Plan Includes Provisions Brown has Long Fought for: Overhauling Our Nation’s Infrastructure & Transit Systems, Investing in Affordable Housing, Improving Access to Broadband, Strengthening U.S. Manufacturing, & More
WASHINGTON, D.C. – April 1, 2021 – Today, U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) applauded President Biden’s newly released American Jobs Plan, which includes historic investments in improving our nation’s infrastructure, affordable housing, school facilities, manufacturing and skills training, and more – all while creating good-paying American jobs.
This plan would be paid for by ensuring this country’s largest corporations pay their fair share in taxes and are encouraged to create jobs here at home. A recent study found that 91 Fortune 500 companies paid $0 in federal taxes on U.S. income in 2018, and that the average corporation paid just 8 percent in taxes. Brown has been pushing for major corporations to pay their fair share for years, and believes they should be encouraged to invest in workers here in the U.S rather than shifting jobs and production overseas.
Brown believes we must invest in the people and the communities that make this country work, and he looks forward to working with the Biden Administration to make historic infrastructure and jobs investments a reality.
“This plan rebuilds American infrastructure by putting Ohioans to work at good-paying jobs that cannot be shipped overseas, and positions America to lead the world in the industries of tomorrow. This is an investment in the Ohio towns, neighborhoods, and homes that have been overlooked by Washington and Wall Street for too long,” said Brown.
The American Jobs Plan contains several critical investments that would benefit Ohioans and their communities. The proposal would:
· Fix highways, rebuild bridges, and upgrade ports, airports and transit systems, by:
o Modernizing 20,000 miles of highways, roads, and main-streets
o Repairing the worst 10,000 smaller bridges, providing critical linkages to communities
o Dedicating funds to support ambitious projects that have tangible benefits to the regional or national economy – such funds could help support replacement of the Brent Spence Bridge
o Replacing thousands of buses and rail cars, repairing hundreds of stations, upgrading airports, and expanding transit and rail into new communities
o Creating good manufacturing jobs by producing electric buses to replace 50,000 outdated public transit buses, and at least 20% of the nation’s school bus fleet
· Deliver clean drinking water, a renewed electric grid, and high-speed broadband to all Americans, by:
o Eliminating lead pipes and service lines in our drinking water systems, improving the health of our country’s children and communities of color
o Putting hundreds of thousands of people to work laying thousands of miles of transmission lines and capping hundreds of thousands of orphan oil and gas wells and abandoned mines
o Bringing affordable, reliable, high-speed broadband to every American, including the more than 35 percent of rural Americans who lack access to broadband at minimally acceptable speeds
· Revitalize manufacturing, secure U.S. supply chains, invest in R&D, and train Americans for the jobs of the future, by:
o Ensuring that the best, diverse minds in America are put to work creating the innovations of the future while creating hundreds of thousands of quality jobs today
o Using strong “Buy America” requirements to ensure American workers build and make things in every part of the U.S., and they’re trained for well-paying, middle-class jobs
o Expanding the manufacture of clean energy technology and electric vehicles to create jobs and fight climate change
· Create good-quality jobs that pay prevailing wages in safe and healthy workplaces while ensuring workers have a free and fair choice to organize, join a union, and bargain collectively with their employers, by:
o Ensuring that American taxpayers’ dollars benefit working families and their communities, and not multinational corporations or foreign governments
o Requiring that goods and materials are made in America and shipped on U.S.-flag, U.S.-crewed vessels
o Ensuring that Americans who have endured systemic discrimination and exclusion for generations finally have a fair shot at obtaining good paying jobs and being part of a union
· Build, preserve, and retrofit more than two million homes and commercial buildings, modernize our nation’s schools and child care facilities, and upgrade veterans’ hospitals and federal buildings, by:
o Building, rehabilitating, and retrofitting affordable, accessible, energy efficient, and resilient housing, commercial buildings, schools, and child care facilities all over the country, while also vastly improving our nation’s federal facilities, especially those that serve veterans
· Solidify the infrastructure of our care economy by creating jobs and raising wages and benefits for essential home care workers, the majority of whom are women of color, by:
o Making substantial investments in the infrastructure of our care economy by investing in our caregiving economy workers
o Ensuring home and community-based care options for older adults and individuals with disabilities