Today, Rep. Cindy Axne (IA-03) voted to advance a comprehensive bill that will cut taxes and lower costs for Iowa’s working families and create 1.5 million new jobs by 2025.
The bill includes Rep. Axne’s priorities of investing in affordable child care, reducing prescription drug costs, biofuels infrastructure, career skills training programs, clean energy, affordable housing, and improved support for older Iowans and their families.
The bill also delivers middle-class tax cuts by extending vital programs like the expanded Child Tax Credit and Earned Income Tax Credit – and protects families and farmers from tax changes that Rep. Axne opposed throughout the drafting process.
“From my first day in Congress, I promised to fight to secure policies that will help middle class Iowans. And with this vote today, I’m keeping that promise by helping pass a bill that will benefit Iowa’s workers and their families, our seniors and children, and our local economies,” said Rep. Axne. “The Build Back Better Act is one of the largest middle class tax cuts in history, and invests in Iowa’s communities to create new jobs and new opportunities. It will lower prescription drug costs, make education and housing more accessible, and help you care for your family members. And we’re doing all of this while also not raising taxes on Iowa’s middle class families — rebalancing an unequal playing field that for too long has seen the largest corporations in our nation paying next to nothing in taxes while you play by the rules and fight to make ends meet.”
A recent report by Moody’s Analytics found that the Build Back Better Act will create 1.5 million jobs by 2025. When combined with the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which was signed into law on Monday, the two bills together will create more than 2.4 million jobs over the same period of time.
Key Provisions of the Build Back Better Act:
Supports New Jobs and Economic Growth
- Supports working families by increasing access to affordable child care through grants to help states improve child care options and bolster the child care workforce, and caps families’ child care costs at 7% of their income for families earning up to 250% of Iowa’s median income – more than 90% of Iowa’s families.
- Rep. Axne has advocated for direct funding to create new child care centers in Iowa, where a quarter of Iowa families live in an area without a child care option.
- Invests $1 billion in biofuel infrastructure to expand use of biofuels nationwide, an investment championed by Rep. Axne that is projected to put $400 million into the pockets of Iowa farmers.
- The Build Back Better Act also extends the biodiesel tax credit for four years, another priority for Axne that she championed through standalone legislation earlier this year.
- It also ensures Iowa’s biofuels industry can find new markets through innovations in sustainable aviation fuel.
- Guarantees universal access to preschool for three- and four-year-olds to invest in the success of future generations while helping working families with young children.
- Only 18 percent of the 70,954 Iowa children eligible for preschool have access to a publicly funded option. Private preschool can cost families around $8,600 a year.
- Expands job training programs to help workers secure good-paying jobs, increasing the Department of Labor’s budget by 50% for the next five years.
- Creates a new Rural Partnership Program to aid small rural communities in community and economic development.
- Makes the largest-ever investment in combating climate change and investing in clean energy – investments that are predicted to cut emissions by 20% by 2030, reduce energy costs, give Iowa kids cleaner air and water, and create thousands of high-quality clean energy jobs.
- Also funds the Rural Energy for America Program (REAP) to provide grants to farmers and small businesses for energy efficiency upgrades on their operations.
- Provides a one-year extension of the expanded Child Tax Credit, which is already delivering a monthly tax cut of up to $300 per child to more than 80% of Iowa’s families and injecting more than $157 million a month into Iowa’s economy.
- Continues the expanded Affordable Care Act (ACA) tax credits originally provided through the American Rescue Plan — a benefit that has already cut premiums in half for Iowans on Healthcare.gov plans, delivering an average savings of $876.
- Extends the expanded Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) to reduce tax burdens on childless workers, a tax cut benefiting 171,000 Iowans.
- Lowers prescription drug costs by allowing Medicare to negotiate lower prices for drugs prescribed at both the doctor’s office and the pharmacy, capping the monthly cost of insulin at $35, capping out-of-pocket drug costs for Iowa seniors at $2,000 a year, and imposing penalties on drug companies that increase prices faster than inflation.
- Increases the maximum Pell Grant by $550 to support the 48,120 students in Iowa who rely on Pell to complete secondary and vocational education.
- Expands Medicare to cover hearing services for more than 600,000 older Iowans.
- Provides up to 4 weeks of paid leave for workers or parents dealing with personal or family-related medical issues.
- Delivers better care for older Iowans and people with disabilities by expanding Medicaid coverage for home care services, with a $150 billion investment in care to help Americans who are struggling to meet their home care needs (four hours of care per week costs on average $5,800 annually) and those who are still on waiting lists for services.
- More than 47,000 Iowans receive home and community-based services (HCBS) through Medicaid, with a waiting list of an additional 6,500 Iowans requesting HCBS care.
- Paves the way for more than $400 million of investments in affordable housing for Iowa, crafted with the help of Rep. Axne through the House Financial Services Committee, and to build or repair 1 million homes nationwide.
- The bill includes language proposed by Rep. Axne that will enable non-profits and other entities to purchase manufactured housing communities (MHCs) to preserve their affordability, and provides $5 billion to address lead paint and other health hazards.
- The bill also invests $2 billion for the construction and upkeep of rural affordable housing through the U.S. Department of Agriculture, an effort championed by Rep. Axne.
“This bill has a clear objective: helping middle class Iowans who work hard every year, pay their bills, and play by the rules. For them, we’re cutting taxes, lowering costs, and investing in their futures and the futures of their children,” Rep. Axne added. “And we responsibly cover the costs of these investments by ensuring that the wealthiest and largest corporations in our country – many of whom pay far less than the average Iowan – finally start paying their fair share for these investments. And I successfully ensured that potentially harmful tax changes were not included in this bill – to ensure Iowa sees the benefits without incurring extra, unintended costs.”
The legislation includes no changes to the ‘stepped-up basis’ provision in capital gains tax law and does not require banks to report account information to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
Earlier this year, Rep. Axne led an effort to protect family farmers from unintended tax burdens that might have resulted from changes to capital gains taxes.
Axne also ensured that a tax reporting rule proposed earlier in the drafting process was not included in the final text
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