Biden’s $400 Billion Blunder

His marketing team needs to get their act together.

Not quite 2 + 2 = Fish, but still bad. (Photo by **George Becker** from **Pexels**)

Introduction (delete later)

Just about a month ago, I wrote an overview of President Biden’s infrastructure plan, formally known as the American Jobs Plan (AJP). After reviewing the different aspects of the plan, this was my position.

For all the exaggerations from conservatives about overspending and the criticisms from the left about under funding, the bottom line is that the Jobs Act is an overall economic boon.

The most contentious part of the plan was $400 billion for caregivers who tend to the elderly and disabled. Putting that in an infrastructure bill was a stretch, but it had to go somewhere.

I’ve always “known” that caregivers are horrendously underpaid, especially since no one I know has ever had “nursing home employee” as a goal. However, this bit by John Oliver really drilled the point home.

But this is not the $400 billion mistake that I’m talking about.

Rather, I’m talking about an additional $400 billion that they FORGOT TO INCLUDE in the original rollout.

The Missing Money

The original rollout of the AJP included the image below, which was widely used in all the major publications reporting on the plan.

That’s all well and good.

What happened is that they forgot to include the $400 billion in tax breaks for investment in clean energy.

Oops.

The problem isn’t that investment in clean energy shouldn’t be included in an infrastructure bill. Fossil fuels (yes, even natural gas) are not long-term answer to our energy needs, and government funding is a standard tool to accelerate adoption of the newest technologies.

The problem is that someone forgot to add it into the press release, and this really pisses me off.

Why Is This a Big Deal?

Not only does it make the administration look like a bunch of complete idiots, it happens on the first bill in a long time that actually takes infrastructure seriously and not just as a political hammer to score votes.

Every four years, the American Society of Civil Engineers puts out in Infrastructure Report Card, using a simple A through F grade in the following categories.

Overall, America’s infrastructure got a C-.

To get all of our infrastructure up to the recommended grade of B in 10 years will take a lot of money; much more than what is currently being spent. This difference is the called the Investment Gap.

Total needed: $5,937 billion
Currently funded: $3,350 billion
Investment Gap: $2,588 billion

So let’s compare the AJP spending to what the ASCE says we need.

Investment Gap: $2.6 trillion over 10 years = $260 billion/year
Jobs Plan: $2.2 trillion over 15 years = $147 billion/year

The numbers don’t work, the Jobs Plan only provides a little over half of the required investment, and our infrastructure will remain in disrepair.

And now the administration can add constant doubt on the factual nature of the plan due to their $400 billion omission, on top of the already vehement opposition by the Republicans.

This is a mistake on par with Lockheed Martin forgetting to convert its calculations to the metric system, crash landing the Mars Climate Orbiter.

Ridiculous.

The Takeaway

I’m still a fan of the AJP.

It doesn’t do enough to fully address our infrastructure needs, but it does a lot more than most anything we’ve seen in the past 20 years.

I work in municipal government and have seen where parts of our water delivery system is using 50, 75, even 100 year old pipes, with most material assigned for immediate repairs.

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg for cities and states the country over.

I truly hope the AJP gets passed, and then we realize how much more work there is to be done.

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