USA TODAY International Edition
Our View: President Biden gambles on big government
If there is an overarching theme of President Joe Biden’s first 100 days, it’s his argument that a bigger government can improve lives. That’s a seismic departure from decades of Reagan- era dogma that big government is never the solution, only the problem. If anything, Biden’s view is a throwback to the Great Society domestic activism of Lyndon Johnson or the New Deal policies of Franklin Roosevelt.
Nonetheless, it’s also vital to highlight the risks of such a strategy.
Biden is setting a high bar for himself with his proposition that trillions in government spending, paid with higher debt and higher taxes, will address society’s ills — rather than rely on the private sector and market- driven solutions. It assumes federal bureaucracy can be an efficient, waste- avoiding engine for social change.
And so far, so good.
In contrast to President Donald Trump’s fumbling hands- off approach last year to the coronavirus pandemic, where botched federal testing and mixed- signal precautions led to soaring infections and death, Biden has marshaled government resources so that within his first 100 days, just more than half of the adult population has received at least a single dose of a vaccine.
Meanwhile, the pandemic illustrated the growing divide between wealthier Americans, who could adjust to the disease by simply working at home, and lower earners whose jobs went away, were reduced or required them to work exposed to the virus.
The K- shaped economy that emerged was fertile ground for Biden’s $ 1.9 trillion COVID- 19 relief package, pushed through Congress in March with only Democratic votes. It’s the largest expansion of the social safety net in generations with its direct payments to those most financially strapped by the pandemic, along with tax credits and billions of dollars for child care and restaurant recovery. Seventy percent of Americans were pleased by it, including 41% of Republicans.
Likewise there is, so far, popular support for Biden’s $ 2 trillion proposed infrastructure bill that would rebuild roads and bridges, and spend hundreds of billions on promoting electrical vehicles, expanding broadband, revitalizing the electric grid and upgrading the community- and homebased eldercare system. And Wednesday, he unveiled his American Families Plan that calls for $ 1.8 trillion in spending for education, child care and paid family leave, among other things.
Meanwhile, there are broad signs of robust economic recovery, for which presidents always receive credit, whether or not it’s appropriate.
And despite a harshly polarized electorate, Biden’s approval rating has consistently remained above 50%, much improved over his predecessor.
All of this might insulate Biden when challenges arise. But the gamble of extolling bigger government is that there’s very little room for failures.
What if the influx of unaccompanied children flooding the southern border becomes an even greater crisis?
What if fears of rising interest rates and inflation become reality? The federal debt is on course to exceed the size of the economy this year for only the second time since World War II.
And what if Afghanistan collapses into televised civil war following the U. S. withdrawal ordered by Biden? After two decades of war in that country, at the cost of 2,400 U. S. troops killed and $ 2 trillion, could there be a greater example of wholesale government miscalculation and waste?
Much of Biden’s agenda is smart and bold, but in a time of a closely divided Washington, where Democrats have the barest of majorities in the House and Senate, successful implementation is paramount.
President Biden will have to manage his new, bigger government with all the benefit of his five decades of experience in Washington to avoid blowback that will diminish his accomplishments so far.