This morning, I devoted a post to one narrow aspect of Biden's speech last night, namely his doubling-down on the claim that the country he presides over is systemically racist. In the first paragraph, I said I'd visit the subject that was the centerpiece of his remarks, unveiling the American Families Plan, so here you go.
For starters, let's look at what redistribution is: Taking Citizen A's money, using the coercive power of government, to address the specific situation of Citizen B. That's what every last feature of this plan is.
Consider the education initiatives in it:
The proposal would provide $200 billion for a universal pre-kindergarten program for children ages 3 and 4 along with $109 billion to provide two free years of community college. Both would be done via partnerships with states, which would have to pick up some of the bill (50 percent for the pre-K plan, 25 percent for the community college plan). The White House projects that the expanded pre-K program would save families an average of $13,000 per year.
Two "free" years of community college. Um, no. I would pay for it and I have no intention of enrolling in a community college.
And spare me the rhetoric about America needing a work force prepared to meet the challenges of the twenty-first century. I have no use for macro-level reasons to redistribute Americans' money. Decisions to go to community college - or a four-year liberal-arts college, or a prestigious university, or a trade school - are made by individual human beings who are making choices about how to plan their lives. If a leg up is needed regarding tuition, that's something to be handled on the local level, or through scholarships, or funds set up by particular institutions to helps their students, or - just a thought - by working one's way through the institution. Money doled out by the most centralized level of government creates the widest possible chasm between the student and the source of his or her ability to attend class and buy textbooks.
And this is supposed to be a "families" plan. So what's with the universal pre-K? Seems like a step in the wrong direction, taking children out of their homes at an ever-earlier age so that the state can get its hands on their noggins and ensure that it, not the children' parents, are the main influence on the kids' development and worldview formation.
The child-care provision is likewise a move away from any strengthening of families. I guess it's too much to ask of a Democrat president and a Democrat House to look at a major shift in policy orientation that provides the conditions for a parent to be home during a child's formative years, and any suggestion of such a shift is sure to bring retorts along the lines of "Get real, would you? Both parents have had to work in this country for decades now." The question to pose at that juncture is, "Would a drastically lower tax rate help with that?"
Oh, and we're going to take money from citizens for whom child care is not a concern to pay child care workers higher wages - and provide free lunches!
Paid family leave is a piece of this plan. Again, I would like to suggest that workers taking time off from jobs is a matter to be decided between employers and employees in a given organization. As the nature of the workforce has changed, a lot of businesses have instituted more flexible policies in this regard. Granted, there are some who haven't, but to make that the government's business is to distort the workings of the free market. If it's good business to be more flexible about time off for sick family members, the birth of a child, and such, those being flexible will thrive and enjoy the gravitation of talent to them.
The plan also calls for increased subsidies of premiums for insurance policies obtained via the "Affordable" Care Act. Again, this creates a yet-wider distance between a patient and the provider of a given health care service by making not one, but two third entities - the insurance company and the taxpayers ponying up for these subsidies - party to that relationship.
Biden envisions "the rich" and those who realize capital gains on investments paying for this. A few things about that: It stokes class envy, there are not enough rich people to cover the cost, and it dampens investment, which in turn dampens innovation and advancement.
And bear in mind it's the third "plan" he's introduced so far this year, with each of them costing several trillions of dollars.
And the other two are suppose to be about COVID relief and infrastructure, respectively, but in each case it's a fig leaf for random acts of government intrusion.
. . . even the liberal-leaning fact-checking website PolitiFact is pointing out that almost all of the bill’s spending is unrelated to the health effects of COVID-19.
“Total spending directly on COVID-19’s health impacts ranges from $100 billion to $160 billion,” fact-checker Jon Greenberg writes. “At the high end, direct COVID-19 spending represents about 8.5% of the bill’s $1.9 trillion cost.”
Of the bill’s nearly $2 trillion in spending, PolitiFact reports that just $14 to $20 billion goes to vaccine distribution and vaccine-related efforts. This is a tiny fraction, a mere 1-2 percent. Overall, the spending that actually goes to health-related matters pales in comparison to the hundreds of billions doled out for partisan priorities.
For example, at least $350 billion goes to bailing out state and local governments—despite most not actually experiencing predicted COVID-19 tax revenue shortfalls. That means Biden’s bill spends more than twice as much lining the pockets of bankrupt blue states than it does actually addressing public health.
Legislators also included a completely unrelated $86 billion bailout for union pension plans. And the bill pours $128 billion into public education. Despite what advocates claim, it’s not actually money to “reopen schools.” A whopping 95 percent of the money will be spent after 2021.
These are just a few of the big-ticket spending items that are unrelated to COVID-19. But slipped into the bill’s 600+ pages are literally countless smaller allocations of millions in taxpayer money. Many of these carve-outsare for waste like billions for racial justice programs for farmers or politician’s pet projects like $1.5 million for a bridge in New York that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer wants built.
Similarly, the administration has a quite, shall we say, expansive definition of infrastructure:
According to a White House Fact Sheet about the plan, $621 billion will be spent on items that are somewhat related to infrastructure, but only $115 billion out of the $2.3 trillion is specifically for roads and bridges. So what is the other $2 trillion-plus being spent on?
The AJP includes $213 billion to retrofit more than two million homes and commercial buildings; $174 billion in the electric vehicle market, including building 500,000 new charging stations; $100 billion to address “racial equity” in the job market; $100 billion to build high-speed broadband internet; $48 billion for an American workforce development program; $45 billion in the Environmental Protection Agency’s “Drinking Water State Revolving Fund”; $40 billion in a “new Dislocated Workers Program”; $25 billion for a “dedicated fund to support ambitious projects that have tangible benefits to the regional or national economy”; $10 billion for a civil climate corps; and $5 billion to support “evidence-based community violence prevention programs.”
Recall what LITD noted this morning, namely, that the combined cost of these three plans is nearly twice the gross domestic product of Germany.
The task before us - that is, before anyone who cares about human freedom and agency, about families, and about the hair-raisingly astronomical debt this country is saddled with - is to persuade our fellow citizens to think past the supposed appeal of these plans. A tall order, to be sure, but to be silent is to let the ruin gain momentum.
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