Vice President Kamala Harris is out with a string of new economic proposals focused on food prices, taxes, housing and medical costs that she says will empower the middle class.
The plans constitute the first major policy proposals that Harris has released in the nearly four weeks since President Joe Biden bowed out of the race and endorsed his vice president.
A look at what Harris is proposing:
Food prices
After years of polling showing that Americans are worried about inflation, Harris is aiming to contain prices where they have often been most conspicuously felt — at the grocery store. She's promising to, during her first 100 days in office, send Congress proposed federal limits on price increases for food producers and grocers. Harris also is seeking new authority for the Federal Trade Commission and attorneys general in states across the country to enact steeper punishments for violators. She also wants to use government regulators to crack down on mergers and acquisitions among large food industry businesses that the vice president argues have contributed to higher prices.
Housing
Harris is calling for the construction of 3 million new housing units over four years, which she says will ease a "serious housing shortage in America." She also plans to promote legislation creating a new series of tax incentives for builders who construct "starter" homes sold to first-time homebuyers.
She also wants a $40 billion innovation fund — doubling a similar pot of money created by the Biden administration — for businesses building affordable rental housing units. Harris also wants to speed up permitting and review processes to get housing stock to the market more quickly.
Taxes and medical costs
Harris wants to speed up a Biden administration effort that has allowed Medicare and other federal programs to negotiate with drugmakers to lower the cost of prescription medications, aiming to cut the price tags of some of the most expensive and most commonly used drugs by roughly 40% to 80% starting in 2026. She's also promised to promote competition with steps to increase transparency within pharmaceutical company pricing practices.
Harris also pledged to work with state entities to cancel $7 billion of medical debt for up to 3 million qualifying Americans.
The vice president also proposed to make permanent a $3,600 per child tax credit approved through 2025 for eligible families, while offering a new $6,000 tax credit for those with newborn children. She says a Harris administration would work to expand the Earned Income Tax Credit to cut taxes for some frontline workers by up to $1,500 and reduce taxes on healthcare plans offered on the marketplace created by the Affordable Care Act.
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Republished with permission of the Associated Press.
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