Ryan Taylor
- Ryan Taylor writes that the Biden plan is a recipe for slowing wage growth, discouraging investment, and stunting job creation.
Gas and food prices are creeping up, inflation is flashing warning signs again, and the national debt is closing in on $35 trillion.
And what is President Joe Biden doing about it? Well, he just doubled down on big government spending – one of the primary drivers of inflation – by delivering a jaw-dropping $7.3 trillion budget proposal.
By comparison, just three years ago while still in the grips of the COVID pandemic, the President said his administration would need $6 trillion to accomplish its goals – a reasonable deal in hindsight.
When President Biden took office, he vowed a return to normalcy in government operations. Biden spent decades in public service as a senator and then as vice president, so he knows what “normal” should look like.
Sadly, he hasn’t kept his word. It’s just the latest in a long line of overdue budgets from administrations that aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on. Gone are the days when administrations took budgeting seriously. Now, presidential budget requests are only good for a cable news cycle.
In lieu of tackling the tough challenges facing the United States’ long-term fiscal issues, namely reining in spending, tapping into the country’s vast energy wealth, or offering a reasonable solution to reforming entitlements, the President is playing panderer-in-chief.
Rather than offering hope, his budget threatens economic stability and expands government power. It would only exacerbate the country’s fiscal problems, leading to higher taxes, higher interest rates, and bigger deficits. Clearly, the President doesn’t want to deal with the real issues but wants to score political points.
In order to placate his far left base, Biden’s budget calls for billions of taxpayer dollars to be spent on pet projects and bloated bureaucracies. To fund his spending spree, the President’s budget would raise $5 trillion in new taxes on American workers and the businesses that employ, reducing private economic investment and raising costs on middle class families.
The economy won’t grow and innovate if we stifle it with punitive taxes. The Biden plan is a recipe for slowing wage growth, discouraging investment, and stunting job creation. It will also put U.S. businesses at a competitive disadvantage to some of their foreign counterparts, as many of them face lower tax rates.
Further, Biden’s budget deserves a gold medal in mathematical gymnastics for hiding its fiscal irresponsibility. Although he promises to reduce the deficit, his plan would add trillions to the national debt, which will further burden our children and grandchildren with unsustainable debt. Rather than address the root causes of inflation and rising living costs, the administration’s answer is to print more money.
This shortsighted approach risks escalating inflation and higher interest rates, making it more difficult for consumers and businesses to borrow and invest in the future. Ultimately, this will lead to slower economic growth and higher unemployment.
Make no doubt about it: we’re on the verge of a fiscal crisis as spending significantly outpaces revenues. Ignoring warnings of fiscal prudence, President Biden and his allies in Congress have laid out a reckless roadmap – one of government expansion and economic decline. It doesn’t take an economist to see that our government is missing out on a fantastic opportunity to conduct a much-needed course correction. Bidenomics isn’t working.
