An Unemployment Tsunami

https://www.axios.com/newsletters/axios-markets-12675eed-329f-41b4-978d-4120b6580c12.html?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter_axiosmarkets&stream=business

Unemployment trends are transitioning from temporary layoffs to permanent ones, signaling a long road to recovery without a comprehensive second stimulus package.

USPS and Small Business

https://spectrumnews1.com/ca/la-west/business/2020/08/21/small-businesses–usps-changes-need-to-be-rolled-back–not-just-suspended#

Changes in the postal service negatively impact small businesses that have been hit especially hard during COVID19.

Children More Contagious Than Adults

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2020/08/20/covid-study-kids-mild-no-symptoms-more-contagious-than-adults/3392088001/

Children have been found to be silent carriers of the virus, with some asymptomatic children having higher levels of the virus in their airways than infected adults in ICUs.

COVID-19 Tests No Longer Need FDA Approval

https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/08/feds-ok-covid-19-tests-without-fda-approval

The Department of Health and Human Services is no longer mandating that COVID-19 tests get FDA approval due to an executive order from the White House.

Hospitals Are Back To Suing Patients

https://www.axios.com/newsletters/axios-vitals-ff58a5a1-e893-48b5-9c04-f0cc25b28607.html?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter_axiosvitals&stream=top

Hospitals are suing COVID-19 patients for payment.

In 2006 a law passed by Congress with bipartisan support that forced the United States Postal Service to prefund their employees retirement health benefits 75 years in advance and ever since this unnecessary and counterproductive legislation, it has been especially vulnerable. Now with the pandemic and lack of government funding, it is in a crisis.  Making matters worse, the newly appointed PostMaster General has been making decisions that seem more aligned with dismantling the essential public service than saving it.  In the past month reports have come in, along with pictures and videos, of post boxes being removed or locked, reduced office hours and potential closures.

Aside from the obvious implications this has in the upcoming November elections, there are many other reasons you should be extremely concerned about this trajectory.

The USPS is a huge employer.  They have 600,000 workers, 97,000 of which are military veterans.  This makes it one of the largest employers of veterans in our country. The last thing we need is an institution to go under that’s keeping Americans gainfully employed during the pandemic.

The USPS also goes places that Fedex, Amazon and other private delivery services don’t go.  This means that it’s one of the only points of access to the outside world for many people, especially in rural areas. Oftentimes, products ordered through Amazon or sent through Fedex end up being outsourced to the USPS in order to deliver to those harder to reach places.  If the USPS goes down, many people will be cut off from the outside world.

It is an essential service. Many rely on the USPS to mail checks to pay their bills, for life saving medication and other necessities, especially the elderly or disabled, and to stay in touch with loved ones.  As mail service has slowed, people have protested, signed petitions and taken to social media to express their outrage and share their struggles. Some people talk about how they haven’t received their cancer medication on time and are still waiting. 313 million adjusted prescriptions were sent through the mail in 2019.  Small businesses that depend on USPS to deliver their goods warn that if the Postal Service goes under, they will soon follow.

It will be terrible for the country if USPS can’t continue to operate.  Even more small businesses will close than already have during the outbreak, 600,000 USPS employees will lose their jobs, and lots of people will no longer have access to lifesaving resources and medication and/or be unable to afford to send mail through other privatized delivery services that are far more expensive.

The post office is a historic US institution.  In 1775 Congress named Ben Franklin the first Postmaster General and James Madison, the 4th president of the United States said this about its importance, “The power of establishing post roads must, in every view, be a harmless power, and may, perhaps, by judicious management, become productive of great public conveniency. Nothing which tends to facilitate the intercourse between the States can be deemed unworthy of the public care.”  It has indeed become not just a great public convenience, but a great public necessity.  Destroying it will throw us farther down a road it is becoming increasingly difficult to walk back from.  We must preserve and defend the USPS, both for the masses of people who depend on it and for the health of our economy and public infrastructure.

To learn more about what you can do to save USPS and make sure it’s sabotage is not just stopped, but reversed, click here.

Yours in Strength,

The Take Back Control Team

Food insecurity, once a rising concern linked to climate change, is now front and center for Americans during the pandemic.  With record levels of unemployment, supply chain disruption and rising grocery store costs, more and more Americans are forced to rely on food banks to feed their families.

Justin Block ,the managing director for the digital platform technology at Feeding America noted that “Across the Feeding America network of 200 food banks, the majority of food banks report seeing an increase in the number of people served compared to this time last year with an average increase of almost 60%.” This is substantial and a huge cause for concern.  With over 1 million new unemployment claims continuing to be filed every week, even as the unemployment expansion from the CARES Act expired last month, there is no end in sight for those out of work from COVID who need to feed their families. 

Feeding America estimates that 1 in 6 Americans will be food insecure this year due to COVID-19, a 46% increase from prior to the virus.  Even more disturbing, the amount of children suffering from hunger is projected to rise to 18 million, or 1 in 4.

Even if your immediate concern isn’t putting food on the table, grocery prices will rise for everyone.  According to the USDA beef prices will rise by 8%, pork by 4.5% and poultry by 3% this year compared to last year.  This is twice as much as the average annual increase in beef and pork prices.

What happens when food banks are overwhelmed?  Already feeding exponentially more people than usual, many that are volunteer led have had to shut down due to COVID. Lowcountry Foodbank in South Carolina fed about 140-150 people a month on average before the pandemic.  In April, that rose to 1,000, though that number has since dropped and held steady at around 700 per month since. But Brenda Shaw, Chief Development Officer for the Lowcountry Food Bank, expects to see another jump now that the unemployment expansion has expired.

We need serious government intervention.  No child should be struggling to eat in the world’s richest country, especially as stock markets continue to climb and the rich get richer off of the chaos of the virus. There is no excuse for this great nation to have 1 in 4 children go hungry.  Perhaps the most insidious component of this rising catastrophe is that it is entirely preventable.  Unemployment expansion is possible and would boost the economy.  Another round of stimulus checks is desperately needed.  Rental assistance and an eviction moratorium are key to preventing a second housing crisis, worse than the 2008 recession. 95% of the population wearing masks would control the virus in a matter of weeks and save 40,000 lives by December.  Our government must act, and act quickly to prevent economic collapse and the unnecessary death and disenfranchisement of its citizens.

Yours in Strength,

The Take Back Control Team

We’ve only just begun August and already schools that have elected to reopen for in-person classes are reporting COVID-19 cases. 

In the Gwinnett County Public School system in Georgia, 260 employees either tested positive for COVID-19 or are quarantined due to exposure.  Corinth Highschool in Mississippi is reporting 5 confirmed cases and requiring children and staff exposed to quarantine for 14 days. In Greenfield, Indiana a school reported a case on their first day of reopening and Elmwood Community School, also in Indiana, was forced to move students in 7th-12th grade online learning for at least a week after several staff members tested positive.  

Most of the public messaging surrounding COVID-19 has warned against super spreader events, cautioning people against poorly ventilated indoor settings and crowds–so, schools essentially. 

Trump’s push to send kids back to school is a desperate attempt for normalcy and parents ability to refocus on their jobs and subsequently, restart the economy.  But there is no quick fix to the economy.  And sending kids back to school while the outbreak continues unabated not only endangers the children, but the parents who are then exposed.

Meanwhile, Governor’s are overriding local school boards and taking matters into their own hands.  In Maryland,  Gov. Larry Hogan overruled Montgomery County’s decision to make private schools go virtual until October.  In Iowa, Gov. Kim Reynolds overrode local school districts and is requiring students to spend half of their schooling in person.  In South Carolina and Florida, the governors are pushing for in person classes.

Teachers in fear for their lives are making wills and finalizing end of life directives.  The American Federation of Teachers says it will back any local chapters that decide to strike.  

It’s clear that the risk to our youth and the adults in charge of their care are being put in high risk situations without adequate protections.  The question is not if people will die, but how many will die needlessly and how badly this will add flame to the already overwhelming spread of COVID-19.

Yours in Strength,

The Take Back Control Team

Republicans have finally presented the outlines of a second stimulus package called the HEALS Act.  It includes more money for a second stimulus check but leaves out an eviction moratorium extension which expired on the 25th of July or rental assistance of any kind. It also cuts the unemployment expansion of $600/wk that many American families depend on for necessities.

Mitch McConnell is saying that they want to incentivize people to go back to work by cutting the expanded unemployment aid of $600/wk and replacing it with $100-200 or 70% of what people would have made at their jobs.

Just the other day Steve Mnuchin said “We’re not using taxpayer money to pay people more to stay home.” What this means is he does not want to use taxpayer money to support taxpayers who do not have jobs because businesses are unable to reopen at full capacity, if at all.

By refusing to support the American working class with their own tax dollars while millionaires get $1.6 million in tax cuts and billionaires get rich off of corporate bailouts, Congress is actually prolonging this crisis and making the economy worse.  According to the Economic Policy Institute extending the $600 UI benefits through the middle of 2021 would provide an average quarterly boost to gross domestic product (GDP) of 3.7% and employment of 5.1 million workers.  

Lisa Roberts, director of economic mobility at the Center For American Progress says, “Each dollar of unemployment insurance boosts economy-wide spending by $2. The Economic Policy Institute estimates that letting the $600 unemployment insurance extension expire would by itself lead to more job loss than happened in the recessions of the early 1990s or early 2000s.”

The HEALS Act also leaves out childcare funding, an eviction moratorium expansion, rental assistance, student loan relief, additional funding for local governments and other major crisis points that desperately need to be addressed and are intertwined with the health and economy of this country.  But it did have an extra $30 billion for defense spending on top of $760 billion already passed.

Reducing the unemployment expansion and neglecting to address critical issues exacerbated by the pandemic isn’t just hypocritical and cruel, it’s bad for the economy and the public health of this country.

Yours in Strength,

The Take Back Control Team