Saturday, October 30, 2021

What is in the bipartisan infrastructure bill?



Some people heavily criticize the first, bipartisan infrastructure bill as a corporate giveaway and a nearly complete capitulation to the FRP (fascist Republican Party). That complaint, or close variants, has come from multiple sources, including some folks here. Democratic Party progressives in the house have complained bitterly about how crappy this bill is. The New York Times describes key provisions like this:
  • $1 trillion spending is agreed to; Biden's original proposal was for $2.3 trillion
  • about $550 billion in new federal money for public transit, roads, bridges, water and other physical projects over the next five years
  • money would come from a range of measures, including “repurposing” stimulus funds already approved by Congress, selling public electromagnetic spectrum and recouping federal unemployment funds from states that ended more generous pandemic benefits early
  • Biden claims that “neither side got everything they wanted,”  but new union jobs would be created and the spending constitutes significant investments in public transit
  • $110 billion is new funding for roads, bridges and other major projects; the American Society of Civil Engineers says there is a a $786 billion backlog of needed repairs for roads and bridges
  • highway and pedestrian safety programs get $11 billion 
  • $1 billion is “reconnecting communities” by removing freeways or other past infrastructure projects that ran through Black neighborhoods and other communities of color, down from Biden's original $20 billion proposal 
  • public buses, subways and trains get $39 billion in new funding to repair aging infrastructure and modernize and expand transit service across the country, down from the original $49 billion proposal; the American Society of Civil Engineers says that there is a $176 billion backlog for transit investments
  • $66 billion spending rail to address Amtrak’s maintenance backlog, upgrades for the high-traffic Washington to Boston corridor, and some for expanding rail service outside the Northeast and mid-Atlantic
  • $55 billion in clean drinking water to replace all of the nation’s lead pipes, which were banned ~30 years ago
  • $7.5 billion to build electric vehicle charging stations nationwide and get rid of areas with no chargers; $2.5 billion for electric school buses
  • Republicans successfully opposed Biden’s plan to raise taxes and empower the I.R.S. to help pay for the package by reducing the tax gap (the amount that tax cheats do pay, currently running at about $1.2 trillion/year)
  • funding will come from (i) pay-fors that repurpose already-approved funds, (ii) accounting changes to raise funds and, (iii) assume the projects will ultimately pay for themselves
  • the biggest funding source is $205 billion that will come from “repurposing of certain COVID relief dollars”
  • $53 billion in funding is assumed to come from states that ended more generous federal unemployment benefits early 
  • $28 billion comes from requiring more robust reporting around cryptocurrencies 
  • $56 billion is presumed to come from economic growth “resulting from a 33 percent return on investment in these long-term infrastructure projects”
It does look like the FRP really got most of what it wanted. The funding sources are questionable and the amounts too small to meet needs. Once again, the FRP protected tax cheats, allowing the annual ~$1.2 trillion Thieves' Festival of Cheating to continue unscathed. 

After reading this, my support for this bill has gone from solidly positive to mildly negative, which is what the FRP wants to see from people. If the Dems cannot agree among themselves on the reconciliation bill, letting this bill fail would be just fine with me and the FRP, which loves tax cheats, but hates government generally and especially most government domestic spending.

I'll do a separate post on the reconciliation bill, which 100% of the FRP in congress opposes.


Question: 
1. Should the public support this bill? Does the existence or size of the reconciliation bill (~$3.5 trillion proposed, now down to ~$1.5 trillion thanks to the corrupt bought and paid for Senators Manchin and Sinema) make any difference (that assumes Democrats can agree on a bill, which is still a highly dubious proposition)? In other words, should the fairly crappy bipartisan bill be supported as better than nothing if the reconciliation bill is too small?

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