Why the Biden Bipartisan Infrastructure Plan is Great But It Is Not Enough
Biden has proposed a bipartisan infrastructure plan that cost 600 billion dollars here is what the money is for
- 312 Billion for Infrastructure Projects Including Roads, Bridges, Rail and Public Transport
- Rest is for other stuff.
Here is what Biden originally proposed.
- 180 billion dollars for Research and Development
- 115 billion dollars for Roads and Bridges
- 85 dollars for Public Transit.
- 42 billion dollars for Ports and Airports
- 111 billion dollars for Water Infrastructure
- 100 billion dollars for Broadband
- 300 billion for Manufacturing
That is not total but I ran out of free articles on the New York Times do that expired. The total for the Infrastructure Plan Costs 2 trillion dollars and the American Families plan costs 1.8 billion dollars according to the White House.
Then here is his American families Plan
- Free Childcare
- Free Community College
- Free Family and Medicare Leave.
This sounds good but unfortunately, it has no chance to pass without abolishing or reforming the filibuster or reforming budget reconciliation. Biden has decided to abandon the infrastructure plan and American Families' plans in favor of a bipartisan bill.
Of course, this is delusional because the Republicans will never support Biden on anything.
Obama once proposed the Individual Mandate System to pass the Affordable Care Act. Which was originally proposed by the Republicans in the 1990s to get Joe Lieberman to vote for his healthcare plan. They immediately called it socialism despite being the ones who originally supported so the Republicans will never support any legislation supported by the Democrats.
No Bipartisan law has passed unless it benefits rich assholes like the ironically named CARES Act and the NDAA of 2012 and 2016 which expanded military spending.
However, I really like the bill because the US is long overdue to invest in its infrastructure. The Bipartisan infrastructure bill won’t do enough to completely repair the US infrastructure but it will certainly improve it.
According to the American Society of Engineers 2021 Report Card, the Grade for US Infrastructure is C- with for 2017 the grade was D+. So the US needs to invest in its infrastructure because it is falling apart and terrible. The US hasn’t invested in infrastructure in a long time and it is about time they did that because the last time the US has done that is under Eisenhower with the interstate highway system.
It is currently estimated that the US needs to spend 2.588 billion dollars to upgrade our infrastructure and that the money currently being spent on infrastructure is 3.35 trillion dollars. So 600 billion dollars is not enough to keep it up to date. So I propose investing 5.9 trillion dollars over ten years to make sure our infrastructure is the best in the world.
Though of course spending, any money that doesn’t benefit-rich assholes is not what Congress does so it doesn’t happen.
I also have an alternative to the Bidens American Families Plan that will help working families pay their bills and make sure working families can get their children taken care of and go to work and pay for college. Here is my alternative to the Bidens plan that he abandoned
- 150 billion dollars of Tuition-Free College, Medical School, Trade Union, Apprenticeships, and Community College.
- 160 billion dollars per year over 10 years in cancelling all student debt.
- 20 Days of Paid Vacation by Law of 80 dollars per day.
- 15 Weeks of Maternity Leaves by law for all mothers of 400 dollars per week.
- 81 Billion Dollars to Cancel Medical Debt.
All of this will be paid for by a Financial Transaction Tax or a 0.05% Financial Transaction Tax on all stocks, equities, bonds, forex spot, futures, options, and swaps which will raise over 354 billion dollars per year.
I will also propose in this 5.9 Trillion Infrastructure Plan in 10 years. Instead of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Plan.
- 2.834 Trillion Dollars for Surface Transportation
- 1,045 Trillion Dollars for Water/Wastewater/Stormwater
- 237 Billion Dollars for Airports
- 637 Billion for Electricity (Be generated by Thorium Nuclear and Renewable Energy)
- 93.6 Billion for Damn
- 21 Billion for Hazardous and Solid Waste
- 80 billion dollars for levees
- 77.5 Billion Dollars for Public Parks
- 870 billion Dollars for Schools
These numbers come from the infrastructure report card investment gap. This website comes from a website where engineers rate the US infrastructure every four years. In 2017 the US infrastructure got a grade of D+ and in 2021 the grade was C-. So in other words my Spanish Grade. This is not good and it is long overdue the USA spends more on its infrastructure.
This does not mean I don’t like the bipartisan infrastructure plan I do think it is better than nothing. However, I don’t think it is enough. I think the issue with Biden right now is that he comes up with a policy and then abandons once it becomes too hard to pass, gets bored with it, or his donors tell him no.
Biden sort of doesn’t believe in anything and is obsessed with bipartisanship and will always support the bipartisan bill even though a partisan bill is way better. Bipartisan doesn’t always equal good and I think has been in that Washington bubble for so long that if your president the opposing party will never agree with you on anything unless it benefits the rich.
I think Biden should have learned from the Obama era and Obamas failures and just used budget reconciliation or the nuclear options to get his legislation through rather than relying on a fantasy that the Republicans will support your legislation.
I think Obama was used to bipartisanship in the Illinois Statehouse while he was a State Senator. While Biden who was in the Senate for centuries loved bipartisanship because it was such an accomplishment in Washington and if you sponsor or pass a bipartisan bill you get respect and praise from your peers and get more power and influence in Washington which explains his obsession with it.
Or another reason is that Biden doesn’t actually want his infrastructure or American Families Plan to pass and it is just worded in order to keep the Progressive Base in line which so far it works because is popular with 90% of Democrats which include progressives.
So I think Biden should just get his original infrastructure plan through budget reconciliation rather than through a bipartisan infrastructure plan which will never pass through regular order. The Republicans will be willing to do photo ops but won’t actually vote for anything a Democratic President supports.
