Commonwealth Policy Center

Congress passed another Covid relief bill. It’s supposed to help ailing businesses with another paycheck protection program, extended and enhanced unemployment benefits, and another round of $600 direct payments to U.S. taxpayers. But there’s also a lot of pork in it, including $700 million in economic aid for Sudan and $453 million in aid for Ukraine. Altogether, the price tag on this relief bill is a cool $900 billion. This begs the question: can we afford this? The national debt has increased by $7 trillion in just four years. Altogether, the national debt is $27.5 trillion. We all know that money doesn’t grow on trees but Congress doesn’t seem to think so.