A Budget For All

by digby

Not that anyone in Washington will pay any attention because it doesn’t insist that average Americans feel pain and deprivation so the “producers” in society are free to pillage create jobs, but here is the one page outline of the new budget from the Progressive Caucus. Like last year, it actually reduces the deficit much more than Paul Ryan’s plan (if anyone actually cares about that.)And it also protects the safety net and stimulates the economy.

It does ask that the obscenely wealthy people kick in a fair piece of their ill-gotten gains and requires the government to stop fighting useless wars. But I have no problem with that. I would be surprised if most people do.

The Budget for All

Budget of the Congressional Progressive Caucus
Fiscal Year 2013

The Budget for All makes the American Dream a reality again. By putting Americans back to work, the
Budget for All enhances our economic competitiveness by rebuilding the middle class and investing in
innovation and education. Our budget protects Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, invests in
America’s future, and asks those who have benefited most from our economy to pay their fair share.

Our Budget Puts Americans Back to Work
Our budget attacks America’s persistently high unemployment levels with more than $2.4 trillion in job-
creating investments. This plan utilizes every tool at the government’s disposal to get our economy
moving again, including:
 Direct hire programs that create a School Improvement Corps, a Park Improvement Corps, and a
Student Jobs Corps, among others.
 Targeted tax incentives that spur clean energy, manufacturing, and cutting-edge technological
investments in the private sector.
 Widespread domestic investments including an infrastructure bank, a $556 billion surface
transportation bill, and approximately $1.7 trillion in widespread domestic investment.

Our Budget Exhibits Fiscal Discipline
 Unlike the Republican budget, the Budget for All substantially reduces the deficit, and does so in a
way that does not devastate what Americans want preserved.
 We achieve these notable benchmarks by focusing on the true drivers of our deficit –
unsustainable tax policies, the wars overseas, and policies that helped cause the recent recession –
rather than putting the middle class’s social safety net on the chopping block.

Our Budget Creates a Fairer America
 Ends tax cuts for the top 2% of Americans on schedule at year’s end
 Extends tax relief for middle class households and the vast majority of Americans
 Creates new tax brackets for millionaires and billionaires, in line with the Buffett Rule principle
 Eliminates the tax code’s preferential treatment of capital gains and dividends
 Abolishes corporate welfare for oil, gas, and coal companies
 Eliminates loopholes that allow businesses to dodge their true tax liability
 Creates a publicly funded federal election system that gets corporate money out of politics for good

Our Budget Brings Our Troops Home
 Responsibly and expeditiously ends our military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan, leaving America
more secure at home and abroad
 Adapts our military to address 21st century threats; through modernization, the Department of
Defense will spend less and stop contributing to our deficit problems

Protects American Families
 Provides a Making Work Pay tax credit for families struggling with high gas and food cost 2013-2015
 Extends Earned Income Tax Credit, the Child and Dependent Care Credit
 Invests in programs to stave off further foreclosures to keep families in their homes
 Invests in our children’s education by increasing Education, Training, and Social Services

It’s really not that hard. If we lived in a sane country it would be passed by acclamation.

But we don’t …