President Biden: I’m determined to put an end to trickle-down economics. I look at the economy through the eyes of the people I grew up with in Scranton and Claymont.
Full comments:
Well, guess what? I’m pretty sure you saw in your home what I saw in mine. Not a whole lot of trickle-down ended up on my dad’s kitchen table as he busted his neck. (Applause.) So, we’re changing that.
We’re replacing trickle-down economics with what everyone on Wall Street is referring to these days as “Bidenomics.” And guess what? It’s working. (Applause.)
It’s about building the economy from the middle out and the bottom up, not the top down. (Applause.) Because I’m not — this is not a political statement; this an economic statement. When the middle class does well, everyone does well. (Applause.)
I’m a capitalist. The poor do well. And guess what? You can still be a millionaire or billionaire, except one thing: Pay your taxes. (Applause.) Pay your taxes.
Bidenomics is a blue-collar blueprint for America. It’s for you.
For example, last week we announced the new proposal — a new rule that would extend overtime pay to as many as 3,600,0000 workers. Now it’s about 35 grand — 36 grand before you can get — after that, you don’t get overtime. Well, now it’s 53 grand, man. (Applause.)
And guess what? Is you got a whole lot of people working as the executive assistants, working a hell of a lot more than 40 hours and not getting paid overtime. Now you’re going to get paid overtime. (Applause.)
It would make a big difference for a lot of families.
We did something else that matters a whole lot to folks in this parking lot. We passed the Butch Lewis Act, which protected pensions for millions of union workers. (Applause.)
It’s one of the most significant achievements for union workers and retirees in over 50 years.
And for the folks at home who don’t know why it matters, let me explain. Two to three million union workers, through no fault of their own, after paying into their pension for years, faced painful cuts to benefits they were counting on in retirement.
Why? They were going to [be] left high and dry while companies they worked for didn’t hold up their end of the bargain and finance their end of the bargain. We just couldn’t let that happen.
And, I might add, we got it passed with not a single, solitary Republican vote. Not one voted to sustain these pensions.
