Despite Trifecta Control, Democrats Have Barely Expanded Welfare

By Matt Bruenig, People’s Policy Project

During his presidential campaign, Joe Biden proposed a lot of additions to the US welfare state. These included:

1. Enacting paid family leave.
2. Enacting child care subsidies.
3. Enacting universal pre-k.
4. Increasing the Child Tax Credit, eliminating the CTC phase-in, and paying it out monthly.
5. Increasing the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit.
6. Increasing allowed contributions to Dependent Care Flexible Savings Accounts.
7. Increasing the Earned Income Tax Credit.
8. Increasing monthly Social Security benefits for very old Americans.
9. Increasing the Social Security special minimum benefit.
10. Increasing the Social Security survivors benefit.
11. Increasing the maximum SSI benefit for disabled people .
12. Eliminating the 5-month waiting period for receiving SSDI.
13. Eliminating the 2-year waiting period to receive Medicare for individuals on SSDI.
14. Expanding the Medicaid long-term support and services program.
15. Creating a public option for health insurance.
16. Providing insurance to uninsured people in the Medicaid gap.
17. Increasing the premium subsidies for exchange insurance plans.

Some of these policies were enacted temporarily as part of the American Rescue Plan (ARP). Others were in initial drafts of the Build Back Better (BBB) legislation.

But, with the release of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), it’s now clear that none of these proposals will be enacted beyond this year except the last one: increasing the generosity of the Advanced Premium Tax Credit (APTC) for individuals who buy insurance on the Affordable Care Act (ACA) exchanges. And even the change to the APTC is set to expire after 2025.