The first wave of coronavirus stimulus checks have been deposited, but most American workers and small businesses are getting the short end of the stick. Banks and corporations, on the other hand, are getting VIP treatment.

According to the Cares Act—the $2 trillion stimulus bill that became law last month—there is nothing preventing banks from simply claiming individual Americans’ $1,200 lifeline before it even reaches their hands, if they owe outstanding debt. While Congress is not expected to gavel back in until May, the Treasury Department could still issue regulations exempting stimulus payments from private debt collection. It has not done so.

The Trump administration has also put private banks in charge of doling out $349 billion in loans for the Paycheck Protection Program, which are meant for small businesses suffering from the Covid-19 recession. But struggling small-business owners are running into bureaucratic roadblocks put up by some of the world’s wealthiest financial institutions, like JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, and Bank of America.

“I’ve been banking with [Bank of America] for 15 years, I have a payroll account with them and a checking account, but not a lending relationship. When I logged on, it said you’re not eligible because you do not have a credit card or lending relationship,” one small-business owner told Yahoo Finance. “They caved to online pressure and by Saturday morning they were letting us apply, but it will go in order of priority, so now I think I’m at the bottom of the list.”

The difficulty small business owners have in getting relief stands in contrast to how large corporations are receiving aid. Distressed industries will have essentially no independent oversight of the $500 billion in bailout money the Cares Act included to support workers after President Donald Trump sacked the chairman of a panel established to oversee disbursements. This means companies could feasibly use this money to pay bonuses to top executives or buy back shares of their own stock, and nobody would know.

The richest Americans are also enjoying a tax break that Senate Republicans sneaked in. A recent analysis by the Joint Committee on Taxation found that more than 80% of the benefits of a change in the tax code for “pass-through” businesses will go to Americans who make more than $1 million per year. This handout to the rich will cost taxpayers roughly $90 billion in 2020 alone, according to the committee’s report.

With approximately one in ten workers now out of a job, millions of people are counting on unemployment insurance to meet monthly obligations. One significant portion of the Cares Act that Congressional Democrats inserted was an extra $600 per week in unemployment benefits, which some states have already started paying out. While this is undoubtedly beneficial for many people who have resorted to forming bread lines in their cars in major cities across the country, states’ antiquated unemployment systems are still unable to accommodate nontraditional workers, including the self-employed and gig workers with unique situations.

The bureaucracy of unemployment insurance seems byzantine by design. After losing my job as a server in mid-March, I applied for unemployment benefits, only to get denied as I hadn’t worked long enough to meet state qualifications for an 18-month “base period” (I moved from Kentucky in January). After being told to apply in Kentucky, I was denied once again. Kentucky said I hadn’t earned enough money in the base period to qualify for a minimum benefit. This basically puts me in unemployment purgatory. Meanwhile, bills are piling up while the “universal” pandemic assistance for laid-off workers never materializes, and Republicans like Sen. Lindsey Graham want to claw back that crucial extra $600.

The Covid-19 stimulus was sold to the public as an aid package for the most vulnerable, yet the people who need help the most are being let down while banks, corporations, and the rich are helping themselves at the government trough. This is a backward system: Ordinary workers—most of whom have far less in savings than personal-finance experts say is necessary to weather an emergency—need to be the focus.

Congress’ first priority when returning to Washington should be passing a recovery package that truly puts workers first. The ship has already sailed for many people who would have been covered by the House Democrats’ legislation to fund COBRA payments for those who lost their employer-sponsored health insurance after being laid off.

A good place to start would be Sen. Bernie Sanders’ proposal to fund hazard pay for front-line workers, $2,000 monthly payments to jobless people, a national rent freeze, and using Medicare to cover all health-care expenses, among other policies. As Coronavirus Task Force member Deborah Birx said recently, we’ve “not yet reached the peak” of the virus’s spread, and Americans deserve their elected officials to put the health, safety, and stability of their households above all else right now.

Carl Gibson is a freelance journalist whose work has been published by CNN, The Guardian, The Washington Post, The Houston Chronicle, and NPR, among others. Follow him on Twitter @crgibs.