Hilary Hoynes, whose research focuses on the impacts of aid programs on low-income families, said the Coronavirus pandemic reveals the limits of the country’s safety net to help people in times of crisis. On April 10th, she spoke at a Berkeley panel on the pandemic’s economic impacts and how the federal CARES Act has attempted to respond to the crisis.

Gabriel Zucman also spoke on the panel and said that the country’s employer-based health insurance system is exacerbating the problem as people lose jobs during the pandemic.