As he urged Republican lawmakers Tuesday to take drastic action to prop up workers and business during the coronavirus crisis, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin issued a stark warning: Should they fail to take such measures, and quick, the United States jobless rate could swell to 20%, a rate double that of the worst point of the 2008 recession. A spokesperson for the Treasury Department emphasized to Bloomberg News, which first reported the interaction, that the unnerving figure was not a prediction, but one mathematical possibility presented to Senate Republicans. Still, that such a number is on the administration’s radar highlights the extraordinary position the U.S. finds itself in as it contends with the rapidly escalating public health crisis—and its unpredictable, but potentially dire economic side effects.

As Bloomberg reported, the Treasury Department is pitching lawmakers a $1 trillion or larger stimulus to provide financial aid to workers and small- and medium-sized businesses, which have already been hard hit by the pandemic. The possibility of 20% unemployment is higher than most predictions to this point, and the Department said he floated the number as one example of the possible impact of coronavirus on the economy. “Mnuchin used several mathematical examples for illustrative purposes, but he never implied this would be the case,” Treasury Department spokeswoman Monica Crowley told Bloomberg. But even if unemployment doesn’t reach a worst case scenario, the U.S. economy—and the workers and business within it—is at a wildly perilous juncture as the country grapples with the novel coronavirus. We’ve already seen the stock market, which Donald Trump has long cast as a marker for the strength of the economy under his administration, plunge as the virus spreads.

Now, as businesses across the country temporarily close in an effort to slow the spread, and the pandemic upends the transportation and hospitality industries, we’re getting our first look at how the crisis is impacting workers. Layoffs in the retail, tourism, and service sectors surged in recent days, with 18% of respondents in an NPR/PBS Newshour/Marist poll saying they or someone in their household had already lost work or had hours reduced. “This demonstrates the urgency for Congress to act,” Ohio Senator Rob Portman told Politico, “and act quickly.”

Nancy Pelosi worked a new coronavirus assistance package through the House—and Mitch McConnell has signaled the Senate could pass it and send it to Trump, despite objections from some in his ranks. “Gag and vote for it anyway,” he suggested to Republicans Tuesday. Mnuchin, meanwhile, is proposing that checks be sent to Americans to help them weather the crisis as part of the $1 trillion aid package. Even so, the ultimate economic toll of coronavirus remains unpredictable, dependent on a number of variables—how quickly the situation can be brought under control chief among them.

As New York’s Josh Barro wrote Tuesday, everyone from Fed chairman Jerome Powell to business leaders has been wary of making forecasts, but that the possibility of a recession, or at least getting dangerously close to one, is likely. “The best course of action for policy-makers is to throw some money out the window, and then throw more money out later if it continues to be necessary,” Barro wrote. “With interest rates on government bonds incredibly low, the cost of stimulating too much is limited, but the cost of stimulating too little could be severe.”

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