To stop the spread of the coronavirus, state and local governments have shut down as much of communal life as possible. People are also social distancing, staying out of public spaces to slow transmission of the disease. But this has destroyed demand for goods and services, putting the United States on the path to a recession that could easily become an outright depression.

Washington is, finally, working toward a response. But even the most ambitious proposals are nowhere near powerful enough to actually stop the coronavirus from destroying the economy. To do that, policymakers have to go beyond stimulus or bailouts for select industries. They have to take responsibility for economic life on a scale not seen since the New Deal.

Nothing has been passed into law yet, but politicians have begun to float ideas and propose legislation. On Friday, the House of Representatives passed a bill that would offer free testing for all Americans as well as sick days and paid emergency leave for a small subset of working people. On Monday, Senator Mitt Romney of Utah called for sending $1,000 to every America, a one-time grant to pump cash into the economy. On Tuesday, Steven Mnuchin, the treasury secretary, called for more than $850 billion in economic stimulus, including $58 billion in airline bailouts, $250 billion in small business loans and $500 billion in payroll tax cuts.

Some of these ideas are good and necessary, if not sufficient. Millions of Americans need to pay for housing, medicine and groceries now and immediate cash disbursals are the only way to make that happen. To its credit, the White House has moved away from the payroll tax cut — which would only help workers still employed, not those who have been laid off, furloughed or who work for tips — and embraced cash payments, although they’ll only amount to an average of two weeks of pay for most workers and won’t go out until the end of April.