U.S. Politics

[Rick Plant]

The simple fact is, no other President in history has done more for job creation and manufacturing than President Biden and he's only a little over 2 years into his first term.

Nearly 13 million new jobs have been created including nearly 1 million new manufacturing jobs.

Thanks to President Biden's investment in America with the Inflation Reduction Act and Chips Act, tens of billions of dollars are being poured into new projects which is creating thousands of new jobs in small towns and suburbs all across America. 

Also because of President Biden's policies, new plants and factories are being built all across America, which is bringing an economic boom to local communities. One other important factor is that people are not having to relocate for work due to an abundance of new job openings and factories that are nearby.

Let's not forget that Republicans in Congress all voted against the Inflation Reduction Act and Chips Act. They spent their time trashing President Biden and Democrats for passing this historic legislation that's putting United States #1 in the world. They said it was "woke agenda" and "won't do anything for job creation". They were all wrong again. 

The people benefiting most from President Biden's policies are Republican voters in red districts who are getting the majority of these projects in their communities. Their own Republican congressmen and Senators voted against their own constituents' well being. These Republican voters should be thanking President Biden and Democrats for looking out for them by giving them good paying jobs and helping their communities flourish. Why on Earth would they ever be voting for a Republican when they don't do anything for them? 

If it was up to Republicans, we never would be having this record job creation or manufacturing boom. We still would be in the same economic disaster that Donald Trump put us in along with his manufacturing recession. But thanks to President Biden, those days are long gone, and even right wingers can no longer try to criticize President Biden's policies because their red districts are feeling the Biden manufacturing boom.                       

The fact is, Democrats are better at managing the economy and with job and manufacturing creation. History has proven it and we are seeing history being made in these last 2 years thanks to President Biden's policies.   


'Transformational change’: Biden’s industrial policy begins to bear fruit
FT research shows commitments of more than $200bn to US manufacturing since IRA and Chips Act



The US appears poised for a manufacturing boom as companies tap into Biden administration subsidies with pledges to spend tens of billions of dollars on new projects, according to Financial Times research.

The Chips Act and the Inflation Reduction Act, passed within days of each other last August, together include more than $400bn in tax credits, grants and loans designed to foster a domestic semiconductor industry and clean-tech manufacturing base. The package was aimed at countering China’s dominance in strategic sectors such as electric vehicles and recapturing jobs from abroad.

The FT identified more than 75 large-scale manufacturing announcements in the US since the passage of these two industrial policies. Here is what we learned.

Semiconductor and clean energy projects

Companies have committed roughly $204bn in large-scale projects to boost US semiconductor and clean-tech production as of April 14, promising to create at least 82,000 jobs. While not all these projects were a direct result of the passage of these bills, they will probably be eligible for the tax credits. The amount is almost double the capital spending commitments made in the same sectors in 2021 and nearly 20 times the amount in 2019. While the FT identified four projects worth at least $1bn each in the semiconductor and clean-technology sectors in 2019, we found 31 of that size after August 2022.

Semiconductors, electric vehicles and batteries captured the bulk of investment. The FT identified 21 semiconductor-related investments and more than three dozen projects aimed at boosting the US electric vehicle supply chain.

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company’s $28bn expansion in Phoenix marks the largest investment to date, bringing the company’s total investment in its Arizona fabrication plants to $40bn, the biggest foreign direct investment project in US history.

The FT looked at projects involving capital investment of at least $100mn since the Chips Act and IRA were passed. We included projects aimed at boosting manufacturing in the semiconductor, electric-vehicle, battery and clean-energy sectors. Our analysis was based on company and government announcements and drew on data from fDi Markets, Rystad Energy, Wavteq and the Semiconductor Industry Association.

The IRA included $369bn worth of tax credits, grants and loans for clean-tech development, with bonus credits for projects paying prevailing wages or located in fossil-fuel communities. The credits can be accumulated, accounting for about 50 per cent of costs for some projects, say accountants. The Chips Act provides $39bn in funding for semiconductor manufacturing as well as $24bn worth of manufacturing tax credits.

“The industrial policy that’s being put into place hasn’t been seen for generations,” said Scott Paul, president of the Alliance for American Manufacturing. “This is a generational, transformational change that we’re seeing in America and our productive capacity.”

Republican districts are winning projects

More than 75 per cent of all investment is headed to Republican-held Congressional districts, where it will create 58,000 jobs, according to FT data.

The surge in spending pledges in Republican areas comes despite the GOP’s votes against both the Chips Act and IRA in Congress. Some in the party remain critical of the legislation.

“I wish that we would be more specific and more calculated in our efforts,” said John Curtis, a Republican representative for Utah and founder of the Conservative Climate Caucus. Curtis declined to say whether he supported or opposed the legislation.

Republican congressional districts have secured far more investment

Senior Democrats are working to gain political credit for the jobs promised by the spending pledged since the industrial policies were passed last year.

Earlier this month, US vice-president Kamala Harris toured Hanwha Qcells’ solar factory in Dalton, Georgia, a district represented by the far-right Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene. Harris announced that the South Korean manufacturer would build the largest community solar project in the US, on top of its $2.5bn expansion announced in January.

“It’s going to be harder for Republican lawmakers to say these policies aren’t effective or aren’t worth it because they’re seeing jobs being produced in their communities,” Paul said.


Over $200bn in green tech and semiconductor investments have been announced since the passage of President Biden's Inflation Reduction Act & Chips Act.


Foreign investors want a stake — including China

About a third of all investments announced since August involve a foreign investor, with nearly two dozen projects coming from companies headquartered in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. This includes LG Energy Solution’s $5.5bn proposed project in Arizona, announced in March, the largest battery investment ever in the US.

Analysts say these investments from the US’s Asian allies are also attempts to diversify away from dependence on China’s supply chains.

“Their strategic calculations here are somewhat similar to the United States’, in that China is the largest economy in their region but it’s also an economy with which they have somewhat tense security relationships,” said Cullen Hendrix, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

But Chinese investors are also vying for a stake in the US supply chain. While the Chips Act and the IRA have anti-China clauses, the US government is yet to rule on the extent to which Chinese companies can participate in building US facilities.

Two other large deals announced since August, both in Michigan, are Ford’s $3.5bn battery plant using technology from CATL, China’s battery giant, and a $2.4bn battery plant being built by a subsidiary of China’s Gotion. Both Chinese companies have been accused by some Republicans of being fronts for the Chinese Communist party. Virginia governor Glenn Youngkin rejected a proposal for the Ford project to be based in his state, telling TV reporters that it was a “Trojan horse”.

“There is no Communist plot,” said Chuck Thelen, North American vice-president of Gotion at a local town meeting. “The fact is we already live in a global industry, and to bring a Chinese manufacturing or a multinational manufacturing site into North America is the onshoring that our past president really promoted.”

CATL did not respond to a request for comment.

'A race to the bottom’

The competition is fierce to win the largest manufacturing projects, with states doling out historic incentive packages to secure investments.

Of the spending commitments tracked by the FT, less than half — or about $80bn — disclosed the size of the subsidies they will receive from state and local authorities, on top of the credits available in the IRA and Chips Act. The total size of the subsidies for those that did disclose them amounted to $13.7bn.

The largest disclosed incentive package was $5.5bn given to Micron for its $20bn semiconductor fab in Clay, New York, helping the state beat Texas to the project.

“We gave every penny that we could give, and New York literally offered billions of dollars that we could not keep up with,” said Texas governor Greg Abbott in February.

The subsidy race has raised concerns among watchdogs over whether the projects will deliver economic benefits to the community.

Greg LeRoy, executive director of Good Jobs First, called the competition among states a “race to the bottom”. Because negotiations are rooted in secrecy, companies can convince states to give out larger packages even if they were intending to site in the state all along.

“We’re all in favour of green jobs. We’re all in favour of saving the planet. We’re not in favour of busting the budget to do that,” said LeRoy. Last year set an all-time record for billion-dollar subsidy packages, according to the research group.

https://www.ft.com/content/b6cd46de-52d6-4641-860b-5f2c1b0c5622

[Rick Plant]

Under the House GOP default ransom demand, here are the states that would see hundreds of billions in private sector investments and hundreds of thousands of jobs ripped away and sent overseas. Mostly red states.

Republicans want to destroy the progress and success President Biden has achieved these last two years by defaulting on the debt Republicans incurred during the 4 disastrous Trump years.



House Republican leaders are proposing repealing hundreds of billions of dollars in clean-energy subsidies in exchange for lifting the federal debt limit
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-04-19/gop-proposes-nixing-climate-bill-subsidies-in-debt-limit-debate

[Rick Plant]

GOP enraged over Marjorie Taylor Greene's committee outburst — and are threatening to boot her



Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) blew up a hearing of the House Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday when she called Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas a "liar" and blaming him for fentanyl deaths around the country — an outburst that violates House rules about impugning the character of a witness. The tirade forced Chairman Mark Green, a Republican of Tennessee, to shut down her questioning and bar her from speaking for the rest of the hearing.

According to CNN reporter Melanie Zanona, Republicans behind the scenes are furious with her, and are considering punishments — even including a threat of booting her off the committee for future disruptions.

"GOP tensions flaring over MTG's committee hearing outburst today," tweeted Zanona. "Source close to Chairman Mark Green said he was furious w/ MTG's behavior and planned to privately reprimand her, and also said he'd encourage McCarthy to remove her from the committee if she did that again. But MTG doubled down on her rhetoric, accusing her GOP colleagues of 'doing the bidding' of Dems. She told me went to [House Speaker Kevin] McCarthy’s office to talk about it & said to him: 'I don’t know how we’re ever going to accomplish anything when we can’t call people a liar when they’re lying.'"

According to a CNN report, other Republicans are coming forward to object to her behavior.

"GOP lawmakers on the committee, speaking on condition of anonymity, told CNN that Greene’s behavior was an unnecessary distraction and complained they had to waste valuable hearing time over the dust-up," said the report. "Rep. Tony Gonzales of Texas, who called Greene a 'friend' that he has hosted in his district, said the incident was 'unfortunate' and supported the chairman’s decision to silence her. 'I thought he did a good job managing the committee as best as he could. But the sooner we can get back to kind of civility amongst colleagues, the better for everybody,' he told CNN."

Greene, a far-right lawmaker who has embraced the QAnon conspiracy theory in the past, was previously stripped of all her committee assignments by a full vote of the House in the last Congress after it emerged she had promoted social media calls for Democrats to be executed. She was an integral figure in brokering a deal to get McCarthy elected Speaker, after which Republicans restored her committee assignments.

https://twitter.com/mzanona/status/1648809468036100096

[Rick Plant]

GOP leadership splits as party is 'getting hammered' on abortion



Republicans in the House and Senate are lost on what to do about abortion after the Supreme Court killed the landmark Roe v. Wade decision, according to a new Politico report.

For a party that once painted itself as small government and individual rights, the new battle over abortion rights puts Republicans in a difficult position. Minority Whip John Thune (R-ND) thinks that they can put restrictions on it, like a 15-week abortion ban. He warned his party was “getting hammered” on the matter.

“We’ve got to come up with a position that’s a winning one,” Thune said, speaking to Politico. “Our guys say, ‘well, it’s a states issue.’ Great, but the Dems are going to be out here advocating for what I think is a very extreme position. And we want to be able to contrast ours with theirs.”

By contrast, even Republican voters agree that the lawmakers have gone too far with inflexible solutions. While they're fine with some restrictions, the laws being pressed by the GOP are beyond what many conservative voters support, Pew's data shows.

“The [Republican] Party, I don’t think, really is setting any sort of guidelines or coming to some consensus,” said Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC).

“The answer is that those decisions should be made at the state level, instead of here in Washington D.C.,” said John Cornyn (R-TX), while calling himself an “unapologetically pro-life Republican.”

“I know that’s not entirely satisfactory for those who’d like to impose a national standard.”

“It was a significant factor in the last election. And I think it’ll be an issue going forward,” Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) added. He backs the 15-week ban, however, which would impose restrictions on all states. Cramer advised his fellow Republicans to figure out a position and move on quickly.

Creating more headaches for the GOP, Texas Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, who was nominated by Donald Trump and supported by Republicans, recently ruled against abortion medication.

Cornyn might have supported the judge that shot down the abortion pill, but now he's dancing around the issue.

"Judges are not supposed to make policy, as we know, but unfortunately today ... people are casting judges in a role as political actors," Cornyn told Politico. "But the remedy for judges making [an] erroneous decision is an appeal to the higher court. And that’s what’s happening.”

“It’s quite telling that with basically the same case, a different judge in a different jurisdiction ruled exactly the opposite way,” said Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK). She's openly said she regrets her approval of the anti-choice judge. Under oath, the Texas judge claimed that a judge should never consider his own values when deciding a case.

https://www.politico.com/news/2023/04/20/gop-struggles-to-find-winning-abortion-strategy-00093039

[Rick Plant]

This article is from last year in Aprill 2022, but you can see how President Biden's policies has made America even better since then with nearly 13 million new jobs, record low unemployment, and a manufacturing boom all over the country. And don't forget all of this incredible success happened during a global pandemic and then with global inflation.   


Biden’s Jobs Boom: How Policies Boosted the Labor Market Recovery in 2021

APR 28, 2022



President Biden’s signature legislation, the American Rescue Plan Act, accelerated the economic recovery when it lost momentum; further fiscal steps are necessary to maintain this momentum and reduce economic inequality.

The latest data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics show that the labor market has added 7.9 million jobs since President Joe Biden took office in January 2021. His administration has made the revival of a flagging economy its top priority, with an emphasis on providing more assistance to struggling families. In early March 2021, Congress passed the administration’s American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA). In the 13 months from March 2021 through March 2022, the economy added 7.2 million jobs.

Were President Biden’s policies the cause of this boom? This much is clear: The data show that his fiscal policies directly accelerated job growth, with the ARPA leading to the creation of 1 million to more than 4 million additional jobs since it went into effect. Now, it is time for Congress to build on these progressive accomplishments by enacting further measures, paid for by a more progressive tax system, to maintain jobs momentum and reduce persistent inequality.

There has been an unprecedented jobs boom since President Biden took office. Indeed, the labor market added 6.7 million jobs in the first 12 months of his administration. No other president since World War II saw such strong growth in their first—or any—year in office.

Even in relative terms, the 4.7 percent increase in jobs created during President Biden’s first 12 months in office marks the fastest start in terms of jobs growth for any presidency since Jimmy Carter’s first year. Likewise, the recent 2.4 percentage-point drop in the unemployment rate, from 6.4 percent in January 2021 to 4 percent in January 2022, is the fastest decrease in unemployment during the first year of any presidential term since World War II.

Thanks to this jobs boom, the labor market is now nearing its pre-pandemic level: The total number of nonfarm jobs in March 2022—151 million—was equal to 99 percent of the 153 million jobs held in February 2020.6 Overall, the labor market has now recovered 92.8 percent of the jobs lost during the pandemic. To put this in context, following the Great Recession, it took the labor market until October 2013—almost four years after the recession started—to reach 99 percent of the employment level before the recession.7 This time around, millions of people got their jobs back much sooner. Indeed, President Biden and Congress seemingly learned from the last recession, when Congress enacted stimulus measures that helped the United States climb out of the depths of the recession but were nonetheless insufficient for a rapid recovery—all while Republicans in Congress and state governments imposed austerity measures.

This experience taught policymakers that the risk of doing too little comes with enormous pains for ordinary Americans. But with a more effective response, the current labor market is recovering at an unprecedented speed.

Policy intervention and its effect on jobs

The recent jobs market boom followed the enactment of the ARPA, an aggressive fiscal policy intervention to meet the moment. As a general rule, successful policy interventions that can create short-term economic and jobs market momentum need to be large enough to make a difference, targeted to those in need, and able to provide the necessary spending in rather quick order.

President Biden’s signature legislation met those criteria. Congress allocated a total of $1.9 trillion to this effort, which followed large fiscal policy interventions in 2020. The ARPA provided help to people still struggling with the fallout from the pandemic—in particular, through sending stimulus checks, expanding child tax credit payments, and providing rental assistance and additional unemployment insurance benefits.9 It also supported necessary state and local government services in education, health care, and transportation, all of which had experienced some revenue losses and increased demand.

Moreover, several of the measures in the legislation took effect immediately. Congress enacted the law on March 11, 2021, and the U.S. Treasury started sending out stimulus checks—officially known as Economic Impact Payments (EIPs)—within a week. These EIPs alone came to an initial disbursement of an estimated $242 billion. And importantly, a substantial share of the relief spending immediately went into people’s pockets.

Yet the strong recovery that followed was never assured without renewed policy interventions amid the massive challenges and uncertainties of the pandemic. This was especially apparent at the end of 2020 and in early 2021. Some continued jobs recovery was expected as the pandemic gradually lost its grip on the world, but a lot of economic uncertainty over the speed and momentum of this recovery persisted—especially in winter 2021, when a massive new and deadly wave of COVID-19 held back consumption, disrupted supply chains, and overwhelmed health systems around the world.

The ARPA’s investments in people’s financial security quickly paid off

As a result, monthly job growth had stalled by the end of 2020, and the number of jobs actually fell by 115,000 in December 2020. Calculations based on data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics show that average job growth during the three months leading up to President Biden’s inauguration—from November 2020 to January 2021—was 246,000 jobs per month, and average job growth during the three months before the ARPA was enacted, from December 2020 to February 2021, was 372,000 jobs per month. In comparison, the three-month average job growth in late summer 2020, after an initial burst of people returning to work, was more than 1 million jobs per month. By the time President Biden took office in January 2021, invigorated public health measures—especially vaccinations—had somewhat contained the impact of the virus on the economy. But with millions of people still out of work and looking for a job, President Biden pushed for his first signature legislation to help people and the economy get back on their feet.

The relief legislation was meant to invigorate the labor market. But did it actually do that? It is difficult to know, since there is no world in which Congress did not pass such legislation against which to measure the ARPA’s effects. But it is possible to ascertain a rough sense of the legislation’s impact by considering reasonable alternatives of what might have happened without it.

Importantly, uncertainty over the pandemic and the concomitant economic fallout persisted. This took its toll on the labor market in winter 2021, and it became clear that renewed policy interventions were necessary for the labor market to recover its momentum. Without these interventions, the labor market may have just lumbered along, as it did after the Great Recession of 2008 and 2009. As noted above, calculations based on employer data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that the labor market added 372,000 jobs per month in the three months before the enactment of the ARPA. If the labor market had continued to grow at this rate, there would have been 2.4 million fewer jobs in March 2022 than was actually the case.

In other words, the labor market in reality grew 49 percent faster from March 2021 to March 2022 than would have been expected based on its performance in the months before President Biden took office and Congress passed the ARPA. Importantly, this calculation only considers the likely impact of fiscal measures, not the possible impacts of Biden’s public health measures that went into effect sooner.

Comparing the actual labor market outcome with forecasts from independent analysts before the ARPA went into effect suggests a similar effect. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO), for example, estimated in February 2021—after President Biden was elected but before Congress passed the ARPA—that job growth from the first quarter of 2021 to the first quarter of 2022 would total 5.5 million jobs.19 Instead, during this time, the number of jobs grew by 6.7 million, or more than 1 million additional jobs.

In comparison, Moody’s Analytics estimates that the ARPA added more than 4 million jobs in 2021.20 Moreover, Moody’s estimates reflect the serious nature of the slowdown in winter 2021, which the ARPA helped keep from turning into something even more dire.

Simply put, these investments in people’s financial security quickly paid off as businesses created millions of additional jobs.

The economic benefits of a quick labor market recovery

Prioritizing job growth had measurable economic benefits. As a result of the ARPA and other targeted policy interventions, millions of people did not have to wait years to get a new job. Strong nominal wage growth also accompanied much of the recent job surge, especially initially in many low-wage sectors such as restaurants and hotels.

The combined effect of more employment and higher wages shows up as more labor income from more people working and earning more. Indeed, average per-capita inflation-adjusted wage income totaled $32,982 in February 2022, the last month for which data are available, while average per-household wage income in inflation-adjusted terms came to $85,942 in February 2022, the last month for which these data are available. These are the highest levels on record since World War II; they also reflect increases of 4.4 percent in per-capita wage income from March 2021 to February 2022 and of 3.3 percent in per-household wage income from March 2021 to December 2021. By winter 2021, both measures of average wage income exceeded the levels recorded before the pandemic started—that is, average wage income has outgrown both population growth and inflation since President Biden took office, even as inflation has increased. In comparison, average inflation-adjusted household and per-capita wage income did not exceed its level from before the Great Recession—in December 2007—until August 2014. Indeed, wage income recovered almost five years sooner this time around than it did after the last deep recession.

The strong labor market gains also meant that the economic pain was much less severe than it was after the Great Recession. For instance, the share of people who fell behind on paying their mortgages stood at 2.3 percent in the fourth quarter of 2021, almost identical to the 2.4 percent recorded in the fourth quarter of 2019, just before the pandemic hit. In comparison, this share soared from an already elevated 3.3 percent in the fourth quarter of 2007 to a whopping 11.4 percent in the first quarter of 2010.23 In fact, it took until June 2018—more than a decade after the recession started—before this indicator of household financial insecurity reached its pre-recession level. Likewise, according to U.S. Census Bureau data,24 the share of renters or homeowners who either deferred or delayed paying their rent or mortgage fell from about 10 percent in January and February 2021 to below 8 percent by April 2021, staying below or at 8 percent since then.

The strong labor market recovery after COVID-19, to a large degree, benefited those who were left far behind during the recovery after the Great Recession.

Moreover, the pandemic came with a lot of mental stress associated with health and financial challenges—which in turn could have increased health care and financial costs. Fortunately, mental stress, too, has slowly subsided alongside the strengthening economic recovery in 2021. By the end of 2020, more than 40 percent of people showed signs of anxiety or depressive disorders, as calculations based on Census Bureau data show.25 Yet by May 2021, this share had dropped to less than 30 percent; since then, it has hovered at still-high levels of between 31 percent and 32 percent. Clearly, there could be meaningful benefits to ensuring that people can quickly get back into a job after a recession.

The strong labor market recovery following COVID-19, to a large degree, benefited those who were left far behind during the recovery after the Great Recession. To gauge this effect, Figure 2 compares employment by race, ethnicity, disability, and education during this recovery and during the recovery after the Great Recession. To make this an apples-to-apples comparison, though, it is important to look at similar points in the two recoveries. The current recovery started in April 2020, which means the period from March 2021 to March 2022 equals month 11 to month 23 of the recovery. The corresponding period after the Great Recession is May 2010 to May 2011, since that recovery started in June 2009. The changes in employed shares for a number of population groups during those two periods—May 2010 to May 2011 and March 2021 to March 2022—are shown below.

This time around, employment had already outpaced population growth for all groups. The employed shares of Black and Hispanic or Latino workers, as well as workers with only a high school education, grew even faster than the employed shares of white workers or workers with a college degree over the 13 months from March 2021 to March 2022. In other words, during the current recovery, the groups of workers who are often the last ones to see employment gains benefited from the labor market recovery as much as those who are typically the first job gainers.

For example, in March 2022, the employed share of Black workers was 58.3 percent, or 98.1 percent of the 59.4 percent recorded in February 2020, before the pandemic started. Meanwhile, the employed share of Hispanic or Latino workers had recovered to 98 percent of pre-pandemic levels, and employment for white workers stood at 98.2 percent of pre-pandemic levels. By March 2022, Asian workers had recovered to 99.7 percent of their pre-pandemic employment shares.

In contrast, 23 months after the Great Recession, Black workers had recovered to 88.4 percent of levels recorded in December 2007, while Hispanic or Latino workers had recovered to 90.7 percent of 2007 levels. White workers had recovered to 93.7 percent of those levels, and Asian workers saw slightly higher gains, at 93.9 percent. The current job market recovery has therefore been much faster and has benefited workers of color more equitably than did the past recovery. This does not erase the persistent inequities that continue to exist in the labor market, but the recovery at least has not exacerbated them.

The quick labor market recovery has also accompanied faster economic growth. In 2021, the economy grew by an astonishing 5.7 percent after accounting for inflation, its strongest growth rate in 38 years.26 Faster economic growth in 2021 then boosted hiring and wages, essentially creating a virtuous cycle of economic and labor market momentum that created a stronger recovery than otherwise would have been possible. After all, economic and job market growth had slowed substantially in winter 2021, threatening a “double dip recession.”

Congress needs to maintain strong economic momentum

The experience in the aftermath of the Great Recession showed that without aggressive, proactive government intervention, it can take years longer to get back to, or even near, pre-pandemic employment rates. Fortunately, Congress and President Biden took this key lesson to heart. The result was a large, expeditious, and targeted intervention in the form of the ARPA, which has had the desired effect of helping struggling families get back on their feet.

However, the policy work is not done yet. The labor market before the pandemic left many behind, and those inequities persist in the current environment. For instance, the employed share of those 25 to 54 years old was 80 percent in March 2022, slightly below the 80.5 percent recorded in February 2020 but almost 1 percentage point below the 81.4 percent recorded in December 2000, the last such watershed moment. Notably, an additional 1.8 million people in this age group would have been working in March 2022 had 81.4 percent of prime-age workers been employed then. Moreover, in March 2022, the unemployment rate for Black workers was almost twice as high as the unemployment rate for white workers: 6.2 percent compared with 3.2 percent. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate for disabled workers was more than twice as large as the unemployment rate for nondisabled workers, and the unemployment rate for people without a high school degree was 5.2 percent in March 2022—more than two and a half times the 2 percent rate of workers with a college degree.

Indeed, many people continue to struggle, even as financial hardships and mental stresses have receded from the heights of the pandemic. In particular, the people who are most vulnerable—people of color, disabled workers, and those with less formal education—need the labor market momentum to continue as a first step to real economic security so that they can have a shot at meaningful economic mobility. This will require continued, targeted policy attention to maintain the jobs market momentum.

The alternative would be to rely on private businesses to carry the labor market forward—for instance, by investing more in new offices, manufacturing plants, car parks, and other goods. Yet private business investment declined relative to gross domestic product (GDP) over the course of 2021, even as the economy gained steam and profits remained high, all while the labor market recovered and supply chain bottlenecks persisted. For instance, calculations based on data from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis show that net investment—the capital additions after accounting for things becoming less valuable or even obsolete—fell from 2.3 percent of GDP in the first quarter of 2021 to 2 percent by the fourth quarter of 2021.

Instead of making new investments that would extend the economic momentum, corporations are using their money to keep shareholders happy

Unfortunately, instead of putting profits toward new investments that would extend the economic momentum and put it on a stronger foundation, corporations are using their money to keep shareholders happy. Calculations based on Federal Reserve data show that in the fourth quarter of 2021 alone, nonfinancial corporations used all of their after-tax profits and then some—111.5 percent, to be exact—to pay out dividends and buy back their own shares, raising stock prices for shareholders, who are concentrated among the wealthiest households.30 In addition, nonfinancial corporations are hoarding cash, rather than accelerating investments. The same data source shows that the share of nonfinancial corporations’ liquid assets out of all assets increased from 12.7 percent in March 2021 to 13 percent in December 2021, outpacing strong corporate asset growth.31 Indeed, private businesses pursued other priorities rather than maintaining the momentum in the labor market, even though they had the incentives and the resources to invest more.

Conclusion

To be clear, the challenges now are different from those that the country faced in 2020 and 2021. Many people still want and need jobs. They will need those jobs sooner rather than later, though, as costs are going up, as careers have already been disrupted for two years, and as inequality remains high. Therefore, policy interventions must be targeted toward helping the labor market keeps its momentum amid middling private investments and widespread uncertainty. Policymakers also need to ensure that lower-income and middle-income workers are not falling behind and have access to real economic opportunities. But importantly, these investments no longer need to be deficit-financed, as was the case in the middle of a sharp downturn with record low interest rates.

Congress can pay for most or all of these investments by repealing ineffective corporate tax cuts; taxing the windfall profits of oil companies; and gradually increasing taxes on the richest Americans, who have seen their fortunes rise ever faster than those of less wealthy Americans. Creating a stronger, more equitable economy is achievable if Congress has the will to continue its progressive investments and pay for them in an equally progressive way. Indeed, new policy interventions need to buffer the finances of those who are at the highest risk financially while also ensuring continued strong job growth. This means ensuring the continued momentum in the labor market and reducing the massive, persistent inequities in the economy.

To start addressing these goals, Congress needs to support further efforts to get the lingering COVID-19 pandemic under control. Otherwise, people’s lives will remain unnecessarily at risk, and unpredictable economic disruptions will continue. Moreover, policymakers need to invest in addressing known risks, such as climate change, that will lead to further economic disruptions. In the same vein, Congress must invest in measures that make it easier for people to attain and stay in newly created jobs—for example, by expanding and lowering the cost of care for children and other dependents. The past few years have made it abundantly clear that this means building a strong care infrastructure and rebuilding capacity in the child care sector, where employment is down by 117,100 jobs relative to February 2020.33 This effort must also involve substantial investments in home and community-based services for older adults and people with disabilities, so that family caregivers have a better support structure to rely on and so they can pursue careers that fit their skills and talents.

The alternative to sustained attention to stronger job growth and less inequality is ultimately an economy that works for the few but leaves the many behind.

https://www.americanprogress.org/article/bidens-jobs-boom-how-policies-boosted-the-labor-market-recovery-in-2021/

[Rick Plant]

In exchange for not defaulting on debts already incurred and crashing the U.S. economy, Republicans want to devastate funding that helps veterans.

Jesse Lee @JesseLee46

This is confirmed: House Republicans make no carve-out for vets, their bill says VA must be cut by 22% or they will destroy the economy. Unconscionable.

https://twitter.com/JesseLee46/status/1648807346951401473


Congressman Chris Deluzio @RepDeluzio

@SecVetAffairs told me cutting the VA to '22 levels would lead to 13m fewer healthcare visits, longer benefit wait times, & VA staffing cuts.

Now Spkr McCarthy announced a budget plan at '22 levels, but claims it somehow won't hurt my fellow veterans.

His math doesn't add up.

Watch: https://twitter.com/i/status/1648342313717092353

https://twitter.com/RepDeluzio/status/1648342313717092353

[Rick Plant]

Yes, you read that right. MAGA Republicans are trying to kill thousands of clean energy jobs in their own districts.

Republicans are job killers. It's as simple as that.


White House says McCarthy debt ceiling plan would kill thousands of green jobs in GOP districts
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2023/04/20/white-house-mccarthy-plan-green-jobs/11703701002/