Biden proposes a $ 1.8 trillion plan to improve social protection

Joe Biden, in Wilmington, Delaware, in a file photo.Carolyn Kaster / AP

One night before serving 100 days in power, Joe Biden is preparing to present to the United States Congress this Wednesday a social welfare plan for the country that is already compared to the New Deal, by Franklin D. Roosevelt, of the decade of the thirties of the last century, or the ambitious economic expansion of Lyndon B. Johnson in the sixties. In a joint session of the two Houses, Biden will propose a 10-year project that will allocate 1.8 billion dollars to "improve the lives of millions of Americans" and that has been dubbed the "American Plan for Families." What will happen tonight on Capitol Hill is not an official State of the Union address, as the last six presidents decided not to deliver it in their first year in office, as the presidential inauguration speech is very close.

If its first legislative victory was the historic rescue package of the 1.9 trillion dollars economy - financed through debt - this significant plan - a commitment to the welfare state that has nothing to envy to European countries - is destined to suffer as it passes through the negotiations on Capitol Hill. The White House intends to pay for its social project with an increase in the income tax for the richest - from 37% to 39.6% -, fighting tax fraud and doubling the capital gains tax on those who earn more than a million dollars a year. In other words, part of Donald Trump's 2017 tax plan is reversed. Republican opposition will be fierce,Among other reasons why from the ranks of that party it is repeated as a mantra that such tax increases will only harm the economy.

The paradigm shift will be on display Monday night at the Capitol. But Biden had already anticipated the magnitude of the measure that the Biden-Harris Administration is about to adopt (this is how the White House has decided to appoint this Administration). "The American Plan for Families is an investment in the future of our nation that happens once in generations," said the president. "It is an investment in children and their families, helping those families to cover basic expenses that many cannot afford right now, lowering the price of health insurance and fighting to reduce child poverty." In the opinion of the Biden-Harris Administration, investment in the American economy and workers will enable the United States to compete with China and other countries in the world.

Helping the North American economy to recover and rebuild after the devastation suffered by the coronavirus pandemic was one of the hooks that Biden launched to capture votes during the electoral campaign that gave him victory. The president, who will win a place in the Democratic pantheon alongside Roosevelt and Johnson by making his bid for a welfare state a reality, wants to reorient social programs to help the poorest.

The new plan highlights something that, paradoxically, the most powerful country in the world lacks: the expansion in four years of the free public education system. At present, children start school at the age of five and thus go through 12 until the end of high school at 18. The Democratic bill also establishes a period of paid leave of 12 weeks for maternity and paternity, as well as for illness. In the words of the White House itself: “The United States is one of the few countries in the world that does not guarantee paid leave to its workers, which is why it lags behind its economic competitors in the number of women in the force. labor".

"There is a lot we can do," Biden stated simply the day he gave his first press conference at the White House. The approval of the economic stimulus plan already marked a progressive course in the US The US Employment Plan - still in negotiations and budgeted at more than two trillion dollars - will involve investing in the US as has never been done since this country he won the space race and built his interstate highway system. The third leg, the social one, the one that ends up assembling a welfare state, is already underway. In the words of a commentator on National Public Radio (NPR, acronym in English), who perfectly define the moment that the US presidency is going through: “Biden is an older man [whose age forces him to work] with rush".

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