Social-Spending and Climate Framework
Please note we finally have a Social-Spending and Climate Framework.
Mr. Biden addressed House Democrats Thursday morning to provide an update on the spending package and a parallel bipartisan infrastructure package that has been held up by progressives in the House. Mr. Biden will then deliver remarks from the White House, and one of the people familiar with the matter said he would provide a path forward on his economic agenda before departing for Italy.
“The president believes this framework will earn the support of all 50 Democratic senators and pass the House,” a senior administration official said, adding that the White House would defer to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) on
Whether the major policy concessions Mr. Biden made to centrists will be acceptable to progressive Democrats remains unclear. Mr. Biden is expected to tell Democrats that he trusts Sens. Joe Manchin (D., W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (D., Ariz.), two pivotal centrists in the talks, according to a person familiar with the plans.
Unclear Framework
- Good News: We have a framework
- Band News: We don’t know if Progressives and Moderates will support the alleged framework
- Ugly News: If we don’t know if the framework has support, do we really have a framework?
What’s In the Frame
- A one-year extension of the expanded child tax credit through 2022, plus a provision making that break permanently available to low-income families that don’t pay income taxes.
- Six years of universal prekindergarten
- Six years of child-care subsidies
- $150 billion to support long-term care for elderly and disabled Americans.
- $555 billion for climate-related provisions, including $320 billion in 10-year expanded tax credits for utility-scale and residential renewable energy, transmission, electric vehicles and clean energy manufacturing.
- Surtax of 5% on adjusted gross income above $10 million and another 3% on AGI over $25 million. Those taxes would effectively raise the top tax rate on ordinary income to at least 45% and raise the top capital-gains rate to 31.8%.
- A 3.8% investment-income tax to active business income, hitting high-income owners of many closely held businesses.
- A 15% minimum tax on profitable corporations, higher taxes on U.S. companies’ foreign income and money to increase the Internal Revenue Service enforcement staff.
- A 1% excise tax on corporate stock buybacks.
- $35 billion to broaden Medicare benefits to cover hearing
Excluded From the Frame
- Democrats abandoned plans to include a paid-leave program in the bill,
- Billionaires’ wealth tax
- A rule requiring banks to report account flows to the IRS
- Changes to estate and gift taxes and higher corporate tax rates.
- Paid leave
- Free community college
- A program aimed at pushing utilities to generate more clean energy
- A proposed series of top marginal-tax-rate increases
- Medicare broadening will not include dental and vision benefits
Complaint of the Day
“Manchin is getting everything he wants and Bernie is getting almost nothing. Why? Because Manchin is willing to kill the bill and Bernie isn’t. Progressives will have no power until they’re willing to kill bills.”
Fight! Fight! Fight!
“Showing you’ll ACTUALLY fight (not just talk about fighting) is the ONLY way to keep it alive”
What a hoot!
Three-Point Synopsis
- The alleged framework is down from $3.5 trillion to $1.75 trillion, still a bit over Manchin’s stated goal of no more than $1.5 trillion.
- It’s unclear if the climate and tax provisions are acceptable to Manchin and Sinema. It’s also unclear if Progressives will hold out for more.
- Bernie Sanders, AOC, and the Progressive Caucus twice threatened to kill the bill if they did not get what they want (and they did not get what they want).
Question of the Day
Do we really have a framework?
Curiously, I side with the extreme progressives in hopes we don’t.
Alas, I suspect we are close to a framework that will waste $1.75 trillion leaving everyone but two Senators unhappy.
Hell No!
Here’s one Hell No
Here’s a “Who Knows?”
How to tell if there is a supported framework: If Pelosi schedules a vote, she probably has them. If not, she doesn’t.
Perhaps there is a symbolic rejection before passage.
But Bernie Sanders is now a potential third problem in the Senate.
Thanks for Tuning In!
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Mish
So if they extend the child tax credit I’ll get 3k each for 3 kids and 3600 for the 4th who would obviously be under 6 years old.
That’s $12,600 in completely free (tax free I might add) cash added to my stash of wealth.
I’m currently buying 2 rental properties a year (100kish in price) and adding 12k a year to my income doing so, not including mortgage payoff and property appreciations, just cash in my pocket.
So, a family earning over 100k a year and likely to be worth at least a million in a couple years is getting $12,600 in free cash from the government.
That is absolute insane policy. Anyone who votes for that is a nut job. It appears we have a bunch of nut jobs in leadership in the USA.I am going to spend every penny of it buying rental property and jacking up rents as high as I can to pocket as much of everyone else’s Child Tax Credit as I can. Every other landlord I know is doing the same.
This isn’t going to help the poor at all.
And there is also the theory that it is so much money that they don’t even need to work. So which one is it?? LOL
IN the short term, it’s very demotivating to work. That means they will stay poor. They’ll never accumulate assets, never get a good SS record and stay poor their entire life.
So yes, this is so much money that they don’t need to work to live, and that’s a terrible life.
What kind of chance does a person have to succeed financially if they don’t work?
Answer: None.What kind of chance does a person have to succeed financially if they do work, even for low wages?
Answer: Better than none.
You choose none, I choose better than none.