Monday, September 5, 2022

Biden Forgets That Workers Are Consumers Too

Biden's Worker-Centric Trade Policy

  • President Joe Biden has sought to position himself as an ally of working Americans
  • His administration is enacting what it calls a "worker-centric" trade policy, and the president scarcely seems to give a public address without mentioning the importance of union jobs
  • He has left in place many of the tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump, including the levies on aluminum and steel
  • By artificially hiking the price of imported steel, those tariffs are supposed to boost domestic production, creating more and better-paying steelworker jobs.
  • Biden also has decided to extend tariffs on solar panels which were due to expire this year

Biden Bailout

  • In July, Biden put the finishing touches on a $90 billion bailout of private-sector union pension plans that have been slipping toward insolvency.
  • The full cost of the bailout was added to the national debt, meaning workers and consumers eventually will pay for it in the form of higher taxes, slower economic growth, or (more likely) both.

Biden and his labor union allies argue that corporations should pay for these policies through higher taxes

  • Taxes and tariffs ultimately are paid by people, not businesses.
  • Since the federal government's main sources of revenue are income and payroll taxes, it will be future workers who foot most of the bill.

https://reason.com/2022/09/05/workers-are-consumers-too/ 

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