Since 1977, Congress has only passed all its required federal spending bills four times and in no year since 1997. It missed multiple deadlines this fall ranging from transportation to defense, debt ceiling and, of course, the federal spending legislation known as appropriations. In December, Washington is again racing the clock, and  they buy themselves more time when it runs out. Congress passed a law extending temporary funding for government operations into February, well past the end of fiscal year on September 30, having already extended the government shutdown showdown to December 3.

As expected, the legal challenges flooded in against OSHA’s Federal Vaccine mandate for employers with 100 or more workers after the Department of Labor published the Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) on November 5.

OSHA recently issued an Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) mandating that employers with 100 or more workers implement a vaccine mandate and/or testing policy by Jan. 4, 2022, with mask and other requirements for other unvaccinated workers taking effect Dec. 5, 2021.

While negotiations in Washington, D.C. continue over tax rates, it looks increasingly unlikely Senate Democrats will have the votes to raise the C-Corporation rate from 21% to at least 25%, as planned.

On October 4, U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai gave a speech outlining the next steps the U.S. would take on trade policy related to China following an eight-month review.

You do not have to be a baseball fan to appreciate one of Yogi Berra’s “isms”: “It’s getting late early.” Nor do you have to be an elected Democrat sitting on Capitol Hill, or in the Oval Office for that matter, to know that the political party is facing significant deadlines in the coming week that affect trillions of dollars and millions of Americans.

On September 9, President Biden announced that he would direct OSHA to mandate employers with 100 or more workers to ensure their workforce is fully vaccinated or require any workers who remain unvaccinated to produce a negative test result on at least a weekly basis before coming to work.

If you had two weeks to decide how to spend $3.5 trillion, what would you do? That is the question lawmakers face as the U.S. House marches toward a self-imposed September 15 deadline to allocate a massive amount of spending to programs and projects across the country. Within this two-week time frame, tax writers must also decide on whom to raise those taxes and by how much.

The U.S. Congress is moving massive legislation investing possibly over $4 trillion in roads, bridges, ports and expanded social programs in two bills referred to as “hard infrastructure” and “human infrastructure.” This begs the question: Who pays the bill and when? 

On Sunday evening, August 1, a group of 10 Senators comprised equally of five Republicans and Democrats released the 2,702-page Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, spending $1 trillion over eight years.