A Progressive Case for the Inflation Reduction Act
By Rep. Pramila Jayapal (WA-07)
After more than a year of negotiations, Senate Democrats finally passed a historic reconciliation bill. The Inflation Reduction Act lowers health care costs, begins to ensure that corporations pay their fair share, and makes the largest-ever federal investment to tackle the existential threat of climate change. While we’re heartbroken to see the care economy, housing, and immigration left on the cutting room floor, we should be very clear that the Inflation Reduction Act takes real steps forward on key progressive priorities. Progressives in Congress and movements across the country should feel very proud of our part in getting to this point: had progressives not held the line a year ago, insisting on real negotiations and an actual Build Back Better bill passing the House, we would not be where we are. Major pieces of that bill are now in the Inflation Reduction Act — about to become law. It’s an achievement we can all feel excited about — especially when we dig into the details.
The bill will put the United States on track to cut carbon pollution by 40 percent by 2030 through rapidly accelerating the adoption of renewable energy technologies such as electric vehicles, heat pumps, and solar panels, saving the average family $1,025 a year in energy costs and creating 9 million good jobs. It includes roughly $60 billion for environmental justice going to frontline communities. The bill allows nonprofit and public utilities, for the first time, to receive direct payments from the federal government to rapidly adopt renewable energy production, and invests billions so utilities and rural co-ops can retire coal-fired power plants, improving air quality for frontline communities and saving lives.
Progressives have been clear: we don’t support the provisions that expand fossil fuel leasing — but critically, independent analyses show that their limited impact will be far outweighed by the bill’s carbon emissions cuts. Under a worst-case scenario, the Inflation Reduction Act will remove 24 tons of pollution for every ton produced by new oil and gas leases.
When we pass the Inflation Reduction Act Friday, 13 million people will immediately see their affordable health insurance coverage extended. The bill will cap seniors’ yearly drug costs at $2,000 per year, and insulin at $35 per month for those on Medicare. For the first time ever, Medicare can begin negotiating prices for a small group of drugs that expands over time. After years of fighting for legislation to take on Big Pharma, Democrats are standing up to one of the nation’s richest and most powerful lobbying forces.
In a win for progressive economic policy, the investments in this bill are paid for by finally beginning to make the wealthy pay their fair share. The bill imposes a 15 percent minimum tax on corporations, taxes corporations that inflate their share values through stock buybacks, and invests in the IRS to go after large corporations and wealthy individuals (those who make over $400,000 per year) who evade taxes. As President Biden promised, the bill won’t raise taxes on any family making less than $400,000 per year.
This isn’t just good policy — the Inflation Reduction Act has overwhelming public support. Polling from Data for Progress finds that 73% of Americans support the bill, including majorities of Democrats, Independents, and Republicans. The majority of Democrats and Independents support the climate provisions of this bill — and for many of the clean energy components, so do the majority of Republicans. The majority of all Americans are more likely to support the bill when they hear about its carbon-pollution-cutting power.
At a time when people are looking for their elected representatives to deliver, the Inflation Reduction Act allows Congress to do just that.
It’s important to note that not a single Republican voted for the Inflation Reduction Act. 43 Republicans voted against an amendment to extend the $35 cap for insulin to those on private insurance. Senator Schumer has promised to bring back that legislation for another vote — and we need to ensure those benefits extend to those who are uninsured.
What’s more: we’ll soon not only have delivered the important investments in the Inflation Reduction Act, but we’ve already won the argument and drafted the legislation that 99% of Democrats in Congress and the majority of the American people support: for universal childcare, pre-K, housing, paid family leave and education and workforce investments. If we can expand our majority in the Senate this November, we will be ready to immediately pass that next piece of the President’s life-changing agenda, delivering long-overdue investments that will allow Americans not just to survive, but thrive.
There is much more work to do to fight the climate crisis and protect the white, Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities that are on the frontlines of disaster from the worst extreme weather, and to provide a roadmap to citizenship for Dreamers, farmworkers, undocumented Americans, and other people waiting in limbo. We’ll continue to push for Congress to take on Big Oil, Big Pharma, and the moneyed interests that continue to take advantage of the tax system.
The Inflation Reduction Act has opened the door to real progress. Progressives in Congress intend to vote to pass it this week, and then charge through that open door to continue the fight for working people.
Representative Pramila Jayapal represents Washington’s 7th Congressional District and is the Chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.