For Immediate Release
Contact:
Kevin Zeese, 301-996-6582, kzeese@howiehawkins.us
HAWKINS DEMANDS GREEN NEW DEAL FOR ECONOMIC RECOVERY
Pending stimulus not strong enough for full recovery
(SYRACUSE, NY, March 25, 2020) Howie Hawkins, a Green Party candidate for president, made the following statement today regarding the stimulus package now pending before the US Senate.
“The pending stimulus package is equal to about one month of spending by the US economy. It’s a temporary stop gap. It is at best a temporary stop gap with the economy on lockdown for what is likely to be months. Once again, as with the bailouts during the Great Recession, the federal government is doing far more to help large corporate interests, not only in this stimulus package but in the multi-trillion dollar bailout already handed out by the Federal Reserve to the banks and financial investors. The package will keep money flowing to working families through a one-time cash payment and continuing workers’ paychecks or unemployment insurance. Businesses will be able to freeze in place and cover their overhead expenses. State and local governments will get some relief from the fiscal shortfalls they now face,” said Hawkins.
Hawkins continued, “but the package is not a real solution to the economic calamity we face. The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis projects up to 30% unemployment this spring. The big Wall Street investment banks project a collapse in economic output of 25-30% next quarter. Those projections forecast a faster and steeper drop than we experienced in the Great Depression.”
“We must demand much stronger medicine for economic recovery. The federal government should make a major down payment now for decade-long program of public investment on the order of $2-3 trillion a year in a Green New Deal. The Green New Deal would rebuild our production systems across all sectors—power production, transportation, manufacturing, agriculture, and buildings—for negative carbon emissions and 100% clean energy by 2030. I have already presented a budget for an ecosocialist Green New Deal at this scale. With a coronavirus depression knocking at our door, it is now imperative for economic recovery as well as for climate safety to embark now upon a full-strength Green New Deal,” Hawkins added.
Howie Hawkins was the first US candidate to campaign for a Green New Deal as the Green Party candidate for New York governor in 2010. The Green New Deal became the signature issue of the Green Party throughout the 2010s. He is currently leading in the Green primaries for the Green Party nomination for president.
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