No more emergency COVID spending

May 11, 2020, Fairfax, Va.—Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement urging Congress to reject emergency COVI9-19 spending:

“The solution to the economic devastation created by the government-mandate reaction to the Chinese-originated virus is to open up the economy, not additional trillions of borrowed dollars. Already, with all the spending to help prop up the economy during the shutdown, the national debt has jumped to more than $25 trillion while our economy is projected by Goldman-Sachs to shrink by 24 percent to around $16 Trillion.

“This means that the virus response has not only destroyed a quarter of our economy, but has pushed our national debt to GDP from 107 percent a few months ago to 160 percent with at least another trillion in debt projected in the next five months.  The lasting devastation of the health care emergency economic shutdown is not just registered in the tens of millions who find themselves suddenly unemployed, but also in our nation’s long-term dependency upon those who can afford to buy trillions upon trillions of new debt created on top of our already dire fiscal situation.

“To put what will likely be a $27 trillion national debt if additional ‘help’ comes from Washington into perspective, the entire world’s economy was $86 trillion before the world’s economy shut down.  If the entire world is similarly impacted as the U.S., the entire wealth of the world will drop to under $65 trillion.  It doesn’t take a mathematician to realize that U.S. debt nudging up to 40 percent of the entire wealth in the world puts our viability as a country at risk.

“While DC politicians in an election year are always willing to hand out dollars like candy, for once, they have to say no.  It is rumored that another spending bill totaling $3 trillion more is under consideration. Rather than throwing more gasoline on the debt fire, Congress should begin cutting back on some of the excess spending they have already authorized, including ending the excess payments of unemployment insurance benefits that make being unemployed more profitable than going to work for about half of all newly unemployed.

“America does not need more debt-fueled spending to recover, we need the economy re-opened, that is the only prescription which will heal our nation.”

Interview Availability: Please contact Americans for Limited Government at 703-383-0880 ext. 1 or at media@limitgov.org.

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