The economy is surpassing growth expectations as effects from the Biden administration’s COVID-19 economic relief plan settle into place. In March, retail sales surged by 9.8 percent after the federal government distributed $1,400 per person stimulus checks to Americans across the country in an effort to offset the economic fallout of the pandemic. Previously, Dow Jones had estimated that retail sales would grow by a little over 6 percent in March. In February, retail sales didn’t grow at all — they fell by 2.7 percent.
On a similar note, new unemployment claims dropped to the lowest one-week total since March of last year, when the pandemic reached the U.S. In the week that ended on April 10, there were 576,000 new unemployment claims across the country, although Dow Jones had estimated that there would be 710,000 such claims. In late March of 2020, new unemployment claims hit a one-week total of 6.15 million, which was by far the highest recorded one-week total of new unemployment claims in the history of the United States. Now, unemployment sits at 6 percent after temporarily topping out amidst the pandemic at 14.7 percent.
As vaccines have rolled out across the country, authorities have moved to allow the full re-opening of key parts of the economy. In California, which was one of the first states to impose sharp restrictions when the pandemic got underway, authorities are planning for a full re-opening on June 15. Other locales, like Texas, have already lifted all pandemic-related restrictions, even though the virus isn’t gone yet. So far, tens of millions of Americans have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19, and over 123 million Americans have received at least one shot (two of the country’s three approved vaccines have been administered in two-dose regimens).
The economic relief that Biden signed into law and helped boost retail spending in March did not get a single vote from Republican members of Congress, but a majority of Americans — including some Republicans — have repeatedly expressed their support for the legislation in polling. Overall support for the relief has repeatedly hit 70 percent, which is a monumental level of public backing for a key policy initiative from a current presidential administration.
