Stimulus is nice. But here's what Biden really needs to fix the economy

Joe Biden last week proposed a $1.9 trillion stimulus bill, part of a historically ambitious plan to combat an economic crisis.

But many economists and business leaders agree that no amount of government assistance to individuals and small businesses can fix the economy until the underlying cause of the problems — the Covid-19 pandemic — has been defeated. At best, the combination of the $900 billion plan passed in December, and this plan from the president-elect, can only help the economy to continue to tread water until the pandemic is under control. "This is a very large package, but it's about helping the economy hang together as well as it can hang together until the end of the pandemic," said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Analytics.