Tag: Infrastructure plan

Budget Watchdogs Project Democrats Infrastructure Plans to Cost up to $5.5 Trillion – $2 Trillion More Than Advertised

Minnesota Sun Staff
President Joe Biden

The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget has estimated that President Biden’s infrastructure proposals will cost up to $2 trillion more than Democrats are projecting.

The White House and Democratic congressional leaders are preparing a $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill that includes policies in Biden’s Build Back Better agenda such as universal pre-K, tuition-free community college and financial support for childcare. Democrats have referred to the reconciliation bill has a “human infrastructure” budget bill. It could also include the creation of a Civilian Climate Corps.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer have said they won’t pass a separate, bipartisan $1.2 trillion physical infrastructure framework until a filibuster-proof reconciliation spending bill gets passed.

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Economy Added 559,000 Jobs in May, Below Expectations for Second Straight Month

Minnesota Sun Staff
Walmart Hiring Sign

The U.S. economy reported an increase of 559,000 jobs in May and the unemployment rate declined to 5.8%, according to Department of Labor data released Friday.

Total non-farm payroll employment increased by 559,000 in May, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) report, and the number of unemployed persons dropped to 9.3 million. Economists projected 671,000 Americans would be added to payrolls prior to Friday’s report, according to The Wall Street Journal.

“We think it will take several months for frictions in the labor market to work themselves out,” Barclays chief U.S. economist Michael Gapen told the WSJ. “That just means we shouldn’t be expecting one to two million jobs every month. Instead, it will be a more gradual process.”

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Biden Administration Proposes ‘More Realistic’ 15 Percent Global Corporate Tax Rate

Minnesota Sun Staff
President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, joined by White House staff, participate in a virtual bilateral meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Tuesday, Feb. 23, 2021, in the Roosevelt Room of the White House. (Official White House Photo by Adam Schultz)

The Biden administration proposed a minimum global corporate tax rate of 15%, but said it hoped world leaders would negotiate a more “ambitious” minimum rate.

Treasury Department officials proposed the 15% minimum corporate tax rate during an Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) meeting on taxation Thursday. The meeting marked the initial discussions over a global minimum rate between nations after the Treasury Department had previously pushed for such a tax to stop the global “race to the bottom.”

“Treasury proposed to the Steering Group that the global minimum tax rate should be at least 15%,” the department said in a statement Thursday. “Treasury underscored that 15% is a floor and that discussions should continue to be ambitious and push that rate higher.”

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Democratic 2020 Hopeful Klobuchar Touts $1 Trillion Infrastructure Plan

Minnesota Sun Staff

Democratic presidential candidate Amy Klobuchar is pitching an infrastructure plan she says will provide $1 trillion to fix roads and bridges, protect against flooding and rebuild schools, airports and other projects. The plan announced Thursday is the first policy proposal from the Minnesota senator since she joined the 2020 race…

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