The new jobless statistics should guide Congress and the president as they consider how to craft what seems an inevitable next phase of their economic response to the coronavirus crisis on top of the recent $2.2 trillion Cares Act. The economy is experiencing a deep, sudden blow to hard-working but vulnerable people and businesses that employed them. Many of those firms are small companies, 24 percent of which may have already gone on temporary shutdown, according to a survey released Friday by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Among those small businesses that haven’t ceased operations yet, 40 percent consider it likely they will do so within the next two weeks, at least temporarily, according to the survey.

The situation calls for a correspondingly swift and strong response targeted at these areas of greatest need. One popular idea — a massive infrastructure plan — might be meritorious in theory but would take months or years to work through the economy, and the benefits would be difficult to target. More likely to be effective would be one or more additional rounds of cash assistance to households, possibly continuing until some public health or employment target had been reached, along with additional support to small business payrolls if and when the current $350 billion in Small Business Administration lending capability runs out. State and local governments may also need additional fiscal support, lest they, too, be forced to make undue budget cuts in education, public heath, water and other basic services upon which local economies depend.

Recognizing these realities, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Friday dialed back her previous advocacy of a major infrastructure push when Congress returns from its recess, scheduled to conclude on April 20. She had been joined in that by President Trump, but this was one time when bipartisan agreement did not connote optimal policy. Ms. Pelosi is now talking about the need to build on the priorities in the Cares Act rather than try to add new ones. For a country still in the early stages of an economic disaster, but one that still might be salvaged through well-timed and well-targeted federal intervention, this strikes us as a more realistic approach.