NAMED NATIONAL FOUR-YEAR DAILY NEWSPAPER OF THE YEAR FOR 2020-21 IN THE COLLEGE MEDIA ASSOCIATION’S PINNACLE AWARDS
Wednesday, Feb. 8, 2023
Volume 160 No. 6 SERVING SAN JOSE STATE UNIVERSITY SINCE 1934
WWW.SJSUNEWS.COM/SPARTAN_DAILY
Biden discusses future plans for U.S. By Alina Ta
STAFF WRITER
President Joe Biden held his second State of the Union Address in Washington D.C. on Tuesday. The president discussed his accomplishments during his first two years of his presidency and his goals for his last year in office.
Coronavirus: One of the first accomplishments Biden talked about in his Address was his administration’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. Biden reminded Americans what it was like at the beginning of his administration’s response. The number of weekly cases when Biden took over in January of 2021 was at 1,381,646 cases. As of Feb. 1, the number of weekly cases had dropped to 280,911 cases, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Biden said the death rate for COVID-19 has decreased by 90%. He said schools and businesses were shut down, but wanted Americans to “recognize how far we came in the fight against the pandemic.” Biden said because of these achievements, the country was able to reopen and end the COVID-19 pandemic. Many early COVID-19 policies such as masking and caps on large gatherings have mostly gone away in the past year. In California, masks are only required in healthcare settings and senior adult care facilities according to the State of California COVID-19 website. However, he also reminded Americans to stay wary of the pandemic.
THE WHITE HOUSE, PUBLIC DOMAIN, VIA WIKIMEDIA COMMONS
among 11 high-income countries with many Americans struggling to afford care as income inequality widens, according to a study by The Commonwealth Fund, a private foundation which aims to create an equitable healthcare system. Throughout Biden’s speech he said he would veto any policies that would cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. “Big Pharma is unfairly charging people hundreds of dollars, $400 to $500 a month, making record profits,” he said Healthcare: during the Address. However, Biden said this will not be Biden addressed some of the an issue anymore. accomplishments and goals to Biden said many of his make healthcare better and more policies, which took effect on financially accessible. Jan. 1, gave Medicare the ability to The U.S. health system ranks last negotiate drug prices which will help
bring down the price of prescription drugs. In a July 9, 2021 article by the American Presidency Project run by UC Santa Barbara, Biden signed an executive order demanding to make the “information technology sector” more fair, open and competitive. To fulfill this executive order, on Nov. 21, 2021, Biden announced his Prescription Drug Pricing Plan. This plan would allow Medicare to negotiate drug prices for high-cost prescription drugs. The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 included several provisions aimed at lowering drug prices according to the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation. The Inflation Reduction Act, is a
10-year plan changing a wide range of policies including paying down the deficit to fight inflation, according to the Democrats Senate summary document. He also said that his administration capped the cost of insulin to only $35 a month for Medicare Part D enrollees. Medicare Part D helps those enrolled pay for prescription drugs according to a Dec. 7, 2020 article by the National Council on Aging, a charity which aims to help older people age with dignity. He also made a plea to some of his colleagues in the audience to continue these efforts after 2025, the expiration date for many of these policies. “Let’s finish the job and make the BIDEN | Page 2
Tech layoffs rock Bay Area workers By Dylan Newman STAFF WRITER
The past couple of months have left tens of thousands of employees from Silicon Valley’s tech industry workforce without jobs, after many companies performed round after round of layoffs. Ahmed Banafa, engineering professor at San Jose State said these job cuts are a product of mass hiring and inflation that took place over the course of the pandemic. Banafa said big tech cor p orations, including names like Google, Meta and Salesforce, brought on more staff in order to accommodate an influx of people using their services. He also said the tech industry used to add 100,000 new employees every year. “In 2022 they added 260,000; this shows you how the hiring went crazy,” Banafa said. Computer science freshman Siddarth Thati said he understands that companies experiment its workforce size to INFOGRAPHIC BY BRYANNA BARTLETT. SOURCE: SF STANDARD, EDD WARN REPORT, SEC, COMPANY PRESS RELEASES
LAYOFFS | Page 2