Rattner: Infrastructure Bill Is About Way More Than Just Infrastructure | Morning Joe | MSNBC

Morning Joe economic analyst Steve Rattner looks at the president's infrastructure plan and explains why it's more than just an infrastructure bill. Aired on 04/01/2021.
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#SteveRattner #InfrastructurePlan #MSNBC

Rattner: Infrastructure Bill Is About Way More Than Just Infrastructure | Morning Joe | MSNBC

69 comments

  1. If you want to talk about taxation and so-called “entitlement” spending, let’s talk about how major corporations in this country have intentionally underpaid and underemployed people to maximize their profits while socializing the costs of feeding, housing, and providing care for regular people for the last 30 years. Or how billionaires owe the US government a combined $25 billion+ that the IRS is intentionally too underfunded to go after. Or how Wall Street hedge funds are making profits by shorting companies until they collapse, a practice that only got so much attention this year because Redditors swarmed shorted stocks to inflate their prices and put some hedge funds in critical danger. Correcting the social ills that allow the rich to profit from the suffering of the poor would create the economic mobility needed nationwide to bridge the gap between spending and revenue, and the sooner we do this, the better.

    1. @Vera von Weltin It seems you might wanna get with your Doctor, at your age, meds must be adjusted.

    2. @Rachael Walrath So your answer is, if someone starts a business, and after a few years it is massive. They are 10-12 thousand employees, but the first 2 years the person who started it struggled, barely made any money if at all, but now he should really pay a lot of taxes to make sure other people make more money? Please. If a waitress does not get tips equaling minimum wage the owner of said business, by law, must pay the difference to reach that threshold. As i said a VAST MAJORITY of waitresses make well above 15 an hour. If they aren’t, then maybe it’s time to, wait for it, GET A DIFFERENT JOB. Do something to help yourself and not depend on others to do it for you. My dad had an 8th grade education. He retired at 42. Never took any type of college or trade school. To many people cry about people having money and do nothing for themselves.

    3. @Rachael Walrath I forgot to say. YES, some people do need a hand up. Some things happenen beyond their control, those people, yes, help them get back on their feet. Not the lazy ones just waiting for a handout. Like during this Wuhan. When they gave unemployment PLUS extra money, many just stayed home instead of going back to work.

    4. @Wisconsin Man I used to think the same way. Trust me. So I am going to give you the same challenge I gave myself. Throw out your assumptions. Throw out the assumptions that all people regardless of where they live in the US have the same opportunities. Once I threw out that assumption and started digging did I really see. I cant convince you. You have to do it on your own. Look up Matthew Cooke on FB or PBS documentaries on YouTube. It was only then did I realize what we are truly fighting. Corporate greed. It starts with guaranteed wage increase by government but it can’t stop there.

  2. One could argue that the “other” section covered by the bill is investing in our societal infrastructure, particularly that around those in need and the vulnerable.

    1. @Mark Simpson agreed. But what is the reason? Elected officials not wanting to take on the challenge. Elected officials not wanting to spend the money. If we want change then it is up to us to make sure elected officials are committed to upholding these programs.

    2. @Richard Batchelder So, NOW you’re concerned with the border, eh? What happened to your concern over the past 4 years? gtfo

    3. @Jock Young you keep believing that. You know how they will help the elderly? by giving them a pill to put them down and save a few bucks in a government run nursing home sometime in the not to distant future. You can look at what Obama did to the VA for a small sample of what’s to come.

    4. @Mark Simpson They’re good at making you wait in line or on hold when you try to call them or visit any gov. run entity. They are also good at wasting our money, making you fill out massive amounts of forms for licences and permints, and spying on US citizens.

    5. You are right ;and at least there is a package now, finally some freaking movement on real issues. People have almost forgotten what press conferences and governance looks like

  3. Housing; the homeless population keeps growing. There’s no excuse for much of it, like homeless veterans. Remember when only one parent had to work? We need affordable housing.

    1. @Kara Bowman The Parties are switching again. The puritanical conservatives are moving to the Democrats and the conservatives are going social libertarian .

    2. @Mark Simpson  no one is trying to take away your liberties. But a civilized society has to have rules and laws, something the right seems to want to pick and choose when convenient. As far as facts, we had people attack our country over a lie about an election result, so where were your “facts” then. The left are snowflakes but we’re not the ones having a nervous breakdown over Peppy La Pew and Mr Potato head. Please spare me with your “facts” when the tinfoil hat party clings to your Jewish laser beams from space Qanon nonsense.

    3. @Mark Simpson yet democratic states are the wealthiest and contribute the most. While republican states take the most. It is an issue across the board. Look up the studies conducted by Bloomberg and Forbes

    4. Housing? Can anyone say gentrification? Urban and suburban developers are simply pricing out all who they consider unworthy of standard living conditions. Money has risen to the top on every level. Why? Because developers don’t have a clue about the meaning of “community.” All they know is bottom line.

  4. Can we get a investor up there with these lines to show how much we pay in taxes how much do the rich pay in taxes and how much their taxes gone down over the years and the reason we were really in a shitstorm in our country only the poor 99% pay their tax the rich 1% do not

    1. This is ridiculous! The top 1% pays 40% of all income taxes! The bottom 50% pay ZERO! And in fact many low income earners not only don’t pay anything – they actually get $$ from Washington through the earned income tax credit!

    2. You don’t know much about the tax structure do you.?? The rich pay the majority of our country’s taxes.. We on the other hand will pay more at the pump, for food and utilities. it ALL trickles down to us in the long run when tax rates are raised.. the goobermint will keep us poor, for the purpose of control.!!

    3. Don’t forget the corporate tax. These companies use all of the infrastructure, rather abuse and don’t pay for.

    4. There are many videos that talk about the topic you want. Just need to search. The top rich people do not pay taxes. They use every trick in the book to not pay taxes. They have avoided billions in taxes along with corporations. I know this from articles and videos that I have researched..

    5. News flash – Joe is giving the rich another tax cut. You should have stuck with Trump. Say goodbye to your job.

  5. Social Security is not related to declining spending on infrastructure. Rattner makes that claim with no evidence. What about bloated military spending and tax cuts for the rich?

    1. @Mark Simpson Amazon paid zero in taxes last year. They have clever accountants who can make taxes go away. Not so much with the working class.

    2. @Mark Simpson Amazon has paid zero in taxes for the past several years. Billionaire Warren Buffett admits to paying a lower tax rate than his secretary. For you to say that the rich are the only ones who pay taxes only shows that you have been brainwashed by the media propaganda from corporate networks owned by billionaires.

    3. @Jon Spitz You realize why that is though right? Amazon pays zero taxes because they reinvest what they are making back into the companies. Bezos was only taking a 1.5m salary as a CEO of the wealthiest company in the world. In fact Amazon was presenting model corporate behavior in that regard. When a company is spending all of its profits on expanding its business then it is creating more and more jobs. This is why the Welfare Democracies have lower corporate tax rates then we do and two to theee times the personal taxes. High corporate taxes strangle their ability to grow their company.

    4. @Mark Simpson reinvest where? there shareholders? Amazon pays zero taxes the richest company in the world pays zero taxes meanwhile single moms who own their own business have to pay both income and business taxes! Make it make sense

  6. The bottom line is that the Biden Plan is for a second New Deal which will get our country up and running again in ways that it desperately needs. The first New Deal was strong enough to kick us out of the Great Depression. It left us strong enough to fight World War 2 and prepare for the post-war recovery. Now, not fully recovered from the Great Recession, America was hit with the COVID pandemic. Even before the recession, obstructionist policies in Washington had allowed the bridges Michigan to begin crumbling with disasterous results for those who tried to drive over or under them. With higher water tables and more frequent flooding, we must upgrade our sewage system capacity. The baby boomers are already within that period of time requiring extraordinary home care. This is the time for all Americans to pay careful attention to who is working with us and who is not. Americans can accomplish anything if we work together toward a common set of goals. We must leave behind any who are unwilling to work along side us.

    1. @THE JACK HQ and the depression might have ended in 1934 or 1935 instead of 1940 and we may have avoided WW2.

    2. @THE JACK HQ China will continue to manipulate their currrency, keep their tax rate lower than the US, pollute to their hearts content, continue using child and slave labor and treat Kerry and Biden like the suckers they are.

    3. @Brian S I’m talking about those that did not have a 401(k) to begin with. Plus, if there was ever to be a market failure, either due to terrorism, a hack that was worse than what Equifax went through, or any other event, this is where Social Security comes into play.

    4. @Brian S I doubt it would have ended that soon. Banking reforms such as Glass-Steagall were needed to ensure that investment and commercial banking were separate, for example.

    5. @Brian S China does devalue their currency, but they have tax rates that are much higher rate at the individual level for the rich at 45%. They pollute but we don’t have to follow that doctrine, so that more of our people can stay alive. And, we can still sanction them for their child labor activities.

  7. GOPs are okay with taxcut to the rich and claim it creates jobs… but when this bill actually creates jobs and the they now say it is a waste of money lol

    1. Trump raised taxes on the rich look it up. If you paid taxes you most likely got a nice tax break. Stop spewing leftist propaganda.

    2. @Brian S where when because it has been said time and time again he brought tax cuts he himself said it with his mouth

    3. @Eme Jay SALT deductions. “Rich” people like me had my state tax write off capped at 10K. That raised my taxes by about 3,000. People richer than me got even a bigger tax increase. Someone that made 200,000 and had a 4 million dollar house in connecticut got a tax increase under Trump by about 8 or 9 thousand dollars. Meanwhile, all the tax brackets under trump had their taxes cut, especially at the lower level. You can easily google “Trump tax cut brackets” and see for yourself and not rely on idiots on TV to tell you what to believe. I want to thank Joe Biden for making rich people like me even richer.

    4. @Eme Jay and another thing, guess what? When Joe says he’s going to punish rich companies and make them pay their fair share, you know what that means? If you have a retirement account, those company stocks will suffer, and worse when Biden raises the corporate tax rate to 28% the US tax rate will be higher than communist china, and only stupid companies will not go back to outsourcing jobs and closing down US operations. It’s common sense stuff.

  8. if you start with a 1.9 trillion $ and slash it before passing how can it still be 1.9 trillion ???

  9. If we are to recoup any of our lost competitiveness in the world economy, we need a heck of a lot more than just roads and bridges. R&D, replaced water lines, mass transit, universal 5G, updated electrical grid, etc are just part of the problem of this failing country. After the great recession we accrued a two trillion dollar short fall on infrastructure spending. There is no such thing as a free lunch. The obscenely rich and corporations need to pay more as their financial interests benefit greatly from good infrastructure.

  10. Go big or go home. We have waited too long to invest in our future as a nation, the cost will only get higher if we put it off again.

    1. Obama, Biden and the Dem’s had “The Summer of Recovery” in 2010, 2011 and 2012.. “No shovel ready jobs”. HUH?? Slo Joe is still looking.!!!

  11. This plan was supposed to roll out 4 years ago after Hillary’s victory but instead we got tax breaks for our yachts and private jets and a few hundred yards of wall. 🤷🏾‍♂️

    1. You failed to mention the economic growth we experienced in 2017, 2018 and again in 2019.. until the China Coof of 2020…

    2. @Richard Batchelder to say it correctly… continued economic growth since 2010. And since you really want to go there, trump had a GDP growth rate about 70% lower than Obama’s (0.95 vs 1.62).

    3. O.A.C. – stop spewing stupid propaganda. Trump raised taxes on rich people who were getting subsidized by red state middle class workers. All middle and lower class had their tax brackets lowered. Look it up.

    4. @O.A.C GDP in 3rd quarter 2020 was 34% in spite of blue states trying to sabatoge the recovery. Biden is riding the tail end of the Trump boom. Enjoy it while it lasts.

  12. If you look at the chart that is up there at about 4:00 it shows somehting very interesting. Prior to about 1986, spending went up at the same time as taxes, roughly. In other words, government spent more when it was making more. However, at the last 2 years of reagan/’s termand for all of Bush 1’s term, spending increased while taxes went down. Then, during clinton, spending went down while taxes went up, resulting in surpluses in the late 1990’s. Then Bush 2 raised spending and lowered taxes again. When he crashed the economy, Obama came in and the GOP-controlled Senate would not allow tax increases, so we spent a bunch of money on the recovery without raising taxes, and due to the crash, tax receipts dropped. After that initial investment, Obama spending decreased and tax receipts increased. Then Trump had his first 3 years, where taxes decreased, and spending was flat, and then he crashed the economy by ignoring the pandemic, and suddenly spending went sky-high.

    The GOP overspends and under earns, and then Democrats come in and earn more and spend less. Who is the party of fiscal responsibility again?

  13. Finally, a President who will take us into the 21st Century. If you travel abroad you quickly learn that we are WAY behind in infrastructure. Go get ’em, Joe B.

    1. Yes, it’s called American exceptionalism. How many of the vaccines were developed by American companies?

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