President Biden believes that the recently passed “American Rescue Plan” changed the course of the pandemic by delivering relief for working families. Likewise, the new “American Jobs Plan,” is touted as an investment in America that will create millions of good jobs, rebuild our country’s infrastructure, and position the United States to out-compete China, according to the Office of the White House.
Not everyone agrees.
Most government officials would have great difficulty looking constituents in the eye while attempting to explain why they would oppose such legislation, as spending money on roads, bridges and other necessary infrastructure improvements to the nation’s economic foundations is in everyone’s best interest.
That being said, Republicans are already set to strongly oppose it; not only because of the legislation’s cost to taxpayers, but also for the requirement that increased corporate taxes must pay the bill, says the NY Times.
Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell adamantly proclaimed Wednesday, that Biden’s $2 trillion “American Jobs Plan” is nothing more than fodder for a major tax increase, as reported in Fox Business. “It’s like a Trojan horse,” McConnell told reporters. “It’s called infrastructure, but inside the Trojan horse it’s going to be more borrowed money, and massive tax increases on all the productive parts of our economy.” McConnell also raised concerns that the legislation would cause the national debt to rise and that the “American Jobs Plan” would work to not so subtly reverse the Republican tax cuts passed in 2017. McConnell also signaled he is unlikely to support Biden’s plan given the tax increases and additional spending.
Notwithstanding McConnell’s pleas, Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi has indicated that by July 4, she expects to have run the American Jobs Plan through the House.
However, that timeline may not be feasible since both Republicans and Democrats still need to wrangle over the details.
The Washington Post reports that Biden’s plan allocates approximately $650 billion to rebuild the country’s infrastructure, which necessarily includes roads, bridges and highways, while $400 billion is earmarked for the disabled and home care for the elderly.
In addition, the plan also includes, among other things, $300 billion for housing infrastructure and $300 billion to stimulate U.S. manufacturing, along with billions of dollars being spent to strengthen the nation’s electric grid, establish nationwide high-speed broadband internet and upgrade U.S. water systems.
The “American Jobs Plan” will cost Americans approximately $2 trillion over eight years, and will be paid for over 15 years by raising the corporate tax rate from 21% to 28%, according to the Washington Post. It would also increase the minimum tax on multinational corporations to 21% and “calculate it on a country-by-country basis so it hits profits in tax havens,” alongside several other efforts to eliminate perceived loopholes in the corporate tax code, as reported by Fox Business.
Source: Newmax
