Stimulus Proposal: Get A COVID-19 Vaccine And Then Get Your Check
America is facing two simultaneous crises at the moment: the COVID-19 pandemic and the financial crisis and it’s hard to imagine one being solved without the other. Entrepreneur and former Congressman John Delaney (D-Maryland) is proposing a solution to both problems.
He told CNBC in an interview that his proposal involves giving people $1,500 stimulus checks in exchange for getting immunized. “The faster we get 75 percent of this country vaccinated, the faster we end Covid and the sooner everything returns to normal,” Delaney said. Given that vaccinations has become a polarizing political issue, Delaney feels that big measures need to be taken. “We have to create, in my judgment, an incentive for people to really accelerate their thinking about taking the vaccine.”
He noted that no one would be forced to take the vaccine, and pointed out that in the U.S., there are other measures to ensure that people get vaccines, one of which is the requirement to get vaccinated in order to attend school.
Of course, the plan would need bi-partisan buy-in, which seems unlikely at the moment, even as 12 million people could lose their unemployment benefits by the end of the year.
The plan, which would cost $380 billion, could have unintended consequences: for instance, given that the CDC has said older people should get vaccinated first, that would mean that older people would also get their stimulus checks earlier than younger people.
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