Tom Hanks narrates video on 1 year anniversary of Biden/Harris Administration

[kairoso]

Even in our toughest times, America always gets back up and builds a better future. We are stronger today than we were a year ago.

Watch our new video featuring @tomhanks and extraordinary Americans to celebrate one year of the Biden-Harris Administration. pic.twitter.com/T9bFeGUUcl
- Biden Inaugural Committee (@BidenInaugural) January 20, 2022

Oh

Comments

[flyingpigs_live]

lmao what has this administration, Congress included, done besides be not-Trump?

[sandstorm]

Biden renewed a free program to feed needy kids. Most states haven’t even applied. https://t.co/I60Oh4YRg7
- Catherine Rampell (@crampell) January 19, 2022

I'm not a fan but it's something.

[xpirate_queenx]

Not being Trump is pretty much the only selling point.

[tanglespiders]

The stimulus payments, local aid, and child tax creditss are why the US economy has recovered better than most countries, is iirc the only g7 country with positive gdp growth, and lifted millions of children out of poverty. It's why what Manchin and Sinema have done is so unconscionable. It's ended, and there's going to be economic consequences, but the American Rescue Plan was something meaningful. They've dropped the ball since, aided by "centrists" in the media making up shit about how helping people is overheating the economy

[bellwetherr]

i genuinely refuse to believe the $2K once in two years helped stimulate the economy and the majority of that $2K is from the trump admin

[tanglespiders]

I mean, it was the democratic congress working with the republicans instead of obstructing and fucking over trump in an election year that passed it, the individual stimulus was three payments ($1200 at the beginning of pandemic with the CARES Act, $600 in the appropriations bill that president hissyfit threatened to veto after the election and which the House Dems tried to raise to $2000 but were blocked by House Republicans, then the Senate, and $1400 in early 2021 with the ARP) of about $3200 total per adult (before the phaseouts) and $5-600 per kid in the first two rounds, $1400 per kid in the third round (the one from 2021). And it wasn’t just that, it was the additional unemployment money (which, like all of this, they should have continued), rental assistance, increased SNAP and WIC money, temporary eitc increase, money to local governments so that they could spend it on loans or direct assistance, etc. But one of the most important was the child tax credit giving families $250-300 per kid. It was nearly 2 trillion dollars, and

[bellwetherr]

on paper it all sounds great! but those stimulus payments came with income requirements and what was on previous tax returns and so for some ppl that $1200 was actually like $400 and those child credits didn't do anything for single folks who've been hired but had hours cut and so they didn't qualify for the unemployment stipend

idk it was all just so poorly done and thought out, a lot of ppl i know who got whatever they could saved it so i'm just shocked to see it having that much of an impact

[tanglespiders]

Oh, I totally agree it was insufficient and the cutoffs were too low (and then that gets into how means testing is more expensive than just giving everyone cash), and state unemployment offices were even more useless than they were before the pandemic, but a few hundred dollars a month made an enormous difference to a lot of people (especially ones who couldn’t just save it.) Even if some people squirelled it away, it was a ton of cash that people needed and got put back into the economy. As limited as these programs and payments were, they still made a difference and that’s the best argument there is for reviving them in the longterm. And all of the legislation, flawed as it is, came from things that dems wrote while having to compromise with republicans. I fully support crticizing and hating on democrats, but I feel like saying that legislation accomplished nothing is just going to guarantee that we never get those programs back and expanded. Because why bother

[bellwetherr]

not long winded at all!! i love these replies from you. and i think we're 100% in agreement! i'm disappointed in biden but you'd have to be an idiot to think it's not better than trump.