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By Trend
U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday signed into law the
Inflation Reduction Act, a scaled-down version of the massive
'Build Back Better' package he and many Democrats envisioned last
year, Trend reports citing Xinhua .
Touting it as a 'historic bill,' Biden said at the White House
that it will lower costs for American families, combat the climate
crisis, reduct the deficit, and finally make the largest
corporations pay their fair share in taxes.
The bill includes a roughly 400-billion-U.S.-dollar investment
in fighting climate change, measures to make prescription drugs
more affordable, and a 15-percent minimum tax on most corporations
that make more than 1 billion dollars per year. The legislation
would generate nearly 300 billion dollars of net revenue over a
decade.
Democrats used a fast-track legislative process known as
reconciliation, which allowed them to pass the measure without any
support from Senate Republicans. Earlier this month, the
evenly-divided Senate approved the bill by a vote of 51 to 50 along
party lines.
On Friday, the bill cleared the House by a vote of 220 to 207,
also along party lines.
Democrats had been eager to push through their domestic policy
ambitions before the mid-term elections, but Republicans strongly
opposed the bill, arguing that tax increases would impose burdens
on U.S. businesses and workers and hurt the economy.
'Democrats robbed Americans last year by spending our economy
into record inflation. This year, their solution is to do it a
second time,' Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said in a
tweet.
'The partisan bill President Biden signed into law today means
higher taxes, higher energy bills, and aggressive IRS audits,' said
McConnell, referring to the Internal Revenue Service, which
administers and enforces U.S. federal tax laws.
'You can't tax and spend your way out of an inflation crisis,'
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said earlier, blaming the
Biden administration's policies for the worst inflation in four
decades.
The Tax Foundation, a nonprofit think tank, recently argued that
by reducing long-run economic growth, this bill may actually worsen
inflation by constraining the productive capacity of the
economy.
Despite doubts over the effect on inflation, budget watchdog
groups praised the bill.
Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible
Federal Budget, noted that lawmakers sent a message that 'it's time
to start working to get our budget back on a sustainable
trajectory.'
'This bill is proof that when something is worth doing, it's
worth paying for, and reducing our nation's alarming national debt
is just as important as other pressing issues we face,' said
MacGuineas.
The new bill is much smaller than the 3.5-trillion-dollar 'Build
Back Better' social spending bill Democrats initially attempted to
advance last year.
In November 2021, the House passed a roughly 2-trillion-dollar
spending package, but it didn't gain support from Senator Joe
Manchin of West Virginia, a key centrist Democrat, who walked away
from negotiations in December due to disagreements over the price
tag.
Last month, a surprise announcement of an agreement between
Manchin and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer brought the bill
back to life. A revised version of the bill then garnered support
from another key Democrat, Senator Kyrsten Sinema, paving the way
for its final approval.
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