Jobs & the Economy
Throughout the 117th Congress, House Democrats have partnered with President Biden to enact policies that expand economic opportunity for businesses, workers, and communities across America. Under President Biden and Congressional Democrats, the unemployment rate is at its lowest in more than 50 years with more than 10 million jobs created, helping more of our people get ahead in today’s economy and Make It In America.
Democrats pursue an economic agenda that helps American businesses create good-paying jobs and ensure that workers have the tools not only to get by but to get ahead in our global economy. From raising the minimum wage to providing skills training and apprenticeship opportunities to ensuring equal pay for equal work, from making childcare more affordable to making it easier to save for retirement, Democrats’ economic policies are aimed at helping workers and their families attain real economic security at every stage of life.
Democrats have also delivered historic legislation investing in infrastructure and greater access to high-speed internet, taking the lead in the clean-energy economy, and supporting innovation and entrepreneurship. The generational Bipartisan Infrastructure Law has already begun to expand economic opportunity for Americans in communities across the country and takes action to repair our nation’s roads, bridges, ports, and other infrastructure while creating nearly 1.5 million jobs annually over the next decade. It contains the first major American investment in climate resilience to help communities upgrade their critical infrastructure and mitigate the impact of climate change-driven extreme weather. Likewise, the Inflation Reduction Act also advances America’s clean energy goals, turbocharging clean energy research and transmission while promoting electric vehicle domestic manufacturing to reduce American dependence on gasoline while revitalizing our auto industry.
The CHIPS and Science Act includes bipartisan measures to revitalize the domestic semiconductor industry and spur research. By strengthening domestic supply chains, this law acts directly to accelerate American innovation in the long-term while acting immediately to address inflation and create good paying jobs. House Democrats will continue to champion skills training and education at every level – from early childhood learning through higher education – to prepare our people for success and advancement in a changing economy. In all of these efforts, Democrats will continue to look for ways to make access to opportunities more equitable and to combat the lingering effects of legalized discrimination that continue to make it harder for minorities to access credit for loans, seek investment capital for startups, and build wealth to pass on to the next generation.
With historic job creation under President Biden, House Democrats will continue to advance policies that expand economic opportunity for working families, support small businesses, and create better-paying jobs.
After 420 days without a jobs plan, House Republicans are continuing their streak by not bringing any jobs bills to the Floor this week. Instead of putting forward a comprehensive jobs plan, Republicans are considering bills that have nothing to do with putting more Americans back to work or growing our economy.
The primacy of calls for major deficit reduction have all but stagnated, but House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer is trying to revive an urgency in Washington, D.C., around his signature issue.
House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland this morning called on Congress to replace $1.2 trillion in automatic spending cuts mandated by law at the end of the year with a balanced package of deficit reduction akin to the grand bargain President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner negotiated unsuccessfully last summer.
Our number one priority must continue to be creating jobs and setting our economy back on a course toward sustainable growth that creates opportunities for our middle class. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told the House Budget Committee earlier this month that growth must take precedence over deficit reduction. I agree. However, putting our fiscal house in order by reining in deficits and getting our debt under control is a critical part of ensuring sustainable economic growth, and so it is essential for us to have a plan to reduce deficits once the economy has further recovered.
We are also helping American families keep more of their hard-earned money through increased energy savings. Ambitious vehicle fuel economy standards set last year will cut oil consumption by 12 billion barrels and save American families $1.7 trillion over the next ten years. The announcement today by the President of a $30 million investment in adavanced energy research is good news for middle class families and American businesses that rely on cars and trucks each day, because it represents another important step forward toward ensuring us access to the affordable energy that will drive our prosperity for generations. Today’s announcement will help us harness the most important resource of all: American ingenuity.
WASHINGTON, DC - House Democratic Whip Steny H. Hoyer (MD) discussed the House Democratic Steering and Policy Committee hearing on women's health and Democrats' focus on job creation today on MSNBC Live. See below for excerpts and a link to the video.
Sustaining our economic recovery depends on American businesses, especially manufacturers, remaining globally competitive and able to continue investing in innovation and job growth. The President's proposal would lower the business tax rate by broadening the base through elimination of those loopholes that distort business decision making. It also goes hand in hand with House Democrats' Make It In America comprehensive jobs plan by providing incentives for manufacturing and research that will help us retain our role as the world's innovation leader. When we help manufacturers make their products here in America, it in turn helps create opportunities for more of our people to Make It In America.
I know that everybody on my side would have supported the agreement that Mr. Van Hollen and I put forward. That agreement would, as the current agreement would say, that the only individuals paying for this bill out of 315 million Americans are the two million civilian workers who work for us, who work for all of us, who day after day, week after week, month after month make sure we give the services to the people of the United States, protect the United states, ensure that our food is safe, ensure that we have FBI agents on the job, make sure at the Defense Intelligence Agency we know what other people are doing, these are all civilian employees. Highly skilled, highly trained, highly educated and, yes, highly motivated. And every day they give outstanding service to the people of the United States. We talk here and we pass laws here but none of that talk and none of those laws make a difference unless somebody implements what we say and the policies that we set. This Congress is on the path to be the most anti-federal worker Congress that I have served in.
I am very disappointed that the proposed UI extension will be paid for by increasing the retirement contributions made by new federal workers. When we work to protect the middle class, it is only right to protect them all, and federal workers are hardworking Americans who have already contributed $60 billion to deficit reduction over the next decade. Our deficit problems were not created by these men and women, and they will not be solved by only asking them to contribute. If we are going to address our deficit in a big, bold and balanced way, we must look beyond just federal workers and ask others to share in the contributions our deficit problems demand.
Just a quick note for Speaker Boehner: When it comes to your behemoth of a highway bill, the problem is your policies, not the process. Republicans are scrambling to split the bill into parts to make it more palatable to Republicans already skeptical of the measure, but that won’t change the fact that the bill destroys 550,000 jobs, bankrupts the highway trust fund by 2016 and leaves our roads and bridges woefully underfunded.