President Barack Obama unveiled the new proposal for the national budget on Monday, February 13. The 2013 budget would be $3.8

trillion, and the President has big plans to match that big number.

The proposal includes heightened taxes on the rich. Around $1.5 trillion will be collected from the wealthiest in America. Thus, President Obama would be successfully ending Bush’s tax cuts for the rich. Also in the plan is the idea of creating jobs now and worrying about the issues surrounding the deficit when the unemployment rate is significantly lower than its current 8.3 percent.

The Obama Administration has made great strides in reducing the unemployment rate to this number and is hopeful for its continual decline in the not-so-distant future. The President also faces a significant challenge in his re-election campaign because of this issue, with the last incumbent president to be re-elected with a national unemployment over 7.2 percent was FDR.

The 2013 budget would also spend billions of dollars on issues close to home, such as infrastructure, education, and domestic production. As far as education is concerned, $30 billion would be dedicated to hire and retain teachers, and another $30 billion would go to the modernization of schools. Also, there would be an extension of long-term unemployment benefits and one for the payroll tax cut currently in place. Hundreds of billions of dollars will also be cut in the areas Medicare and Medicaid. President Obama commented on the hopeful rise of domestic production by saying “the time for self-inflicted wounds to our economy has to be over.”

The GOP is naturally in disapproval to the President’s plan. The Chairman of the Republican National Committee, Reince Priebus, has called him a hypocrite who is “threatening our children’s future” by not decreasing the deficit immediately. November will show whether the GOP is going to have the final say on this issue.