The Internal Revenue Service began sending $600 stimulus payments to eligible Americans’ bank accounts on Tuesday evening and will continue processing the transfers into next week, according to a statement from the agency, Bloomberg News reported. The IRS and Treasury Department will start mailing paper checks on Wednesday. The $600 payments will go to many low- and middle-income adults. Dependent children ages 16 and under in those households are also eligible for $600 each. “These payments may begin to arrive in some accounts by direct deposit as early as tonight,” Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin wrote on Twitter Tuesday. “The IRS emphasizes that there is no action required by eligible individuals to receive this second payment,” the IRS said in a statement on Tuesday evening. “Some Americans may see the direct deposit payments as pending or as provisional payments in their accounts before the official payment date of Jan. 4, 2021.” The IRS is beginning to send the payments just two days after President Donald Trump signed the $2.3 trillion government funding and coronavirus relief package into law. The relief measures include a second round of direct payments as an attempt to bolster consumer spending and disposable income, which have fallen in recent weeks amid surges in COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths, and new restrictions by cities and states.
