Podcast | Race to the White House: Joe Biden’s 'trump' card

Hi I am Nivedita Varadarajan and welcome to the latest episode of the Race to the White House. Last week Democratic presidential hopeful Joe Biden released policy recommendations which will the guide his presidency. Though he covers many critical issues, Biden’s economic agenda is absolutely important -- it could be the one factor that could help Biden clinch the elections. And, of course, we are talking about it in this week’s episode.

The plan, which was put forth by a taskforce set up by Biden, has four parts: Covid-19 response, job creation, reducing inequalities and enhancing social security. Here’s how they plan to do it: they want to push infrastructure funding, raise wages, address racial discrimination and increase funding for social welfare schemes.

They propose reforming the unemployment insurance system to cover independent contractors, gig, part-time and tipped workers. They also want to promote payroll support programmes, maintain workers’ benefit programmes and provide paid sick leaves to employees.

As part of a broader agenda to digitalise the nation’s economy, the party wants to provide high-speed broadband services at affordable rates, especially in rural areas where connectivity is abysmal.

In a push for labour reforms, the Democrats are promising to raise the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour and want to reform labour union to provide workers a say in the functioning of the companies.

They also want to enact universal, high-quality prekindergarten programmes for 3- and 4-year-olds and make new investments to increase childcare options for parents. They also want to provide equitable and racially just housing.

Now, I want to talk about three policy recommendations in detail:

1. Reducing economic inequalities

The party, in this document, says that it “will take decisive action to level the playing field for people of colour, working families, women, and others who have been left on the sidelines.”

To do this, they want to provide affordable banking services for low- and middle-income families. They will expand access to credit by creating a public credit reporting agency and will mandate its use for all federal lending programmes, including for home loans and student loans.

2. Trade policy

In the document, the party says that they will “pursue a trade policy that puts workers first.”

They note that they will negotiate strong fair trade practises, and this includes having labour, human rights, and environment standard s in agreements. This they believe will ensure trading partners don’t capture market share using fraudulent means.

3. ‘Made in America’ push

The democrats want to want to invest in the nation’s infrastructure system. They will make investments in clean energy, clean transportation, energy efficiency and advanced manufacturing. They also want to spend to repair the infrastructure that is already in place while wanting to invest in a high-speed rail system and public transportation.

The most intriguing part of Biden’s economic platform is scheme to expand support for American manufacturing. He wants to America to become a manufacture hub and wants to support “Made in America” products. To do this, the Biden administration wants to end policies that incentivises offshoring and accelerate onshoring critical supply chains, especially medical supplies and pharmaceuticals.

The party also wants to boost small business funding, especially to businesses owned by women and people of colour, and those in rural and underbanked areas.

This brings me to my take of the economic policies agreed upon by Biden’s team. Many of these policies, like the Make in America, bring jobs back, reducing income inequalities were all issues that Trump ran on in 2016 and he reaped the benefits. Now, four years later, he doesn’t have much to show for it.

Biden’s critics say that these ideas are nothing new and that he hasn’t taken many ideas, like the green new deal, that the progressives want. But, Biden is currently enjoying a massive lead over Trump right now and even if he wins some of Trump’s disfranchised voters, he is sure to win the election.