Thread by @senrobportman

I have long believed in and advocated for investing more in our nation’s infrastructure, including modernizing our roads, bridges, transit, ports and more. But we should focus on our core infrastructure needs to help grow our economy.

President Biden’s massive $2.7 trillion “infrastructure” plan is filled with broad policy priorities that are a far cry from what has ever been defined as infrastructure, by either Democrats or Republicans.

The Biden plan costs about $2.7 trillion, but only about $600 billion is directed toward traditional infrastructure like roads, bridges, transit, rail, and ports. That’s just 20% of the overall plan.

Moreover, just $115 billion goes towards our nation’s roads and bridges. That’s less than 5%. It spends more on nursing homes ($400 billion) and schools and daycare ($137 billion) than it does on roads and bridges.

To help pay for his “infrastructure” plan, @POTUS is proposing one of the biggest tax hikes in American history, totaling roughly $2.1 trillion. These tax increases will lower wages, undermine economic growth, make America less competitive & hurt our economy.

Under the Biden tax plan, US businesses would pay a combined tax rate of 32.8% - that is by far the highest rate in the developed world. This would hurt our economy, send businesses overseas and stifle investment in our cities and communities.

In 2017, we lowered business tax rates to level the playing field and make the United States competitive once again. The results were incredible. $1.6T in overseas earnings came back home to invest & create #jobs here.

The largest US companies increased domestic R&D spending by 25% ($707B) and capital expenditures by 20% ($1.438 trillion). All of this led to job creation, wage growth and economic prosperity. The unemployment rate plummeted to 3.5% and we saw the lowest poverty rate on record.

CBO has estimated that 70% of corporate tax increases are paid by workers. Why would we want to put in place policies that lead to less U.S. investment & fewer jobs at a time when the global economy is more competitive than ever before?

Even with the added infrastructure, the Penn-Wharton Model projects that @POTUS’s tax plan would result in about a 1% reduction in GDP and a 0.7% drop in wages by 2031 over current projections.budgetmodel.wharton.upenn.edu/issues/2021/4/…

There is a far better way for us to go about this. Let’s pursue a bipartisan approach focused on what we have all agreed is infrastructure – roads, bridges, ports, rail, broadband, other true infrastructure.