'Digital dollar' proposal stripped from latest Congressional coronavirus stimulus bill

A review of the latest version of House Democrats' coronavirus economic stimulus bill shows that language around a proposed "digital dollar" has been removed.

As The Block reported on Monday, a version of the bill circulating this weekend included the noteworthy proposal, which would have – if passed – created a system of digital dollar wallets maintained and operated by Federal Reserve system banks. The purpose: to serve as the infrastructure for delivering stimulus payments to American consumers as they weather the economic storm triggered by the spread of COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

A separate bill, previously advanced by members of the House Financial Services Committee, still includes the digital dollar provision.

Yet as The Block noted yesterday, the digital dollar proposal wasn't guaranteed to survive the political back-and-forth around the bill. A source with knowledge of the process on Capitol Hill had pointed to the problem of setting up such a system from the ground up. 

The sprawling Take Responsibility for Workers and Families Act, which now weighs in at more than 1,400 pages, makes no reference to the digital dollar. The payout method has also been significantly altered, appearing to take the form of an advance tax refund via the Treasury Department.