already making after they’ve tapped every revenue source they conceivably can to pay for new spending?

Read the full piece here.

Ritz for Forbes: “2019 Was Officially Trump’s First Trillion-Dollar Deficit. Will Democrats Debate It?”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

It’s official: the Trump administration spent $1 trillion more in 2019 than it raised in revenue. That deficit is 50% larger than the deficit in 2017, which was President Trump’s first year in office, and represents the first calendar-year deficit to top $1 trillion since 2012. Annual deficits will only grow worse in the coming decade, in large part thanks to the $2 trillion tax cut Trump signed into law in 2017 and a similarly-sized tax and spending deal he signed at the end of last year (over a quarter of which was added to the national debt).

With trillion-dollar annual deficits stretching into the future indefinitely, will Democrats address this generational challenge in their Presidential debate? There sure is an appetite for it: when I had the privilege of speaking with students at the New England College Convention in New Hampshire last week, they expressed deep concern about the rising national debt they’re poised to inherit and how the Democratic candidates would pay for their proposals.

Unfortunately, these issues haven’t been raised in any of the more than 500 questions asked throughout the last six presidential debates. The seventh debate on Tuesday night presents one last opportunity to change this dynamic before the Iowa Caucus.

Read the full piece here.

Stangler for Medium: “The first Democratic debate of 2020 is next week: Guess what won’t be talked about?”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

The Democratic presidential field continues to be in flux, with Julian Castro dropping out and Michael Bloomberg ramping up his campaign. Participation in the January 14th debate is, as of yesterday, limited to just five candidates. Those five — Joe Biden, Amy Klobuchar, Elizabeth Warren, Pete Buttigieg, and Bernie Sanders — have hit the polling and donation thresholds to qualify.

The narrowing is unsurprising, but unfortunate in many respects. The biggest is that it means the debate likely won’t include much mention of one of the most important economic issues facing the country. What’s that?

Declining business creation and overall economic dynamism.

Read the full piece here.

Ritz for Forbes: “The Trillion-Dollar Question Missing From The Presidential Debate”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute
Congress voted this week for a $1.9 trillion tax and spending deal, over a quarter of which was added to our $23 trillion national debt. Thanks to this and other fiscally irresponsible legislation signed into law by President Donald Trump, the federal government will run an annual budget deficit of over $1 trillion this year and every year that comes after it. Yet of over 500 questions asked throughout six presidential debates, not a single one has raised the issue.

 

Read the full piece on Forbes.