The full text on this page is automatically extracted from the file linked above and may contain errors and inconsistencies.
1/10/2024 Remarks by Secretary of the Treasury Janet L. Yellen at Roxbury Community College in Boston, Massachusetts | U.S. … Remarks by Secretary of the Treasury Janet L. Yellen at Roxbury Community College in Boston, Massachusetts January 10, 2024 As Prepared for Delivery Good a ernoon. Thank you, President Jenkins-Scott, for the introduction. Iʼm very glad to be here in Boston with Governor Healey and Mayor Wu to tour Roxbury Community College and see its groundbreaking energy projects and student training programs. I learned while touring that RCC has a “tri-level renewable solution.” It uses geothermal wells to circulate fluid deep below the ground then push it back up to cool the facility in the summer months. These wells sit below a parking lot with electric vehicle charging stations. And the parking lot sits below a canopy of solar panels that generate energy for the campus. Solutions put in place across the campus are estimated to create savings of up to $800,000 per year for RCC. Those are funds being freed up to better serve students. At the same time, the solutions are shrinking RCCʼs carbon footprint by an estimated over 5 million pounds of carbon dioxide annually. Iʼm here because this is a model for what we are seeing more and more of around the country due to Biden Administration policies: solutions that cut costs— for schools, businesses, and families—while advancing our nationʼs climate and energy security goals. In my remarks today, Iʼll talk about these policies and where theyʼre leading. But first, at the start of this new year, let me step back to talk about how far weʼve come over the past twelve months. Instead of the recession many predicted, during the first three quarters of 2023, annualized growth of the U.S. economy averaged around 3 percent. Inflation is now near 3 percent and the prices of many key goods have fallen, from televisions—down 28 percent from their peak, to used cars and trucks—down 11 percent. Gasoline prices are down too—by around $1.90 per gallon from June 2022. The typical middle-class American household now has more wealth, higher earnings, and more purchasing power than before the pandemic. Because wages have risen more than prices since https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy2019 1/5 1/10/2024 Remarks by Secretary of the Treasury Janet L. Yellen at Roxbury Community College in Boston, Massachusetts | U.S. … 2019, the median family can today buy the same basket of goods and services as in 2019, but now with nearly $1,000 le over to save or spend. Household consumption has also been strong as families put their extra income and accumulated pandemic-era savings back into the economy. This is due to the Biden Administrationʼs policies—beginning with the American Rescue Plan and continuing with a historic trifecta of legislation: the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the CHIPS and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act. But despite how far weʼve come, we know significant work remains to be done. For too many families, prices for goods that matter—such as groceries, rents, and prescription drugs—are high. At the Treasury Department and across the Administration, weʼre using all tools at our disposal to bring these costs down so that families have more breathing room. This starts with healthcare. The Biden Administration has already capped insulin costs for Americans on Medicare at $35 per month, meaning an individual will save $500 per year on average. Weʼre lowering the price of prescription drugs for seniors. Thatʼs estimated to create savings of $400 per year. Energy costs also pose significant challenges for American families, including families in New England. Here in Massachusetts, itʼs estimated that households using natural gas, or over half of Bay State households in 2021, will spend $900 this winter. Households using oil, one in four households in 2021, will spend over $2,000. Using electricity instead of fuel oil to heat your home here can save over $1,000 a year. Using electricity instead of propane can save you more than $800. Thatʼs money parents can use for other daily expenses or put toward their kidsʼ college education or their own retirement. And reliance on gas and oil for heating isnʼt just expensive—itʼs energy insecure. When prices spike due to geopolitical events, consumers are on the hook to pay unless government acts quickly. We saw this in 2022 when Russia invaded Ukraine. The Biden Administration responded rapidly, releasing 180 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and working with a coalition of partners to put in place a novel price cap on Russian oil. This kept global energy markets well-supplied and costs lower than they could have been. But Americans are still vulnerable to future volatility. The pain is o en most acute for lower income and middle-class families, including those living paycheck to paycheck. For them, energy—electricity, heating fuel, and gasoline—account for a significant share of their monthly budgets. An oil price shock can mean choosing whether to put food on the table or https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy2019 2/5 1/10/2024 Remarks by Secretary of the Treasury Janet L. Yellen at Roxbury Community College in Boston, Massachusetts | U.S. … stay warm, while shi ing to clean energy means families will be better shielded from global events and more energy independent. Weʼre working to address energy costs and volatility, including through the Inflation Reduction Act. The IRA is the most important climate and energy law in U.S. history. Itʼs driving changes in how America produces and consumes energy, including through tax incentives. Some of these tax breaks support manufacturers—and theyʼre working, boosting investment in factories across the U.S. that produce solar panels, batteries, and electric vehicles. Other provisions support the deployment of clean power generation—resulting in a record year for solar power plant additions in 2023. Since the start of the Administration, companies have announced over $600 billion in manufacturing and clean energy investments. And over the past year, Iʼve seen these investments firsthand, such as in November, when I traveled to North Carolina to tour the countryʼs largest lithium hydroxide production facility and see new cutting-edge lithium products that will power the domestic electric vehicle supply chain. And because itʼs now cheaper to produce clean energy and manufacture clean energy products here in the United States, production will increase and costs will drop over time. This will make clean energy even more a ordable for American consumers, and for consumers globally. But the IRA is also about lowering costs for American families in the short-term, allowing them to shrink and stabilize their energy bills right away, and itʼs this Iʼd like to talk about now. The IRA provides taxpayers a tax credit of $150 to put toward energy audits of their homes. These assessments can serve as roadmaps for determining where youʼll see the highest rate of return on your energy-e iciency investments—whether thatʼs replacing windows or doors or installing better insulation. You can use other IRA credits to o set up to $1,200 for these improvements. New windows and doors may not be high tech, but they can result in significant, immediate cost savings. You can also discount by up to 30 percent the cost of putting solar panels on your roof or batteries in your garage to store the energy those panels produce. You can get up to $2,000 for installing a heat pump. That allows you to shi from oil or gasbased heat to electricity instead. You can also take advantage of rebates for water heaters, home insulation, and many other energy-e icient home improvements at the time of sale and covering 100 percent of relevant costs for low-income households. This is alongside a generous state program for rebates here in Massachusetts. https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy2019 3/5 1/10/2024 Remarks by Secretary of the Treasury Janet L. Yellen at Roxbury Community College in Boston, Massachusetts | U.S. … The popularity of heat pumps is growing. Heat pump sales exceeded the sales of gas furnaces in the United States in 2022 for the first time. Weʼre also seeing growing demand around the world—including in Eastern Europe, where countries including Poland have sought to reduce their reliance on Russian-supplied gas. As the IRAʼs incentives drive down costs of clean energy technologies over time, theyʼll help our allies and trading partners continue making progress toward meeting their climate, energy security, and a ordability goals, too. Beyond energy, you can save up to $7,500 when purchasing an electric vehicle. And for these credits, thereʼs no lifetime limit: for the home energy credits in particular, you can claim the credit every year you make improvements for the next decade. And Iʼll briefly mention thereʼs support not just for households, but for others, from incentives for landlords and developers for energy-e iciency improvements to certain multifamily buildings to funds for states and local governments to update building codes. We know itʼs not enough merely to create credits, so weʼre also working to make accessing them as easy as possible. For example, starting just last week, consumers can transfer their clean vehicle credit to the dealer in exchange for a discount when they buy their car. This means you donʼt have to wait to claim the credit on your tax return—you get an upfront downpayment. Thanks to IRA funding, access to credits will also be supported by the massive modernization of the Internal Revenue Service, which is helping taxpayers get the support they need. This filing season, which starts next week, increased support to taxpayers will include call lines with wait times of five minutes or less and expanded in-person assistance at centers around the country. Iʼll end by addressing another exciting development I saw here at Roxbury Community College today, one thatʼs also at the heart of President Bidenʼs economic agenda. Building our cleanenergy future requires a skilled workforce, and RCCʼs Center for Smart Building Technology provides training so students can green the buildings of the future with technologies that are environmentally sustainable and low cost. Similar programs are increasingly emerging at community colleges across the country, and beyond community colleges, as I saw when I visited the IBEW training center in Nevada last summer on the one-year anniversary of the IRAʼs passage. This focus on workforce development reflects President Bidenʼs commitment to building our economy from the middle out and bottom up. You shouldnʼt need a four-year college degree https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy2019 4/5 1/10/2024 Remarks by Secretary of the Treasury Janet L. Yellen at Roxbury Community College in Boston, Massachusetts | U.S. … to support your family. IRA-related investments are going to the communities that need them most—communities that have historically been le behind—creating jobs for workers who may not have college degrees. And through IRA provisions like the prevailing wage and apprenticeship requirements and this Administrationʼs support to unions, weʼre fighting to make sure these jobs are good ones. Being here today is inspiring. The Inflation Reduction Act makes what happened at Roxbury Community College—cost savings that also propel us toward a clean energy future—possible, for Massachusetts residents and for middle-class Americans across the country. Weʼve already driven a historic recovery, and now weʼre focused on easing financial pressures on American families. The IRA provides us with a pathway to do just that, and I look forward to seeing the transformation itʼll drive. ### https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy2019 5/5
@FedFRASER