Reversing the significant increase in inequality in the United States over the past four decades is critical to boosting overall economic growth, Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo told top business leaders at New York this Monday.
Mr. Adeyemo, in remarks prepared for an Economic Club of New York luncheon, said President Joe Biden’s economic policies have helped the US economy weather the COVID-19 virus pandemic and the Russia’s invasion of Ukraine better than any other advanced economy, with lower inflation rates.
He added that the administration remains focused on reducing inflation and using targeted investments to “unlock the untapped potential of our economy” by revitalizing communities in rural areas and communities of color that have been “left behind.” accounted for or excluded for too long.
Mr. Adeyemo, who also worked at the Treasury under former President Barack Obama at the height of the 2008-2009 recession, noted that average annual salaries of the top 0.1 percent of earners increased more than 16 times faster than those of the 90% of lowest paid people between 1979 and 2021.
“Despite the obvious economic benefits, opportunities are too often concentrated in too few ZIP codes,” he said, adding that increasing investment in rural areas – where one in five Americans live – is essential to our economic growth.
The rapid recovery in the United States from the COVID crisis showed that targeted economic action could unlock supply constraints, prevent economic scarring and combat long-standing disparities, he said.
He said that rising levels of education spurred productivity growth in the second half of the 20th century, and that increased opportunities for black women and men to take up skilled jobs accounted for up to 40% of US GDP growth between 1960 and 2010.
He said the U.S. administration is leveraging significant investments, including $20 billion for rural health care programs under Biden’s American Rescue Plan and $13 billion for measures rural clean energy incentive under the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), to help rural areas that historically experience higher unemployment, higher participation weak labor force and lower wages.
These funds have borne fruit, he said, noting that the gap between the unemployment rate, which was on average 20% higher in rural areas before the pandemic, had been eliminated and wages were increasing .
The administration is also investing about $75 billion to expand rural broadband access, which is expected to help close the rural divide, with 22% of rural Americans lacking access to broadband. adequate, compared to 6% for all Americans.
Early data shows that nearly two-thirds of investments in ERI-related sectors are in counties with above-average poverty rates, 80 percent in counties with higher-than-average graduation rates university is below the national average, and almost 90% in counties where weekly wages are below average, Mr. Adeyemo said.
2023-09-11 14:10:58
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