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“President Joe Biden and top U.S. congressional Republican Kevin McCarthy on Wednesday underscored their determination to reach a deal soon to raise the federal government's $31.4 trillion debt ceiling and avoid an economically catastrophic default. After a monthslong standoff, the Democratic president and the speaker of the House of Representatives on Tuesday agreed to negotiate directly on a deal.” Reuters
“Work requirements for federal aid programs have emerged as a sticking point in ongoing negotiations over raising the nation’s debt ceiling… Legislation passed by the House in April would impose new or expanded work requirements for three federal programs — the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the food aid formerly known as food stamps; Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, which offers aid to low-income families with children; and Medicaid assistance for adults without dependents.” AP News
Here’s our prior coverage of the debt limit. The Flip Side
The right argues that debt limit compromises are part of the political process, and supports increasing work requirements for federal aid programs.
“The House Republicans’ insistence on negotiations and compromise is not hostage taking. It is the ordinary stuff of politics. The two sides can posture all they want, but in the end, Congress and the president have to reach an agreement. That is not a bad thing. It is a good thing. The Constitution does not permit a unilateral solution on either side…
“Mr. Biden has only one real choice if he wishes to avoid default: He has to negotiate with Congress, the branch of the government with authority over borrowing and spending. If that means agreeing to spending reductions, that is hardly a disaster. That is what previous presidents have done; indeed, as vice president, he negotiated just such a deal between President Barack Obama and Congress. The idea that the 14th Amendment gives the president unilateral power to borrow is dangerous nonsense.”
Michael W. McConnell, New York Times
“The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program currently stipulates 20 hours per week of work or training for able-bodied adults under age 50 without children. Those who don’t comply can only receive benefits for three months out of every 36…
“House Republicans want to raise the age requirement to 55. The bill would also crack down on states that water down the requirements with exemptions. Decide for yourself if a part-time work program aimed at able-bodied men without children at home constitutes taking ‘food out of the mouths of kids,’ as House Democrat Pete Aguilar said…
“‘They’re coming for the children. They’re coming for the poor. They’re coming for the sick, the elderly and the disabled,’ Democrat John Lewis wailed on the House floor in the 1995. He was wrong about that 1996 welfare reform, which included a work requirement and has been an engine for upward mobility. By one analysis, single-parent household poverty fell more than 60% between 1995 and 2016.”
Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal
“The president is no doubt also sensitive to polling that shows that, while Congressional Republicans are pushing current pro-work policies, significant majorities in key states and in both parties support work requirements for taxpayer-funded benefits…
“In April, almost 80 percent of Wisconsin voters approved a ballot measure that said welfare recipients should at least search for work to receive taxpayer-funded benefits. And in February, a YouGov poll found that two-thirds of Americans—including 64 percent of Democrats—support expecting able-bodied welfare recipients to participate in work or training in exchange for benefits…
“Liberal Democrats in safely blue House and Senate seats may be comfortable ignoring such popular sentiments. But President Biden, who is running one last time across an ideologically diverse country, appears to sense he lacks the luxury of their handwringing over such widely supported policies.”
Matt Weidinger, American Enterprise Institute
The left criticizes the use of the debt limit to demand concessions, and opposes increasing work requirements for federal aid programs.
The left criticizes the use of the debt limit to demand concessions, and opposes increasing work requirements for federal aid programs.
“All we’ve seen from Biden officials since the House changed hands has been a combination of assertions that a U.S. default would be catastrophic — which may well be true — and denigration of any and all possible end runs around the debt ceiling. My heart sank, for example, when Janet Yellen, the Treasury secretary, repeatedly rejected the idea of minting a platinum coin — one of several possible ways to bypass the debt limit — as a ‘gimmick.’…
“The economic merits of various unconventional financing strategies aside, think about how the White House was positioning itself politically. On one side, it signaled that it was terrified of the consequences of default; on the other, it made it clear that it was unwilling even to consider any alternatives to an increase in the debt limit. The administration might as well have put a sign on its back saying ‘Kick Me.’…
“Now that Republicans see what seems to be an administration on the run, there’s every reason to expect them to keep escalating their immediate demands.”
Paul Krugman, New York Times
“All available evidence indicates that the GOP’s proposals would yield negligible impacts on employment at the cost of cutting off health care and food aid to hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of working, low-income Americans because of missed paperwork and bureaucratic errors…
“The House GOP’s most egregious proposal is to append work requirements to Medicaid. On a theoretical level, it is difficult to see why denying someone access to basic medical care would render them more capable of contributing to the economy. The idea that many Americans are choosing not to work because they can get a check-up for free is quite strange…
“This is a solution in search of a problem. The labor-force participation rate among workers ages 25 to 54 is currently at its highest level since the 2008 financial crisis. And even if Americans in their early 50s were shirking work en masse, there is no evidence that appending work requirements to SNAP would significantly increase their workforce participation. Research from the Urban Institute shows the past imposition of work requirements and time limits did not meaningfully increase beneficiaries’ earnings or employment.”
Eric Levitz, New York Magazine
“Many of the savings [Republicans] demand in return for a higher debt ceiling would come from killing the landmark clean energy initiatives President Biden achieved just nine months ago, and which already have set off a ‘gold rush’ of job-creating investments…
“In April, McCarthy crowed that the House debt limit bill, by repealing clean energy credits, would ‘end the green giveaways for companies that distort the market and waste taxpayers’ money.’ Ever the hypocrite, he proposed to expand the corporate welfare that oil and gas producers have enjoyed for decades.”
Jackie Calmes, Los Angeles Times
