I bet they'll give it a try. I frankly don't understand how the federal reserve works. I share the sentiment of a lot of people here in thinking that fiat isn't stable, yet it keeps surprising me and managing to avoid the devastating effects common sense would leave you expecting through all of the recent rounds of quantitative easing and other "strategic money printing". Fiat works just fine as a short term exchange medium I guess? My uninformed guess is that the fraction that was paid out to individuals in the stimulus bill will be used as an excuse to retrieve the full amount back in increased taxes, funneling money to buy corporate handjobs and lobby support, but I could be pleasantly surprised. Paying out 600 billion as an excuse to recollect 2 trillion seems like a good business model.