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A pilots' union for Mexico's Grupo Aeromexico said it had accepted cuts amounting to $350 million on collective bargaining pacts in negotiations required for the airline to win a second tranche of bankruptcy financing, Reuters reported. The Association of Airmen Pilots (ASPA) voted to accept the reduction over the next four years to support the firm's financial restructuring, it said in a statement. Salary cuts for pilots ranged between 5% and 15%, while 79 pilots facing job cuts will be compensated under the agreement. The pilots also accepted fewer benefits, the union added. Aeromexico filed for chapter 11 protection in a U.S. court in June, after the coronavirus pandemic slammed the global travel industry. The carrier was approved for up to $1 billion in debtor-in-possession (DIP) financing, and received an initial $100 million payment in September. The company said in December it had completed negotiations with two other unions.

President Joe Biden said he’s open to negotiate on his $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief proposal, and is hopeful to bring Republicans behind it, though didn’t rule out pursuing a Democrat-only route, Bloomberg News reported. “I’m open to negotiate,” Biden said at a news conference on Monday. Still, he said “time is of the essence and I must tell you I’m reluctant to cherry pick and take out one or two items here.” Biden said that it would be up to lawmakers as to whether to use a budget-rule procedure in the Senate to forgo Republicans and proceed just with Democratic support. He also said that it won’t be clear if there’s a basis for agreement until the final stage of talks, which he anticipated in a “couple” of weeks. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said yesterday that he aims to secure passage of the next round of COVID-19 relief by mid-March, just when jobless benefits from the last package will be running out. “We’ll try to get that passed in the next month, month and a half,” Schumer said with regard to pandemic aid on Monday, speaking on a call with New York City mass-transit advocates. A bipartisan group of senators, along with the Republican and Democratic leaders of a moderate group of House representatives, on Sunday questioned the White House on the basis for Biden’s $1.9 trillion stimulus proposal. Brian Deese, head of Biden’s National Economic Council, was pressed on the justification for the price tag of the plan, which would be the second-largest emergency spending package on record. GOP Senator Susan Collins of Maine said she’d suggest to the bipartisan group that it look at pulling together its own, more targeted, proposal.

President Joe Biden will escalate appeals for Congress to back his top priority, $1.9 trillion in pandemic relief, seeking to overcome Republican opposition to the plan as he enters his first full week in office, Bloomberg News reported. Biden’s top economic adviser, Brian Deese, spent more than an hour on Sunday discussing the proposal with a bipartisan group of lawmakers. Some asked the White House to further justify what would be the second-largest emergency spending measure in U.S. history and expressed interest in a much narrower bill focused on accelerating coronavirus vaccine distribution, according to Senator Angus King of Maine and people familiar with the matter. Deese and other officials provided details and context in response to the senators’ questions, according to an administration official. Senior White House aides plan to keep talking with lawmakers in both parties this week to hear their concerns but also press for urgent action, the official said. As the president’s team began its work with key lawmakers, Biden is moving forward with another round of executive actions, following on a series of orders signed soon after he took office. On Monday, he will sign an order directing federal agencies to buy more American-made products and is expected to take other actions on criminal justice, climate, health care and immigration. The new orders will add to roughly two dozen actions Biden has signed since Inauguration Day in an effort to address the coronavirus pandemic, reverse former President Donald Trump’s agenda and point the nation in a new direction.

State and local governments face a $225 billion shortfall for the coming fiscal year, according to a study from the left-leaning Center for Budget and Policy priorities, The Hill reported. The study estimated that the governments' revenues, which had in recent months come in higher than expected, were still 7.8 percent below pre-coronavirus estimates. Once federal aid was taken into account, states, localities, tribal nations and territories were left about $300 billion short of revenues. States still have an estimated $75 billion in rainy day funds that could be used to plug some of those holes. President Biden has requested $350 billion in state and local aid as part of his $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill, a figure that is likely to be pared back in negotiations with Republicans. Other relief efforts and proposals have sought to address some of the additional costs states face, such as education costs, funding related to the coronavirus and various public health measures. The study noted that shortfalls among state and local governments had already contributed to 1.4 million jobs lost since the pandemic took hold, including 177,000 in the fourth quarter alone.

The Small Business Administration said on Tuesday that roughly 60,000 borrowers were approved for more than $5 billion in forgivable loans during the first week of the reopened Paycheck Protection Program, the Wall Street Journal reported. The small-business coronavirus relief effort relaunched Jan. 11 after closing last August. The first wave of applications was largely handled by community and small lenders after the SBA set aside time for them to process the loans exclusively. The program’s restart comes as many small businesses continue to struggle with the fallout from the pandemic. One-third of small businesses surveyed between Jan. 4 and Jan. 10 said they would need financial assistance or additional capital in the next six months, according to the Census Bureau, up from nearly 25% in mid-November. The average PPP loan size was below $20,000 for first-time borrowers and below $75,000 for second-time borrowers for applications processed through Jan. 17, according to an SBA spokesman, a sign the loans were being approved for smaller businesses. Loan amounts are based on the size of an applicant’s payroll. The average loan size was $206,000 during the program’s initial launch last April and was $101,000 at the program’s close last August.

As President-elect Joseph R. Biden, Jr. prepares to take office this week, his administration and the Federal Reserve are pointed toward a singular economic goal: Get the job market back to where it was before the pandemic hit, the New York Times reported. The humming labor backdrop that existed 11 months ago — with 3.5 percent unemployment, stable or rising work force participation and steadily climbing wages — turned out to be a recipe for lifting all boats, creating economic opportunities for long-disenfranchised groups and lowering poverty rates. And price gains remained manageable and even a touch on the low side. That contrasts with efforts to push the labor market’s limits in the 1960s, which are widely blamed for laying the groundwork for runaway inflation. Then the pandemic cut the test run short, and efforts to contain the virus prompted joblessness to skyrocket to levels not seen since the Great Depression. The recovery has since been interrupted by additional waves of contagion, keeping millions of workers sidelined and causing job losses to recommence. Policymakers across government agree that a return to that hot job market should be a central goal, a notable shift from the last economic expansion and one that could help shape the economic rebound.

President-elect Joe Biden yesterday outlined his $1.9 trillion stimulus proposal and called for swift action on it, warning that the health of the nation and its economy hang in the balance, The Hill reported. Speaking six days before he will be inaugurated as the 46th president of the United States, Biden laid out a plan that would support coronavirus vaccination efforts, help reopen schools, deliver critical aid to workers and small businesses, tackle the hunger crisis and send funding to state and local governments. He said that his plan would be two-pronged. The first element is the “American Rescue Plan” the president-elect is asking Congress to pass immediately. The second is a forthcoming recovery package that he plans to lay out in February that will involve investments in infrastructure, research and development and clean energy. Biden said that he plans to describe his recovery package during an address to a joint session of Congress in February. Biden is proposing a $1.9 trillion relief package that includes $415 billion focused on combating the COVID-19 pandemic, over $1 trillion in direct aid to individuals and families and $440 billion in assistance to businesses. The plan includes funding for $1,400 in additional stimulus checks to Americans who qualify for them, adding to $600 checks already enacted in December; an extension for key unemployment programs from mid-March to the end of September; and an increase in weekly additional unemployment assistance from $300 to $400. The proposal also calls for increasing the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour over time. The proposal also sets aside $20 billion for a national vaccination program and $50 billion to scale up coronavirus testing.

President-elect Joe Biden will unveil a stimulus package proposal today designed to jump-start the economy during the coronavirus pandemic with an economic lifeline that could exceed $1.5 trillion and help minority communities, Reuters reported. Biden campaigned last year on a promise to take the pandemic more seriously than President Donald Trump, and the package aims to put that pledge into action with an influx of resources for the coronavirus vaccine rollout and economic recovery. The incoming administration will work with Congress on the quick stimulus package after Biden takes office on Jan. 20, although the impeachment of Trump threatens to consume lawmakers in the initial weeks. The stimulus package has a price tag above $1.5 trillion and includes a commitment for $1,400 stimulus checks, according to a source familiar with the proposal, and Biden is expected to commit to partner with private companies to increase the number of Americans getting vaccinated. Biden’s incoming White House economic adviser, Brian Deese, told Reuters on Wednesday the president-elect would press Congress to pass immediate stimulus measures and then turn to longer-term economic recovery measures related to healthcare and infrastructure.

Senate Democrats plan to prioritize a bill containing more COVID-19 relief, including additional $1,400 payments to many Americans and money to accelerate vaccine deployment, as their “first order of legislative business” when they assume control of the chamber, the New York Times reported. The priorities, which Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the incoming majority leader, outlined in a letter to colleagues on Tuesday, echo many of the policies that President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. has signaled he will officially unveil on Thursday. The president-elect has said repeatedly in recent days that he will push Congress to pass an additional pandemic relief bill meant to boost the flagging economic recovery and to accelerate efforts to deploy vaccine doses. In a call with Schumer and Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Friday, Biden stressed the need for “immediate economic relief for families and small businesses, funding for COVID-19 response, including vaccinations, testing, school reopening, and state and local frontline workers,” according to a readout from the Biden transition team. Schumer picked up on those themes in his letter. “The work of the 117th Congress will begin in the wake of a devastating attack, on the heels of a devastating year,” he wrote. Schumer said the immediate relief bill would contain the additional money, on top of $600 individual payments Congress approved last month, to fulfill the promise of $2,000 payments that Mr. Biden made to voters in Georgia’s runoff elections this month: “We will get that done.” He also said that it would contain money for vaccine distribution, schools, small businesses and assistance for state and local governments, which was left out of the last COVID-19 package in a dispute with Republicans. Schumer said senators would also prepare broader legislation to address climate change, infrastructure, manufacturing, immigration, criminal justice, inequality and elections.