Shortages in the labor force, an increase in the rates of interest, and high inflation have had many economists and experts concerned.
With such uncertainty in the country’s economy, it is still unclear if a stimulus check payment would be the best possible solution to this problem. A recent poll that Newsweek conducted highlighted that around 63% of the American public did support a new round of stimulus payments from the American government that would then be used to combat the rate of inflation.
However, it has been documented that legislators in Washington have provided absolutely no indication that they would be passing the fourth round of stimulus payments. And some analysts, on their behalf, have claimed that one such payment would actually aggravate the entire issue.
Stimulus Check Payment- Is It Still Useful?
One senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, Beth Akers, recently wrote in a blog post that handing out stimulus check payments in a completely inflationary environment would simply make matters worse by increasing the prices even further. Nevertheless, this doesn’t imply that all has been lost.
The support that one seeks from the federal government will probably come through the state government. In recent times, there have been several states that have had pretty historic surpluses over the last year- solely due to the rate of inflation that has been driving up the prices of goods and high pandemic spending. The state government revenue, after being adjusted for inflation increased by 16.4% in the first quarter of 2022 when compared to the year prior.
Lucy Dadayan, the senior research associate at the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, stated that giving direct air in the form of stimulus check payments could be more beneficial than gas tax holidays, or income tax cuts.