Second stimulus check calculator: how much could I get?
The HEROES Act proposes a second round of coronavirus Economic Impact Payments in the US. Find out here how much you could claim.
As part of the CARES Act, a $2.2-trillion relief bill passed in March, around $267 billion has been sent out in Economic Impact Payments (EIPs) to help Americans cope with the financial effects of a pandemic that has officially left the country in a recession, the National Bureau of Economic Research said this week.
Although unemployment actually fell slightly in May, a jobless rate of 13.3% nonetheless remains a whole 10% higher than it was in February, and several recent polls have shown that people in the US are clamoring for further financial support on top of the CARES Act EIPs, more commonly referred to as stimulus checks.
HEROES Act: up to $1,200 each, $1,200 per dependent
Passed by the House in May, the $3-trillion Democrat-backed HEROES Act proposes handing out a second round of stimulus checks to eligible people in the States.
Like the CARES Act, individuals earning below $75,000 a year would be paid $1,200, while those on up to $99,000 would get a steadily lower amount. Married joint tax filers with a shared income below $150,000 would receive $2,400.
Whereas the first round of checks included an extra $500 per family for every dependent, meanwhile, the HEROES Act would up this credit to $1,200 each (max. three), allowing households to claim a total of up to $6,000. What's more, unlike the CARES Act, dependents aged 17 or over would not be excluded.
Calculate how much your HEROES Act check would be:
(Calculator created by Mateusz Tkaczyk and Jasmine J Mah)
HEROES Act faces opposition in GOP-controlled Senate
To be signed into law, however, the HEROES Act has to be approved by the Senate - but has come up against fierce resistance from Republicans in the GOP-controlled upper chamber. Indeed, it has been described as "dead on arrival" at the Senate.
What’s more, a fresh Covid-19 relief package may not happen right away. Forbes reports that stimulus legislation is unlikely to be passed until the end of July, in line with recent remarks by Republican Senator Roy Blunt, who said: "My personal belief is we will do something before the August break - that's about the right timing."
Senate Republicans are reportedly insisting that the next stimulus bill - which, says Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, will be the “final” one - must not exceed a $1-trillion spend.
Trump administration open to second check, says Mnuchin
Senate Republicans may have balked at the HEROES Act, but United States Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin has offered Americans encouragement that a second round of stimulus checks will still happen, saying it is something the Trump administration is "seriously" contemplating.
"I think we're going to seriously look at whether we want to do more direct money to stimulate the economy," Mnuchin told a hearing by the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship on Wednesday. "I definitely think we are going to need another bipartisan legislation to put more money into the economy."
Live coverage of the coronavirus pandemic
At the time of writing, there had been 2,023,347 confirmed coronavirus cases in the United States, leading to 113,820 deaths, according to figures compiled by Johns Hopkins University. You can stay up-to-date with the latest Covid-19 developments and numbers as they emerge in America with our live, US-focused coverage.