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    Yellen Testimony 9-28-21

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    Secretary Yellen testified before the Senate Banking Committee about the ongoing economic recovery from the pandemic recession. While expansion continues and jobs are being recaptured, challenges from the Delta variant are slowing progress. Treasury has administered much of the relief funding from recent bills, distributing $46 billion in expanded Child Tax Credit payments and $350 billion to state and local governments. More work remains to expedite emergency rental assistance, but flexibility in relief programs is helping communities respond to evolving needs like vaccination incentives. Congress must address the debt limit to avoid economic crisis.

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    Yellen Testimony 9-28-21

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    Zerohedge
    73K views3 pages
    Secretary Yellen testified before the Senate Banking Committee about the ongoing economic recovery from the pandemic recession. While expansion continues and jobs are being recaptured, challenges from the Delta variant are slowing progress. Treasury has administered much of the relief funding from recent bills, distributing $46 billion in expanded Child Tax Credit payments and $350 billion to state and local governments. More work remains to expedite emergency rental assistance, but flexibility in relief programs is helping communities respond to evolving needs like vaccination incentives. Congress must address the debt limit to avoid economic crisis.

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    Secretary Yellen testified before the Senate Banking Committee about the ongoing economic recovery from the pandemic recession. While expansion continues and jobs are being recaptured, challenges from the Delta variant are slowing progress. Treasury has administered much of the relief funding from recent bills, distributing $46 billion in expanded Child Tax Credit payments and $350 billion to state and local governments. More work remains to expedite emergency rental assistance, but flexibility in relief programs is helping communities respond to evolving needs like vaccination incentives. Congress must address the debt limit to avoid economic crisis.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    73K views3 pages

    Yellen Testimony 9-28-21

    Uploaded by

    Zerohedge
    Secretary Yellen testified before the Senate Banking Committee about the ongoing economic recovery from the pandemic recession. While expansion continues and jobs are being recaptured, challenges from the Delta variant are slowing progress. Treasury has administered much of the relief funding from recent bills, distributing $46 billion in expanded Child Tax Credit payments and $350 billion to state and local governments. More work remains to expedite emergency rental assistance, but flexibility in relief programs is helping communities respond to evolving needs like vaccination incentives. Congress must address the debt limit to avoid economic crisis.

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    of 3

    For release at

    5:00 p.m. EDT


    September 27, 2021

    Statement by

    Janet L. Yellen

    Secretary

    United States Department of the Treasury

    before the

    Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs

    U.S. Senate

    September 28, 2021


    Chairman Brown, Ranking Member Toomey, members of the committee: It’s a pleasure to testify

    today. We are in the midst of a fragile but rapid recovery from the pandemic-induced recession. While

    our economy continues to expand and recapture a substantial share of the jobs lost during 2020,

    significant challenges from the Delta variant continue to suppress the speed of the recovery and present

    substantial barriers to a vibrant economy. Still, I remain optimistic about the medium-term trajectory of

    our economy, and I expect we will return to full employment next year.

    A rebound like this was never a foregone conclusion. In fact, the American recovery is stronger

    than those of other wealthy nations. One key factor for our overperformance is the policy choices that

    Congress has made over the past 18 months. Those choices include the passage of the CARES Act, the

    Consolidated Appropriations Act, and the American Rescue Plan.

    Treasury, as you know, was tasked with administering a large portion of the relief dollars in those

    bills, and when we last met, our Department was busy standing up programs to help individual families,

    state governments, and organizations of every size in between. While we still have much more work to

    do, we have made significant progress, and I wanted to give you an update.

    Let’s start with families. In July, our Department started sending the monthly expanded Child Tax

    Credit payments to the families of nearly 60 million children across the country. To date, $46 billion

    dollars in payments have been made, and we’re already seeing the impact. Analysis by the Census Bureau

    found that after the first payments in July, food insecurity among families with children dropped 24

    percent.

    As for state, local, tribal, and territory governments, COVID-19 decimated their budgets. There

    were mass layoffs, and to end the health and economic emergencies, we knew that communities would

    need funding to hire educators to bring kids back to school, for example, or frontline workers to

    administer the vaccine. The American Rescue Plan included $350 billion to that end, and those dollars are

    indeed helping the machinery of local governments get up-and-running. States and localities can rely on

    relief money that is available instead of resorting to painful budget cuts.


    Congress rightly designed the state and local program with flexibility in mind. I think many of us

    knew the recovery could run up against some unforeseen challenges, and we wanted communities to be

    able to devote resources where and when they saw fit. I want to note that this flexibility is paying off

    now, especially with the spread of the Delta variant. Harris County, Texas, for instance, has used this

    funding to boost its immunization rate, offering $100 to each person who gets their first vaccine dose.

    For the relief dollars not yet out the door, Treasury is doing everything it can to expedite their

    delivery. The Emergency Rental Assistance Program is one example. Prior to the pandemic, there was

    essentially no national infrastructure to get money from government coffers to renters and landlords.

    Building that infrastructure has been a massive undertaking for states, localities, and tribes.

    The program is scaling up quickly, with 1.4 million payments made to help struggling renters

    keep a roof over their heads. Still, too much of the money remains bottlenecked at the state and local

    levels. That’s why our Treasury team has worked to eliminate every piece of red tape possible in order to

    ensure more payments can get to renters and landlords, but states and localities must also work to remove

    barriers that can speed up distribution of rental assistance funds.

    I’ll end my remarks there except to reiterate what I’ve communicated many times these past

    several weeks: It is imperative that Congress swiftly addresses the debt limit. If it does not, America

    would default for the first time in history. The full faith and credit of the United States would be impaired,

    and our country would likely face a financial crisis and economic recession.

    We must address this issue to honor commitments made by this – and prior – Congresses,

    including those made to address the health and economic impact of the pandemic. It’s necessary to avert

    a catastrophic event for our economy.

    Senators, the debt ceiling has been raised or suspended 78 times since 1960, almost always on a

    bipartisan basis. My hope is that we can work together to do so again – and to build a stronger American

    economy for future generations. Thank you, and I’m pleased to take your questions.

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