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Democrats’ $3.5 Trillion Socialist Dream Is Tax-and-Spend Nightmare

Beyond spending and taxes, Sen. Bernie Sanders’ budget would bludgeon the Land of the Free into a socialist “workers’ paradise.” Pictured: Sanders, I-Vt., addresses a Washington rally protesting high prescription-drug prices on Sept. 21. (Photo: Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call/Getty Images)

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi plans a vote soon to push Sen. Bernie Sanders’ $3.5 trillion socialist dream budget one step closer to law.

The news gets worse from there. Every other detail about this onerous legislation merits scorn, revulsion, and rejection.

The so-called Build Back Better budget resolution boasts a $3.5 trillion price tag. Taxpayers should be so lucky.

That figure assumes that several key initiatives, including the child tax credit, will expire in three to five years. Since government programs are virtually immortal, this is not wishful thinking. It’s pure fantasy.

Reasonably assuming that these programs grind on for 10 years swells the budget’s true price to $5.5 trillion. Add the Senate’s $1 trillion “infrastructure” bill, which most House Democrats hope to append, and Sanders’ budget hits $6.5 trillion.

Next, blend in $400 billion for interest payments on the exploding national debt. That pushes the “$3.5 trillion” package’s real cost to $6.9 trillion—nearly double its advertised price.

“Bernie’s budget is all about inserting the federal government into the daily lives of all Americans and spending as much money as possible while doing so,” warned Rep. Jason Smith, R-Mo., the ranking member of the House Budget Committee.

Democrats plan to underwrite this bachelor-party-like extravaganza by borrowing from the Chinese Communist Party and by hiking levies on America’s beleaguered taxpayers. Sanders’ budget constitutes the biggest tax increase since 1968—before man walked on the moon.

The Club for Growth Foundation counts $3.6 trillion in new taxes in this measure. Among them:

Add state levies on such enterprises, and U.S. companies would strain beneath the developed world’s highest tax burden. That’s dreadful for American businesses, jobs, and growth, and a boon to this country’s economic rivals.

Beyond spending and taxes, the Sanders budget would bludgeon the Land of the Free into a socialist “workers’ paradise.”

Among its far left social-engineering schemes:

These taxpayer-funded eco-busybodies also would be unionized. And, of course, their union dutifully would kick back a chunk of their members’ mandatory dues into the Democratic Party’s campaign coffers.

“In the face of mounting inflation and economic instability, a rational Congress would enact pro-growth tax and spending reforms that pave the way to a smoother recovery,” Andrew Moylan, the National Taxpayers Union’s executive director said, adding, “Instead, current leaders are marching full speed ahead with the most sweeping expansion in the size and scope of government in decades. It’s like throwing a drowning child an anvil instead of a life preserver.”

The Daily Signal publishes a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Heritage Foundation.


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