What Will Biden’s “Build Back Better” Bill Do to the Economy?

            President Joe Biden and the Democrats in Congress are working overtime to find a way to pass the “Build Back Better” bill out of Congress – or at least give Biden something to show when he travels to Europe. Biden continues to claim that the $3.5-trillion tax-and-spend bill is an “investment” that will not cost American taxpayers even a single penny. He continues to say that the bill will pay for itself. Richard Stern at The Heritage Foundation tells a different story. 

However, the specific details of this 2,465-page manifesto tell a very different story. It’s an old story, one where your interests and hard work are subverted for the benefit of a well-connected few….

Every good and service we produce that enriches our lives requires innovation and hard work to invent, design, produce, and ultimately make available. That’s a delicate process that requires a society where people are free to pursue their passions and reap the benefits of their hard work and successful innovation.

Instead, Biden’s plan offers dramatic tax increases, increasing regulatory burdens, distortionary benefits for the well-connected, and a bloated bureaucracy designed only to micromanage and suppress freedom.

The only investment made by Biden’s so-called Build Back Better bill is in the tools of tyranny and central planners.

            Stern gave ten of the “egregious provisions of the bill that would undermine the work of innovators and entrepreneurs” and “stifle economic opportunities for all Americans.”

1) Your Tax Dollars for IRS

The bill would dramatically expand funding to the IRS for so-called enforcement activities. Section 138401 of the bill would provide $78.9 billion to hire an army of new IRS agents over the next 10 years … a 64% increase in IRS funding.

2) Labor Department Bureaucrats

The bill doesn’t just stop at bolstering the IRS. Sections 21001-21003 would direct $2.6 billion of taxpayer funds to the Department of Labor to dramatically expand its army of bureaucrats to harass businesses more and more….

3) Micromanaging Small-Business Loans

The bill would increase the Small Business Administration’s bureaucracy by $3 billion. That represents funds taken from taxpayers and used to distort and micromanage investment in small and new businesses….

4) Suppressing Worker Freedom

Section 138514 of the bill would create an above-the-line tax deduction for union dues, granting a taxpayer-funded subsidy to unions. That would effectively give union income the kind of tax treatment reserved for charities….

5) Making Well-Connected Even More So

In additional to the aforementioned IRS provision, the bill would give another $3.8 billion to the IRS to administer subsidies through the tax code….

6) Central Planning for Rural America

Sections 12008 and 12009 direct $3.5 billion toward federal central planners to cherry-pick winning and losing businesses in rural America. They also use $545 million in taxpayer funds just to administer this program….

7) Central Planning at Regional Level

The bill would also create a $5 billion program to allow bureaucrats to subsidize the business ventures and economic activities they deem worthy of investment….

8) New ‘Clusters’ of Micromanagement

Sections 110018 and 110019 would commit $4 billion in taxpayer funding to so-called economic growth clusters. As with the above sections, that would just create one more bureaucratically directed slush fund….

9) Injecting Bias Into Central Planning

Section 40401 would allot $1.6 billion in direct and indirect business subsidies based on discrimination using demographic data. Specifically, those funds would be used to provide services to federally designated minority businesses or business support centers that are federally designated as serving minorities….

10) More State, Local Bailouts

Despite numerous state and local bailouts already provided during the COVID-19 pandemic, Section 135101 of the bill would provide yet another state and local bailout. It would use taxpayer funding to offset a portion of the cost of certain state and local projects. Any entity receiving those funds would be required to use David-Bacon union-determined prevailing-wage levels. That would boost unions with taxpayer funds.

            In addition to the ten reasons outlined by Stern, “this program would take billions of dollars from hardworking Americans and productive U.S. businesses to be used by state and local governments.” He wrote, “This is a clear-cut case of funds being directed away from private free market investment and toward ‘investment’ run and directed by the government.”

            From Stern’s point of view, Biden’s “Build Back Better” bill is “a giant step in the direction of central planning, government malinvestment, and stunted economic growth and opportunity.”

            It appears that the “Build Back Better” is the plan for socialists to move the United States from its free enterprise system to one of socialism. Democrats must pass the bill before the end of the year. Otherwise, the nation will be close to the mid-term election and could have terrible results for Democrats. Americans should be praying for God’s help to stop the bill!