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President Biden signs the $379 billion Climate bill and tax legislation into law. Mr. Biden told a White House crowd to standing ovation "This is the biggest Climate Bill ever." At the signing event Mr. Biden tells Senator Manchin  "Joe, I never had a doubt." Senator Schumer quietly negotiated the final bill with Senator Manchin in one crucial week just recently to get it through a 50-50 split US Senate.

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In a 50-50 Senate to pass president Biden's $3.6 trillion Families and Workers plan requires the vote of Kyrsten Simema, Democrat of Arizona. Simema is the lone holdout in the plan to raise $540 billion by increasing corporate tax rates to pay for part of the plan. Tax rate increases on capital gains would raise nearly $300 billion. A law passed by president Trump lowered corporate tax rates to 21% which would go up to 26.5% under the Biden plan. The top individual rate lowered to 37% would go up to 39.6% and capital gains rate from 23.8% to 28.8% under the Biden plan. Democrats say these new rates are fair considering how much wealth distribution is skewed and how much workers and families have failed to benefit in the policies pursued by different administrations since Reagan, through Bush, Clinton, Obama and Trump.

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Officials of 130 countries met virtually to agree on a global minimum tax rate. A minimum tax rate of 15% would be paid by corporations in each of the countries in which they operate so that tax avoidance is prevented. The Group of 20 major economies including India and China also agreed to this change in taxation to ensure that all companies pay their fair share of taxes. It is also part of the Biden plan for tax revenue generation to fund the infrastructure and human needs in health, education and public services that were neglected for so long. US president Biden says- "This will level the playing field and also make America more competitive. And it will allow us to devote the additional revenue we raise to make generational investments, which are necessary to keep America's competitive edge razor sharp in today's global economy." This tax change was needed to prevent companies shopping for low tax locations such as Ireland. This kind of locating in low tax rate locations worked badly for the major G-20 economies for decades as it prevented the generation of revenues needed for essential services and infrastructure investments. Tax changes include Biden's plan to increase the corporate tax rate to 28% from 21%, and raise the minimum tax on US based companies foreign profits to 21% from 10.5%.  ...

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Trump tax cuts were seen as helping people in the 95th to 99th percentile for most of the gains by the Tax Policy Center, with little benefit to lower income households. Penn Wharton Model shows for the bottom 60% of the taxpayers the after tax benefit is only 1.5% with much larger gains for wealthy households if they are renewed in 2025. Democrats and Biden who say no taxes will increase for people making over $400,000 a year may prefer to let the Trump tax cuts expire in 2025 and make targeted changes to bring fairness.

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The failure of the 117th Congress to pass key parts of president Biden's agenda for hard hit families and workers in America is now taking place. The 50-50 standoff in the US Senate and failure of two Democrat senators Sinema of Arizona, Manchin of West Virgina to support Biden's Families and Workers Plan leaves key parts of the safety net being left out. This leaves out the education, and paid leave part of the agenda and provisions for utilities to accelerate shift away from coal out of the bill. It fails to implement a new national agenda for upward mobility, child care and paid leave to help stressed out mothers and families. The failure to include even a modest community college 2 years of support at a time when men's college enrollment is dropping to disastrous levels for America's economic competitiveness is a failure of the 117th Congress to grasp the needs of families and workers in America today. Only a new Congress in 2022 can take up the needed action for families and workers in education, health care, child care and help for families. The passage of the infrastructure bill and the current version of the social spending bill can only be seen as a first step in the right direction, after three decades of different administrations neglecting infrastructure, education, healthcare, childcare, elderly care, upward mobility, and climate change. On the plus side as the first step to restore dignity and health of families and workers in America it includes- $150 billion for rental assistance, home buying help, public housing repairs, and building 1 million affordable housing units. $150 billion for federal programs for home health care and community care for older Americans and people with disabilities $165 billion to reduce premiums for people under Affordable Health Care Act, cover additional 4 million through Medicaid, adding hearing coverage but not dental or vision to Medicare. $200 billion for child care tax credit to parents. $400 billion to reduce health care costs and give universal pre-kindergarden for 3-4 year old children. $40 billion for worker training $555 billion for fighting climate change including through tax incentives for sources of energy that are low emission and low carbon. It will be paid for by additional taxes on incomes of very high income earners in annual $1 million plus range, and by having a corporate minimum tax of 15% for large corporations, including on profits overseas, that previously did not pay this tax. A wealth tax on unrealized capital gains of billionaires or other wealth of the richest Americans is left for a future Congress to consider for financing the key parts of climate change provisions, education and health care that were left out. The education and healthcare provisions need to be expanded to restore America's historic mission of upward mobility for all. A provision for Medicare to comprehensively negotiate prices with pharmaceutical companies that would be taken for granted in any advanced country as in Europe, is also left for a future Congress that understands and responds to the dire needs of families and workers in America for affordable healthcare medicine neglected by administration after administration for the last three decades.   ...

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The UK is open to American proposals for a global minimum tax rate given that it includes a fairer split of the taxes from US tech companies. Discussions are taking place under the umbrella of the OECD, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. This is intended to prevent tax escape by large companies which choose the lowest tax jurisdictions that are set up just for that purpose. The result has been that Europe and the US have suffered from decades of underinvestment and neglect of essential infrastructure and weakened the health and education systems leaving essentials of quality of living underfunded in cities and towns across Europe and the US. The pandemic has brought the lesson home in many ways. The UK has already increased the corporate tax rate to 25% in March to help pay for pandemic related help packages. The US Biden administration has proposed a 28% tax rate, and Treasury Secretary Yellen has suggested 21% as the minimum corporate tax rate. ...

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Baby boomers and older Americans are beginning a huge wealth transfer, the largest in modern history. Americans over 70 years in age had net worth of nearly $35 trillion, according to the Federal Reserve data. This is 27% of all US wealth, up 20% from 1990. This wealth is 157% of US gross domestic product, more than double what it was in 1990. Gift tax exemption today is $11.7 million for individuals and $23.4 million for couples. It is scheduled to go down to 2017 level of $5.49 million per person adjusted for inflation in 2026. Annual gifts were $75 billion in 2016. The Biden administration proposed reducing a $40 billion annual tax break in some of these wealth transfers. Some of this would go into infrastructure spending. Other ways the transfers could help the communities in the US revive after the twin crises of 2009 and 2020, one financial and one health, is how some of this money goes into funding many of the needs of communities in America today. $9 trillion is expected to go into helping communities from the $35 trillion. The Buffett children foundations have purchased farmland to create an agricultural hub in Kingston, New York, on the Hudson River north of New York city. They also set up a food cooperative in an old Honda dealership, and setup a ad free community radio station Radio Kingston. More of this kind of work is needed from individuals and couples in the American tradition of community awareness and solidarity, and in communities across Europe, Asia, Africa and Latin America during this pandemic following the same practice. ...

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Both candidates Mr. Trump and Mr Biden put forward their positions on immigration, the coronavirus response, the economy, and racial justice, in the final debate of 2020. This was a calmer debate with policy details and the candidates delivered their points without the sharp attacks of the earlier debates. At some points in the debate the discussion turned to Mr. Biden and dealings of son Hunter Biden with a Ukrainian company. Mr. Biden raised the issue of Mr. Trump's tax returns not being disclosed. The Affordable Care Act and coverage for Americans lacking health care, immigration and the wall with Mexico, and the oil industry were other issues in the debate.

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WSJ points out that the wealthiest 400 billionaire families in America pay only 8.2% in taxes on federal individual income taxes between 2010 and 2018, not the 3% it says president Biden has said. The average income tax rate in 2020 was about 14% says the WSJ. For higher incomes it was about 25%. All this happened while infrastructure, education and health remained woefully underfunded, with Tech companies egregious behaviour in not paying their fair share of taxes and massive misallocation coupled with low productivity of capital invested compared to infrastructure. 

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The $3.5 trillion bill of president Biden to help America get back on its feet after the pandemic and after years of neglect of infrastructure, manufacturing technologies, child care, health and education, is that much only if offsetting tax increases and spending cuts are not included. When this is taken into account the US is spending about $871 billion to rebuild its economy and for a better life for Americans. That is the estimate provided in the report September 13 by the Congressional Joint Committee on Taxation.

Experts say that if president Trump's bill- Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 was calculated without offsetting cuts and tax increases the same bill would be $5.5 trillion package.

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G-7 nations reach agreement for a global minimum tax of 15% a floor for taxes that the Biden administration finds acceptable. This agreement was reached at a meeting of the Treasury chiefs of the 7 G-7 countries in London on June 5, 2021. The G-7 countries are Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, UK, and US. Next agreement from Russia, China, India and Brazil in the G-20 nations would establish new ground rules for the major economies. The G-20 meeting is in Venice July 9-10. The OECD is steering the international efforts to achieve that goal. For the agreement to be effective a number of small nations that use tax rates of below 15% to attract business have to be part of the new rules. One of these countries is Ireland with a tax rate of 12.5%. For the Biden administration in the US the goal is a significant one as president Biden seeks business to pay its fair share so that long neglected priorities for education, healthcare, infrastructure, post pandemic improvements can be met. France and other nations in the EU face similar needs in the post pandemic environment. By setting a floor the Biden administration is both creating a new cultural concept of fairness in taxation and making it possible to finance the $2 trillion spending programs for these priorities of president Biden. Behind this are important facts that have left the large tech businesses paying little or no tax depriving governments of the very revenues that are needed for infrastructure and services for a modern well run state. The Biden administration seeks to include the tech businesses as well as all businesses in the new tax rules so that a uniform idea of fair taxation applies across the whole economy for the first time in two decades. In this way it makes up for the missed opportunities in the OBC administrations of Obama, Bush, Clinton that have led to loss of faith in the state and institutions in the US. A similar situation prevails in the UK,  France and Germany where previous administrations failed to address this important issue of fair taxation and financing infrastructure and priorities in health, education, and critical needs of the people.   ...

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US president Biden's 2024 Budget places great emphasis on aid to workers and families in the US and shores up the Medicare hospital-insurance trust fund. He will do this by raising taxes on the wages, investment gains and self-employment income of people making more than $400,000 a year. Additional savings come from increasing the drugs on which Medicare can negotiate prices from 20 to 50 drugs.  Childcare- families making less than $200,000 a year will get subsidized child health care, the lowest income families paying nothing. Housing- Building and preserving 2 million housing units. Series of tax credits to make buying homes more affordable. College education- Reducing the cost of going to education with $12 billion allocated for this. Offering tution free community college. Family and Medical Leave- Federal paid family and medical leave program. Retirees- a $2000 cap on out of pocket cost of prescription drugs for retirees. Reduced taxes for under $400,000 income households- This would be done without increasing the deficits to extend the tax reduction from the 2017 tax cuts to households making less than $400,000 a year.     ...

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The BBC Fact check for crime, cost of living, immigration, world affairs is shown next to this transcript of the former president's speech at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, July 2024. The biggest issue is cost of living, for housing, food and groceries, gas and automobiles new and repairs. "I will end the devastating inflation crisis immediately, bring down interest rates and lower the cost of energy . We will drill, baby, drill. Prices will start to come down." Fact: Gas prices may come down a bit, but it will do little or nothing for the other major components of cost of living - for housing and mortgage rates of 6-7%, for automobile prices and auto repairs, for food and groceries.The problem of job creation will come to the fore because of an inherent contradiction of trying to commit to Republican old platform of tax cuts for the wealthy and efforts to take cost of living action for the now larger lower and middle classes. Without this money that goes to tax cuts for wealthy there is not much to invest in Make at Home, in manufacturing in US the way Biden is doing and plans for next 4 years creating hundreds of thousands of jobs every month and still keeping inflation low at 3% through an investment driven economy. ...

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Jack Horton of BBC Verify screens the former president Trump's speech at the Republican National Convention. “Our crime rate is going up, while crime statistics all over the world are going down".  Fact: FBI data shows crime down 6% and a drop in the murder rate by 13% in 2023. For the First Quarter of 2024 crime down by 15% and recorded murder rate down 26%. "We've had the worst inflation we've ever had under this person [Biden]. I will end the devastating inflation crisis immediately, bring down interest rates and lower the cost of energy . We will drill, baby, drill."  Fact: Inflation went up to 9.1% from 1.4% at the end of the Trump term in the first 2 years of of the Biden Administration by June 2022. Biden and Federal Reserves Powell brought this down to 3%. Explained: This inflation jump to 9% would have happened from supply chain in China for Trump administration as well. Trump's last year was 2019 the Covid pandemic started in January the lockdown by midyear meant sharp drop in demand and little room for inflation. The concentration of supply chain in China was the cause of the surge in inflation as China shut down and restarted late into 2022 causing shortages in factory parts and supplies. Biden focused on vaccination in 2020-2021. This inflation would have happened under Trump- this concentration of supply chain started with Reagan economic philosophy to ship production (and jobs) overseas, Clinton Bush Obama and Trump did little about it. Biden invested heavily in Make in America manufacturing and jobs at home. Biden and Powell did a good job of bringing this inflation down by 2023 to 3% before the European Union and UK. Younger voters don't know this they get their news from the internet and show little interest, see only that the low inflation under Trump and the higher inflation during the pandemic recovery under Biden and blame Biden. will Trump do better on inflation in 2024-2028. The WSJ does not think so its analysis shows inflation higher under Trump than Biden because of a planned 60% tax on imports from China. Trump follows Reagan/Friedman theory of the old Republican party of higher tax cuts for the wealthy, so no money is left for investing in American manufacturing and jobs as Biden free of this theory is able to do, leading to slowing growth with inflation under Trump.        ...

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The present state of affairs only puts all countries in a race to the bottom as companies seek the lowest tax rate to base their headquarters, leading to tax systems that are unstable and tax revenues that cannot support essential public goods and services such as healthcare, and essential infrastructure. US central bank head Janet Yellen called for a globally coordinated tax rate which would apply regardless of where a global company is located. In her speech to the Chicago Council of World Affairs she redefined what competitiveness should mean today- "Competitiveness is about more than how US headquartered companies fare against other companies in global merger and acquisition bids...It is about making sure that nations have stable tax systems that raise sufficient revenue to invest in essential public goods and respond to crises, and that all citizens fairly share the burden of financing the government." For too long the burden of  investing in essential public goods such as healthcare, education, environment, and infrastructure has not been fairly shared by all citizens in advanced nations of Europe and in the US and essential investment has been neglected in the process. The pandemic today has only exposed the major cracks in the system that prevails today. President Biden's infrastructure plan of $2 trillion to fund renovation rebuilding of roads, bridges, water systems, electricity systems, and the entire network of infrastructure including for health and education, is only possible in an environment that encourages essential investment and provides sufficient revenues to do this. Europe is in the same situation, and so is much of Asia, Africa and Latin America. ...

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US president Biden proposes to reduce the US deficit by $2 trillion by increasing taxes on American households worth more than $100 million that would apply to their earned income, and their unrealized gains on liquid assets like stocks. Biden also plans quadrupling the tax on stock buybacks by companies, a tax approved in the Inflation Reduction Act of 2021. The deficit in 2023 will be about $1.4 trillion and rise to about $2 trillion, so that Biden's plan is to practically eliminate the  large deficit if the Republicans come on board. Republicans prefer cuts in spending. US companies have engaged in a dramatic increase in stock buybacks in recent years leading to calls for increasing the tax on stock buybacks. Biden says even high income households will not see an increase in their taxes, only the wealthiest households with over $100 million who have benefited vastly through the Reagan type policies of the last two decades. These households with over $100 million in assets will not be affected in the same way as students, workers, and middle income households are affected in shouldering a large part of the burden of these Reagan type policies that did not adequately fund education, healthcare, and manufacturing in communities across America. This was a period when Democrats in Congress awed by Reagan type policies failed to vigorously oppose policy that increased the US deficit and burden on households for health costs by not allowing Medicare to negotiate prices with pharmaceutical companies. A senior AARP official says that when we talk about the Biden Inflation Reduction Act of 2021 the key component is the Medicare price negotiation with companies that is now law. Why Republicans and Democrats before Mr. Biden allowed such a gross distortion for two decades since 2001 that burdened ordinary  working Americans while neglecting American manufacturing, till Mr. Biden assumed the presidency, says much about the policies of the last two decades and how it has affected ordinary working families. Shriveling factory towns and creating much distress in these communities with these distortions that are a legacy of Reagan type laissez faire policies that government should do little. The result of these policies is that manufacturing is concentrated in only one country for the whole supply chain something that would never have happened with a thoughtful policy planning process. India and Vietnam are only today seen as alternatives for the supply chain in 2023 when policies were in place in these countries since 2014 for the supply chain to be distributed in a way that would be a win-win situation for all countries, avoiding the national security threats of today with overconcentration of manufacturing in China. This has not benefited China or the US because of the rancor and tension it has created. It was the fall of the Berlin Wall that created some of this awe for Reagan, when looking at it objectively it was nothing more than a course correction in Europe after the Hungarian revolution suppressed in 1956, Czech in 1968. It had little to do with what policies the US should pursue for workers and families, just as the war in Ukraine today remains another course correction in a different direction in Europe, and does not affect domestic policy in the US to build a better society for workers and families that Mr. Biden is doing. ...

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The WSJ responds to president Biden ramping up renewable energy plans and linking Republicans with Senator Rick Scott's plan for sunset provisions on federal legislation every 5 years that Biden says would include Medicare and Social Security. WSJ is critical of Biden's renewable energy plans and calls for increasing production of oil and gas to meet energy shortages and price increases. It is also against a wealth tax, Biden's $2 trillion Workers and Families Plan, and Biden's plan for Medicare to negotiate drug prices. WSJ says real disposable personal income increased $4205 under the Trump presidency 2017-2020, and has since declined by $374 with high inflation depressing purchasing power. The impact of climate change requiring brave choices and strong action is missing in the Republican plan as Republicans focus on attacking Democrats controlling the presidency and Congress on the issue of inflation. The issue of remaking supply chains are on both the Republican and Democratic agendas with president Trump giving more rhetoric against China's role in dominance of supply chains and Mr. Biden taking stronger action in Theodore Roosevelt's style of carrying a big stick and quiet posture in restoring America as a manufacturing powerhouse. The impact of climate change is short term rather than long term as seen by the heat wave in South Asia today, the fires in North America and Europe. Republicans are losing sight of the importance of making the shift on renewable energy quickly with some short term pain, as they push for oil and gas solutions and a less effective program for renewable energy. Mr. Biden is taking on bigger risks in the short term in the midterms and beyond but following a sound policy of aggressively pushing renewable energy. This can also be seen in the importance renewable energy is being given even in countries with a need for coal and natural gas such as India. Modi's plans in India are to buildup renewable energy capacity with aggressive targets for 2030. ...

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Gerald Seib of the WSJ says president Biden is coming back with new actions to revive the Democratic agenda after a challenging period in the first year. Yesterday's first formal press conference of 2022 gave Biden an opportunity to respond. Why the WSJ, NYT, did not cover on their online edition front pages president Biden's first formal press conference on Jan. 19, after 1 year of the Biden administration, will remain a mystery. With the American press acting this way it did not take much for Germany's DW.com to run the story with the title "Biden's first year weighed down by disappointment," with a thoughtful Biden at the press conference replaced by a picture of Biden staring downwards.  This is only the first year of the Biden administration. Actions are planned to ease the supply chain situation and bottlenecks at ports. Much is made of inflation, Afghanistan, Ukraine, by Republicans assailing the Biden record. President Biden responded to this by asking at the press conference what Republicans are for. On Afghanistan Biden held firm on not investing billions of dollars every week when there is so much need in America and the rest of the world at this time of the pandemic after a failed adventure for 20 years in "a graveyard for empires."  Biden pointed to the bright spots in 2022- vaccination and testing achievements in the face of anti-vax sentiment with 200 million vaccinated, the job creation in the economy with unemployment way down and wage increases by employers, and the $1 trillion in infrastructure spending tackling much needed projects state by state with immediate impact. Rarely has a president faced so many challenges in the first year as Biden pointed out- vaccination drive in the face of the Delta variant and anti-vax sentiment, the Ukraine crisis with a president Truman period like event of the Berlin Wall coming up just potentially around the corner, and efforts to tackle problems left untackled for a generation in infrastructure, for working families and climate change. Scoring on infrastructure spending, one of the three, with the other two for working families and climate change to be tackled in the remaining three years and beyond.  Biden also told the American audience at the press conference that he was reminded of what his father used to tell him- that if all goals are equally important, nothing is important. In saying this he said help for working families through child tax credit, child care assistance, community college education funding, health care costs, climate change investment were priorities for his administration that would be tackled step by step. And he pointed out from the outset of the conference that only one or two senators were blocking the party's plan for children and working families. All 48 other senators were united in the Democratic party behind his plans for workers and families. As were 5 Republican senators who he said he would not disclose because of confidentiality. In that sense president Biden already has the majority he needs in Congress. This is not happening because of the peculiar situation of the 2016 and 2020 elections in the US and also in Europe- the historical problem of administrations of Democrats in US, Social Democrats in Germany, and Labor in Britain having give up on their working class families and middle class roots. Tech revolution and internet has further complicated the situation with economic changes, tech companies not paying taxes normally due, and tech workers shifting to Democrats yet living in a world distant from working class families fracturing social cohesion. This is changing in Germany with Scholz in Germany with the help of the Greens determined to restore the dignity of working class families, for Biden with a similar coalition, and a process underway in Britain as Labor returns to its roots. In essence Biden was saying- the process of unwinding decades of unwise policy that hurt America as a nation and leader of the free world would take time, requiring a patient step by step approach. To bring America closer to its own roots and Jefferson's immortal words of "all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, and among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness." Jefferson went on to say in the Declaration that when government becomes destructive of these ends it is the Right of the People to alter it.   ...

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The RNC speech of the former president is described by the WSJ Editorial Board as long and rambling for 90 minutes after a good start becoming a typical speech that did not broaden the appeal, and with its random comments lacking clarity. The former president's claims on crime up when it is actually down by 15% according to FBI. On inflation and cost of living the inflation peaked at 9% is now down to 3% in 2023 with cost of living actions by Biden and Powell. The former president's solution to "Drill, baby drill," would only affect gas prices a bit, and do nothing for the principal causes of inflation in housing, in rental of apartments, in prices of automobiles and auto repairs, and in cost of drugs, student loans. Only a concerted action on all fronts as Biden and Powell have done would work, along with large investments in American manufacturing and jobs, which can only be done if no tax cuts are made for the wealthy not in the Republican platform. This means the hundreds of thousands of job creation each month happening now will stall and inflation from supply chains in China will be harder to control especially with a 60% Trump proposed tariff on Chinese imports. ...

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Americans Save Early and set aside for savings 10% of your pre-tax income, is the advice to ensure a safe and healthy savings retirement. This is absolutely critical. What the government can do is to ensure that incomes keep uo with inflation with fair wages in industry. It also can and should protect Americans from unexpected medical costs by ensuring that all Americans are covered by health care and for catastrophic situations. Then it is the task of Americans to build a culture of careful saving that their ancestors had and considered a essential part of virtue. For this to help build savings for retirement the government and the Federal Reserve together- as Biden and Powell have shown one with capital investments to build a strong economy and the other by protecting savings and cost of living action- must ensure that no financial crises take interest rates to zero or 1-2%. At interest rates of 5-6% for returns this helps build savings for retirement. For this to happen banks have to go back to their traditional work in the economy and no speculation risk, and Silicon Valley go back to inventing and not a culture of capturing capital allocation in capital markets and paying little in taxes. A new culture would put government in its right place to ensure that it plays a significant role in building manufacturing and science and technology in the US as president Biden has done through government investing in infrastructure and renewable energy, chips and science, and in education, healthcare.  ...

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Bernie Sanders who won in 23 states running for president says the American system is broken and this is why DJT won in 2026. He says Biden genuinely wanted to bring the changes to help workers. Other Democrats simply wanted to patch the system, a little here a little there. This he tells Reid Epstein of the NYT is not working and Bernie Sanders says DJT is right that the system is broken. Sanders excoriated billionaires in his speeches. Yet the tech billionaires at Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Amazon have over the last two decades supported Democrats and yet paid a lower tax rate than firemen, police, teachers. Apple paid less than 15%, Google less than 16%, Microsoft less than 18% and Amazon less than 9%. This also constitutes an oligarchy similar to the oil companies and pharmaceutical companies. This makes it difficult to have a fair system of taxes that can fund the Nation's crumbling infrastructure, its manufacturing, its chips and advanced technologies, health and education of children. Sanders is focusing his efforts or 2025 to 15 Congressional districts where Republicans won by very thin margins. And he is on his way to Iowa City and Omaha, Nebraska, where the margins were so thin to get his message to workers.  This interview also provides a hint of how DJT has approached the issues with a willingness to try unconventional approaches and people who did not fit the mold. RFK Jr. at Health, Tulsi Gabbard at Intelligence, Lori Chavez at Labor. Something that Democrats have failed to do to look at different ideas and find solutions to intractable problems in unconventional ways. Epstein asks why Tulsi Gabbard who supported Sanders bid for president is now in the DJT cabinet.    ...

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Seen in a larger context, the Biden tax pledge seen from the southern and midwestern and less well off states is not about taxes, it is about federal revenues that build the infrastructure and services in these states that increase the standard of living. This happened in the 1930's and 1940's under FDR and Truman, in the 1950's under Eisenhower, in the 1960's under Kennedy/LBJ. And is happening again under Biden today. Lets not forget that president John F. Kennedy says in his speeches that these regions in America in the 1860's under Lincoln were in development close to what prevailed in the 1960's in India, Ceylon, Chile, Turkey or China. The Biden pledge not to increase taxes on anyone making less than $400,000 is significant because it grasps the situation in America where extraordinary gains in wealth since 1980 have gone only some of it to the top 1-2% in midwestern states and southern states, and most of it to the top 3-5% in coastal states population in the east and west, New York and California, where the finance and tech industry are based. In Michigan and Wisconsin only 2% of households make more than $400,000, in Pennsylvania, Nevada, Arizona and Florida 3%. WSJ shows a map of the US showing this for individual states. The core southern states have 2% of households with incomes over $400,000- including Arkansas, Tennessee, South Carolina, Alabama, Louisiana, Oklahoma, with Mississippi less than 1%. It is only segregation in the late 1960's and culture issues such as abortion that have turned them from Democratic states to Republican states as they were the largest beneficiaries of taxes diverted into investment in these places since FDR/Truman and John Kennedy/LBJ. It was JFK who came up with the phrase "a rising tide lifts all boats" when he opened federally funded projects in Arkansas. Seen objectively the large investments made under Lincoln, FDR/Truman, Kennedy/LBJ from tax revenues are what changed this region from conditions that prevailed in less developed countries that John Kennedy points out in his speeches, true for the midwest, parts of the west, and the southern states alike.  President Kennedy said on Feb. 25, 1963 to the American Bankers Association Symposium on Economic Growth: "Today, many Americans tend to think of developing underdeveloped countries in terms only of faraway nations. But in 1863, even measured by 1963 dollars, our own per capita income--and this should be a source of encouragement to many who are laboring with the problem of underdevelopment in far-off countries--our own per capita income was less than $1 a day, approximately the same as Chile's. Nearly 60 percent of our labor force was engaged in agriculture, the same percentage as is today engaged in the Philippines. An estimated 20 percent of our population was illiterate, the same percentage of the population of Ceylon. Only one-fifth of our 34 million people lived in towns or cities of over 5,000 in population, as is roughly true now of Turkey. In 1863, this Nation had fewer railroad tracks laid than India has today, and its children had a shorter life expectancy than a child born this year in Thailand or Zanzibar."   ...

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Prof. Barry Naughton at the University of California, San Diego, looks at how China has approached tech regulation in a way that has not yet happened in the US and Europe. It says tech regulation expands the role of the government, yet is one that has "a reasonable regulatory rationale," and can be easily supported on an individual basis. It says the US and Europe have recognized the issues that need to be tackled as tech companies were left with no checks or regulation after growing in insidious ways in the last ten years, but have so far failed to act on this knowledge. Some of the goals pursued in China made sense for China it says- technology self-reliance after delinking with the US, data security, de-risking the housing market, getting on a path to carbon neutrality. Other goals such as de-licensing tutoring companies and reregistering as non profit companies-  this was because of president Xi's concern that excessive costs and stress were discouraging Chinese families from having more children as China's population ages rapidly. This means the government plays a bigger role yet Naughton says when it coms to the goal of reducing inequality China has still to come up with ways to use tax policy and other ways to mitigate an extremely unequal distribution of wealth in China. Today this is limited to donations and giving by companies. In the US and Europe social democratic governments from Biden, Scholz and others are taking serious steps and have plans to address these problems of common prosperity with plans to help families and workers. ...

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Republicans and Democrats decided to tackle the U.S. fiscal cliff in several steps. The first step for the Bush tax cuts to be extended to single earners with income under $400,000, and couples earning under $450,000 was part of the agreement reached Jan. 1, 2013. Republicans see this as protecting small business owners who generate jobs in the U.S. economy. Democrats see this as progress in taxing the wealthy to reduce spending cuts in other programs. As expected the deal was reached between Senate colleagues Republican Mitch McConnell and former Democratic senator and Vice President Joe Biden, as rapport is missing in the relationship between Speaker Boehner and president Obama. The $110 fiscal cliff spending cuts on entitlements and defence will be postponed for 2 months till early March under the deal. Debt ceiling will not be raised and negotiations will be needed again by the end of Feb. 2013 to raise the debt ceiling. By March 27, 2013 short term funding measures lapse. Republicans see accepting tax cuts on the wealthy as a way to remove this issue in future negotiations to focus on spending cuts needed to improve U.S. finances. ...

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Who is Nandalal Weerasinghe? This report in The Daily News gives some idea about the man chosen to help Sri Lanka negotiate a deal with the IMF.  Dr. Nandalal Weerasinghe was an alternate executive director at the International Monetary Fund before being appointed deputy governor of the Ceylon Central Bank in 2012. Before this he managed several macroeconomic departments at the central bank and was assistant governor of the central bank from 2007 to 2009, He has spent the large part of his career in economic positions at the Central Bank of Ceylon after getting his PhD in economics from the Australian National University. Weerasinghe is the leading expert in macroeconomics from Sri Lanka who has IMF experience. He says "things will get worse before they get better." He retired early from the central bank with a change in government in 2019. He was reappointed as Sri Lanka faced a debt crisis in March 2022 following the two year long pandemic, and the Ukraine war in 2022 that was bad for emerging market economies. Weerasinghe says about the crisis facing Sri Lanka- Recent decisons followed Modern Monetary Theory. This has dire consequences. In recent times the savings brought about by the low tax and interest rate regime passed savings on to the corporate sector and took away spending power from savers and pensioners. Surging inflation made things even worse for the lower income middle class and older parts of society. Years of accumulated debt have brought Ceylon to this point. In Ceylon one is seeing the effects of savings being passed on to the corporate sector in an economy dependent on tourism and remittances from overseas workers, both hit by the two year long pandemic. This is part of  a trend that has hurt emerging market economies from Argentina and Pakistan which also turned to the IMF to Turkey.  In other countries in the European Union savings also passed on to the corporate sector with low tax and low interest rate regime. With high inflation resulting in the cost of living crisis seen today in France and Germany. This type of policy that Weerasinghe calls 'Modern Monetary Theory' is not healthy for the European Union and the US, as these policies led to the neglect of much needed and vital investments in infrastructure, health and education. Only now are these effects being corrected by new administrations of Biden in the US and Scholz in Germany, with Biden's 2 trillion plan for workers and families, and a similar plan from chancellor Scholz. With this come needed investments to tackle climate change, all of which was neglected before. India has taken a different approach. By following good governance, managing vaccination effectively during the pandemic, social emphasis for food, water, electricity, cooking gas, medicine for the vast population of 1.2 billion, and a Master plan for building Made in India manufacturing,  India has avoided such crises and maintained strong economic growth. In this sense it is a model for South Asian, South East Asian, African, and Latin American emerging market economies that face a difficult situation today. Good governance is critical.   ...