But the accolades you could have thrown at the U.I. supplement in June deserve something of a sequel. Researchers at the University of Chicago’s Harris School of Public Policy have an updated study on its impact, and the upshot is that it reversed “income patterns which would have otherwise arisen across income levels, occupations, and industries.” As University of Utah economics professor Marshall Steinbaum enthused on Twitter, noting the supplement’s effects on year-on-year change of income in certain industries, “Everyone who works in the policy world on poverty needs to look at this chart and realize that the thing that happened by chance in March did more to ameliorate poverty than anything anyone in that institutional landscape has done in their entire lives.”

This really is tremendous news. So, naturally, the $600 sweetener became a thing of the past: It expired in late July, amid (fruitless) congressional debate about another pandemic stimulus package. Trump later issued an executive order to create a temporary $400 weekly supplement, but it makes nearly impossible demands of the states. This week, as Congress resumed debate on a new package, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell made clear what he’s willing to permit: a $300 sweetener. This would be part of a broader package that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has called “emaciated.” And it still might not pass. “I don’t know if there will be another package in the next few weeks or not,” McConnell said this week, lamenting that bipartisanship on the Hill has “descended.”
 
This new round of congressional dysfunction is coming at a particularly bad time. As the summer turns to autumn, the warm temperatures that fostered the relief of outdoor gatherings will fade, businesses that did a brisk patio trade will have to pack it in, flu outbreaks are likelier to add havoc and the coronavirus surge once again. Meanwhile, the economy is on unsteady terrain. As Axios reported this week, we could be headed into a “recession within a recession,” as the temporary layoffs at the beginning of the pandemic become reclassified as permanent. Those Americans who felt a small measure of relief from the $600 boost are now fully in the teeth of this crisis.
 
This pandemic year in America has been a nearly unending string of self-inflicted calamities. It’s almost unimaginable that just a few months ago, our embittered lawmakers came up with a game-changing anti-poverty benefit almost by accident. It’s much less surprising that, despite the clear evidence of the benefit’s success, Congress has snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. We’re not waging a war on the coronavirus; we’re waging one on ourselves.