Fiscal Policy in the US: Covid-19 Pandemic

This article was published by the Council on Foreign Relations on April 10th and it outlines the economic impact in the UK, US, Japan, Germany, and China. This article provides projections on how much each of these economies are expected to shrink and how long it might take for them to recover. These are considered to be the largest economies in the world so it is important to see how they are affected by COVID and what policies are being used at this time.

This source includes general stimulus plans for many countries around the world. It outlines the plans for all major European and Asian economies during the COVID outbreak.

The U.S. government was slow to respond and hesitant to escalate the stringency of its public policies compared to other countries in similar situations.

America was extremely slow to escalate its policies relative to the other countries displayed in the graph above. This is reflected by the fact the Stringency Index did not increase in the United States until about 40 days after the first case was reported.