US President Joe Biden warned on Wednesday that the United States is losing its global leadership position and is being eclipsed by other countries due to underinvestment and defended his infrastructure plan as a way to restore supremacy.
“There is a new book out about how we have fallen behind. America is no longer leader of the world because we are not investing. It used to be we invested almost 2.7 percent of our GDP in infrastructure, now it is about 0.7 percent. We were investing and we were the leader in the world,” Biden said in a televised address.
Biden unveiled earlier a $2.3 trillion program to upgrade aging US infrastructures with a controversial corporate tax hike proposed to fund expenses.
“We are the only, (one of) few major economies in the world whose public investment in research and development has declined as a percentage of GDP in the last 25 years. The United States of America! That led the world,” Biden said.
“Do you think the rest of the world is waiting around?.. Do you think China is waiting around for us to invest in digital infrastructure or in research and development? I promise you they are not waiting, but they are counting on American democracy to be too slow, too limited and too divided to keep pace,” he added.
Biden invited the Republican opposition to consultations over details of his plan including its funding sources.
