Third Way: Looking For Roosevelt; Biden's New Deal
Drew Angerer
In the early summer, Democratic Candidate Joe Biden may have not looked much Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He had just begun to hunker down in his basement for a quiet 2020 election campaign (one that resembled McKinely's) while his opponent, President Donald Trump, rallied around the country.
Now, Biden is predicted to win the election by strong margins. As the summer continued, Biden began to show not just why he was better than Trump, but how he could spearhead American reinvention. Biden even invoked the legacy of FDR, comparing the current recession to the Great Depression. By August, he was beginning to match his predecessor's posture, and the DNC only further indicated this shift. It was a celebration of the broad-church appeal the Democratic Party is aiming for in 2020, something that FDR was able to broker in 1932.
Naturally, the analogy is not perfect. Big business openly worked against FDR's candidacy, but now supports Biden. Biden also has no plans to totally re-make the American economy, as FDR felt the need to do. Yet, these differences do not disprove the analogous connection. The comparison fits the scale of the crisis and gives meaning to the possible successes of a Biden presidency.
Biden still needs to prove his worth. His plan is bold, but it lacks the ambition the New Deal captured. Biden also faces a different American political environment with a non-compliant Senate. The comparison to FDR, while apt in terms of policy, is tempered by Biden's own pragmatism and caution. Framing his plan in terms of the New Deal, however, goes to show how much he hopes to accomplish.
Both Democrats sought to utilize relief plans, spurred by the belief that their respective crises required a greater national-level response. FDR established the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) in 1933, which expanded the state-level relief policies of the Hoover Administration and made cash allocations directly available to states who needed it. FERA also enacted federal government oversight of relief efforts across the country, putting the national government at the helm of recovery instead of states. The Civil Works Administration (CWA), another major part of immediate relief, spent roughly $1B on public works projects in the span of four months, creating jobs and pumping money into the economy. The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) came with all of this too, putting 300,000 young men to work to deal with unemployment.
Biden faces a similar crisis. Before he can tackle the economic recession plaguing the country, he must deal with the plague. His plan entails taking similar steps to FDR: enacting federal oversight of the crisis, increasing mask production, enforcing nationwide guidance, and ramping up testing. Biden is calling for a U.S. Public Health Jobs Corps to enlist 100,000 young people to assist medical workers with Covid-19 related challenges, similar to the CCC. Biden even analogizes FDR's War Production Board of the Second New Deal for his plans to massively increase American testing output.
The most well-known aspect of the New Deal was FDR's infrastructure and industry agenda, which created dozens of programs to refurbish infrastructure and industry. Two stand out in relief to Biden. The first, the Public Works Administration (PWA), allocated money to states and local governments who then paid private contractors to stimulate the labor and construction job markets. This program ultimately created 34,000 new infrastructure projects. In contrast, the Works Progress Administration (WPA) of 1935 employed people directly in a diverse range of roles.
The aim of creating more jobs through infrastructure renovation and construction is a strategy Biden employs as well. His plan for green infrastructure calls for the upgrading of houses, buildings, bridges, and more to be made modern, sustainable, and technologically innovative. A $2T investment is intended to spur American manufacturing jobs too, a sector where job numbers have contracted despite American industry output increasing in recent years.
Yet, Biden’s plan to boost the American economy comes after Trumpian trade tactics, some of which the Democratic Candidate will keep in place. That protectionism is juxtaposed to FDR's liberalization of the American global economy, which he made law in the 1934 Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act (RTAA). Removing the tariffs of Trump sooner may help the global and American economy recover from Covid-19. Overall, this issue is emblematic of the caution which holds Biden's plan back.
A less-discussed aspect of the New Deal is its impact on education. Multiple programs increased affordable education for students during the Depression. Those were coupled with programs designed to increase the young workforce. In December 1933, an education component was added to the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). Two years later, FDR issued an executive order creating the National Youth Administration which, with a total expenditure of $662 million, prevented children from dropping out of school by financing their educations with part-time jobs. The secondary goal of the NYA was to provide long-term employment training, creating a strong workforce and curbing unemployment.
Joe Biden's Proposed Spending, 2021-2030
The Biden Plan for education is strikingly similar to the NYA. Biden plans on allocating $50B in workforce training programs to increase one’s employability, while also investing heavily in community-colleges, intending to make the first two years of community college tuition-free. Potential first-lady Dr Jill Biden, a champion of community-college policy, echoes Eleanor Roosevelt's own commitment to educating the youth for the workforce. If successful, these First New Deal-style plans (among others) would allow Biden to not only establish Democratic popularity, but also increase American strength.
Sealing The Deal
What sets the Biden Plan and the New Deal apart from other Democratic agendas is their massive scale. Their sweeping agendas and ambition could only come at historic lows in America. Yet, the Biden Plan is not revolutionary, rather the status-quo pushed a bit to the left. Much of what Biden is campaigning for has already been realized in most Western countries.
While FDR had occasional opposition in Congress, specifically regarding court-packing and the price of the Second New Deal, he went 12 years without deadlocked Houses. It is often forgotten that, in 1932 the Democrats won 97 new House seats and 12 Senate seats from the Republicans, without losing any of their own. That gave the Democrats a three-fifths majority in the Senate, allowing them to pass most of the First New Deal.
The Senate is predicted to be blue in 2020, but only by a slim majority. For a Biden presidency to make a serious change, he would also have to severely limit the filibuster. While the demographics indicate this would be better for the democrats in the long-run, eliminating the filibuster would make the current partisan battles a nuclear war. It would also only be possible with 60 democratic Senate seats.
Even without the Senate potentially biting his ankles, Biden's plan lacks the creative destruction that is beginning to shape a new American identity, much like the New Deal molded the New Deal coalition. Biden's combination of public and private not only has potential, but also appeals to moderate Republicans. For a President seeking unity, an explosion of progressivism would only cause further polarization.
Biden, then, is justified in distancing his agenda from the Green New Deal. The scope of his plan is much wider than the 14-page resolution of the progressives, while its restraint is emblematic of his centrist instincts. The pragmatism of Biden is still to be lauded. It has got him far in his political career, even when it has not resulted in the best policy decisions. He should remember, however, that the current crisis is on par with the one FDR handled 90 years ago.
FDR was practical, but experimental with his programs, something Biden seems less willing to attempt. Faced with the gargantuan job of restoring America, Biden has told America he is up to the task. For his last performance in politics, he needs to channel that ambition and prove it.
