Right now, corporations and the ultra-rich are spending millions to derail President Biden’s Build Back Better plan. Behind the scenes, they’re hard at work to keep our elected officials from helping our country recover from the pandemic.
Poll after poll tells us that Biden’s plan is full of things people want: lower drug costs, greater access to health care, a green economy, and restorative investments in our communities. Three out of four voters support this infrastructure bill and budget, yet corporations are fighting tooth and nail to stop it. Why?
It’s because the wealthy few, after trillions in tax cuts and giveaways during the last administration, want inequality to be a permanent part of American life. They want the gap between them and us to seem normal — along with dirty water and air, rising temperatures, and unaffordable homes, education, and health.
People’s Action, my organization, refuses to accept this vision. We believe we can do better, together.
As the nation’s largest grassroots member organization, with more than a million members in 32 states, we see a future with room for all, where every one of us can thrive. But none of this will happen unless we make the long-delayed investments our communities need. The Build Back Better plan is a down payment on our brighter future.
In our new report, Behind The Curtain: The Corporate Plot to Upend Democracy, we zero in on who’s spending big to stop key parts of the Biden plan: including fairer taxes, drug pricing, health care, housing, and immigration, as well as big investments in green jobs and our environment.
We name the bad actors and show how they undermine our democracy and our economy. All across the country, our members are taking this message to the doorsteps of corporations to tell them we’ve had enough.
Twenty corporations and their associations — led by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Blue Cross Blue Shield, and the National Association of Realtors — have spent over $201 million on lobbying so far this year.
The pharmaceutical and health care industries alone — which oppose the Biden administration’s efforts to lower drug prices and expand health coverage — have spent $171 million in 2021 on lobbying, more than any other industry. They employ 1,500 lobbyists in Washington — three for every member of Congress.
Meanwhile, people in the United States pay the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs and health care. That ain’t right!
A lot of attention has gone to the price tag of the Build Back Better plan: $3.5 trillion over 10 years. But that’s not deficit spending — it’s funded by reversing tax cuts for the very rich. And experts agree the package will pay for itself.
It will spur economic activity, unlike Donald Trump’s 2017 tax cuts, which add $2.3 trillion to the national debt. As a direct result of Trump’s giveaways, 82 ultra-rich families have been able to avoid paying over $1 billion in taxes, and many large corporations pay no taxes at all.
The Build Back Better plan will reverse Trump’s giveaways to raise money for expanded health benefits and a permanent Child Tax Credit. More savings come by allowing Medicare and the Department of Health and Human Services to negotiate drug prices, which will save $450 billion and reduce prices for branded drugs by 55 percent.
The United States is more unequal than ever. If we’re going to heal the wounds in our economy and our society, we need Congress and the president to deliver what the people want and need: assistance and investments so we can survive and thrive. That is exactly what the Biden Build Back Better plan does.
Our economy, our democracy, and our lives all hang in the balance. Make no mistake: the time is now. It’s corporations versus the people in this Build Back Battle, and it’s time for the people to win.
This op-ed was distributed by OtherWords.org.
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re summoning up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
Last week, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
It will be a tough, scary four years to produce social justice-driven journalism. We need to deliver news, strategy, liberatory ideas, tools and movement-sparking solutions with a force that we never have had to before. And at the same time, we desperately need to protect our ability to do so.
We know this is such a painful moment and donations may understandably be the last thing on your mind. But we must ask for your support, which is needed in a new and urgent way.
We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
Please dig deep if you can, but a donation of any amount will be a truly meaningful and tangible action in this cataclysmic historical moment.
We’re with you. Let’s do all we can to move forward together.
With love, rage, and solidarity,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy