Friday 30 April 2021

Biden Attempts to Consign Trickle-down Economics to the Dustbin of History

THE GUARDIAN: Analysis: why the president wants to build the US economy from the middle and bottom, not top down

Cut taxes on the rich. Unleash a wave of entrepreneurship. Growth will pick up and more jobs will be created. Everybody benefits. That, in essence, is trickle down – a theory of economics that Joe Biden wants to consign to the dustbin of history.

The US president was a young politician when the idea that cutting taxes on the well-off would be good for the poor first came into vogue in the 1970s. Now he has used his first address to a joint session of Congress to call on the US’s top 1% to pay for his $1.8tn (£1.3tn) American families plan – higher spending in areas such as education, childcare and infrastructure.

Anticipating pushback from Republicans on Capitol Hill, Biden had a simple message. It was time, he said, to build the country from the middle and the bottom outwards, not from the top down. Trickle down has never worked,” he said. » | Larry Elliott | Thursday, April 29, 2021