President Biden wants to spend $2.3 trillion on the American Jobs Plan. Here is what’s in the proposal

President Joe Biden has rolled out his American Jobs Plan, a $2.3 trillion proposal targeted at restructuring the nation’s economy and infrastructure by employing the country’s workforce and increasing corporate taxes.

• “It’s a once-in-a-generation investment in America,” the president said in speech in Pittsburgh on Wednesday, MarketWatch reported. “It’s big, yes. It’s bold, yes, and we can get it done.”

The trillions of dollars infrastructure and jobs plan, which will need to find traction in a narrowly divided Congress, “would cost roughly $2.3 trillion over eight years and be paid for over 15 years by raising the corporate tax rate to 28% from 21% and increasing taxes on companies’ foreign earnings,” The Wall Street Journal reported.

• “The tax changes would revamp or replace much of the international tax structure congressional Republicans established four years ago in the law signed by then-President Donald Trump,” according to The Wall Street Journal.

Here are some takeaways from the White House’s American Job Plan:

What’s in the American Jobs Plan?

Biden’s infrastructure plan proposes a lot more than spending on the country’s aging highways and bridges. Infrastructure is “the place where we will be able to significantly increase American productivity, while at the same time providing really good jobs for people,” Biden said during his first press conferences last week.

The Washington Post divided the proposal into four categories:

• $650 billion for “infrastructure at home” includes spending on “affordable and sustainable housing,” “clean drinking water” and “high-speed broadband.”
• $621 billion in “transportation infrastructure” would allocate billions for “electric vehicles,” roads and bridges, “public transit” and “passenger and freight rail.”
• $580 billion for “research and development, workforce development and manufacturing.”
• $400 billion to support the “caretaking economy,” which includes spending for “home and community-based care for elderly and disabled people.”

Congressman Lloyd Doggett, D-Texas, a senior member of the House Ways and Means Committee said the “bill is about both highways and highway robbery of our Treasury,” Politico reported.

• “The plan cracks down on corporate tax dodging — and that will help fuel and fund the roads, jobs, clean energy and broadband that American families have long needed,” Doggett added, according to Politico.

Democrats have slim majorities in the House and Senate, and nearly all members of the party will need to buy in to the White House’s plan if it is to survive negotiations in Congress.

Progressives want more, GOP says it’s too much

Progressive Democrats, like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, of New York, believes the plan should do more for the country.

• “This is not nearly enough,” Ocasio-Cortez said on Twitter Tuesday. “The important context here is that it’s $2.25T spread out over 10 years. “For context, the COVID package was $1.9T for this year *alone,* with some provisions lasting 2 years.”

• Progressive Change Campaign Committee co-founder Adam Green called the infrastructure plan a “home run” that was a “significant step” for climate policy, and that “hopefully there are more steps to come,” The Hill reported.

Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, of Kentucky, criticized the plan as a “liberal wish-list” in a statement Wednesday.

• “This proposal appears to use “infrastructure” as a Trojan horse for the largest set of tax hikes in a generation,” McConnell’s statement says. “These sweeping tax hikes would kill jobs and hold down wages at the worst possible time, as Americans try to dig out from the pandemic.”
• “Critics, including business groups and many Republican lawmakers, say the administration’s plan to pay for the measures through tax increases will damp investment, undercutting the boost to growth,” The Wall Street Journal reported.