Biden Budget Floats Tax Breaks for Families

President Biden on Monday released a budget proposal aimed at getting voters' attention: It would offer tax breaks for families, lower health care costs, smaller deficits, and higher taxes on the wealthy and corporations. House Speaker Mike Johnson issued a joint statement with other GOP leaders calling the Biden proposal a "glaring reminder of this Administration's insatiable appetite for reckless spending." Details, via the AP:

• Unlikely to pass the House and the Senate to become law, the proposal for fiscal 2025 is an election year blueprint about what the future could hold if Biden and enough of his fellow Democrats win in November.
• If the Biden budget became law, deficits could be pruned $3 trillion over a decade. It would raise tax revenues by a total of $4.9 trillion over that period and use roughly $1.9 trillion to fund various programs, with the rest going to deficit reduction.

• Parents could get an increased child tax credit in 2025, as payments would return briefly to the 2021 level funded by Biden's coronavirus pandemic relief package. Parents making under $200,000 annually would have access to child care, with most eligible families paying no more than $10 a day.
• Homebuyers could get a tax credit worth up to $10,000 and $10 billion in down payment aid for first-generation buyers. The budget proposal includes $258 billion to help build or preserve 2 million homes, helping to address a national shortage that has kept housing prices high.
• Corporate taxes would jump upward, while billionaires would be charged a minimum tax of 25%.
• It would eliminate origination fees on government student loans, possibly saving borrowers $1,000 over the life of the debt. It also includes $12 billion to help universities develop strategies for reducing their costs.
• The proposal would provide about $900 billion for defense in fiscal 2025, about $16 billion more than the baseline. The Biden administration is still seeking money to help Ukraine defend itself against Russia and aid for Israel. His budget plan reiterates the supplemental funding request made last October for Ukraine, Israel, and humanitarian relief for Palestinians.
• It's also requesting funding to expand personnel and resources at the US southern border. Still, military spending over 10 years would decline $146 billion to $9.57 trillion.
• Biden said in his State of the Union that Medicare should have the ability to negotiate prices on 500 prescription drugs, which could save $200 billion over 10 years. Aides said his budget does not specify how many drug prices would be subject to negotiations. Biden's plan would permanently keep Medicare solvent, according to aides, but as noted by Maya MacGuineas, president of the fiscal group Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, it does not appear to fix Social Security, which projections say will be unable to pay full benefits starting in 2033.

(More President Biden stories.)