Biden unveils massive $7.3T budget with $5.5T in tax hikes, plans for ‘highest burden’ in US history
President Biden unveiled his election-year budget pitch Monday, calling for $5.5 trillion in tax increases by raising rates on the wealthy and corporations — while spending $7.3 trillion on defense, federal benefit programs, affordable housing and student debt cancellation, among other proposals.
The fiscal year 2025 budget — which is highly unlikely to be approved by Congress — matches last year’s topline tax increase level and spends $300 billion more while purportedly cutting the federal deficit by $3 trillion over the next 10 years, the White House said on Monday.
Fiscal hawks and Republicans alike were quick to call out the administration for the “reckless spending.”
The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (CRFB) noted the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) estimates project the national debt would surge to $45.1 trillion — or 105.6% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) — by 2034 under the plan, up from $27.4 trillion.
Brian Riedl, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute focusing on the budget and taxes, told The Post on Monday that the president’s proposals would saddle the US with “the highest sustained income tax burden in American history as a share of the economy.”
“The president isn’t simply raising taxes to close the deficit, he’s raising it to expand government,” Riedl said after having called Biden’s budget last year “the highest peacetime burden in American history.”
In a Friday interview before the budget dropped, Riedl added that the proposals amount to “even bigger tax hikes down the road when it’s time to rein in the deficit.”
“The price tag of President Biden’s proposed budget is yet another glaring reminder of this Administration’s insatiable appetite for reckless spending and the Democrats’ disregard for fiscal responsibility,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and other GOP leaders said in a statement.
