After various state efforts to boost vaccination rates—like million-dollar lotteries—failed to reverse the decline in adults seeking COVID-19 vaccinations, Joe Biden has come up with a brilliant new plan to fix the problem: $100 bribes.
On Thursday, Biden called on state and local governments to give $100 to adults who get the COVID-19 vaccine.
The plan was announced the same week that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reversed its previous recommendation and said that fully vaccinated people must wear masks indoors in schools and in certain other areas.
“Today, I’m calling on all states and local governments to use funding they have received, including from the American Rescue Plan, to give $100 to anyone who gets fully vaccinated,” Biden announced. He cited grocery store chain Kroger’s successful incentive program back in February, when they offered $100 to their employees who got vaccinated. This increased their vaccination rate from 50 percent to 75 percent.
Biden failed to mention that Kroger’s program came in the early weeks of the vaccine distribution when vaccination rates were increasing organically. He also failed to mention that this was before his disastrous decision to pause the Johnson & Johnson vaccine rollout over six cases of severe blood clotting out of nearly 7 million doses administered. The decision to pause the J&J vaccine rollout made little sense and was slammed by governors. Dr. Fauci predictably defended the decision, even though the risk was nominal from a statistical perspective—smaller than the risk of catching COVID and dying from it.
As expected, trust in the Johnson & Johnson vaccine plummeted. The same administration trying to combat vaccine hesitancy literally created an environment in which more people don’t trust the safety of a very important vaccine. Unfortunately, the Biden administration’s lifting of the pause did little to restore faith in any of the vaccines. And now Biden is hoping that large-scale bribery can get vaccinations back on track.
Related: Quick: Read This Study on Recovered Immunity Before It Gets Memory Holed
Biden also addressed the apparent unfairness of offering $100 for people who’ve not yet been vaccinated, when so many others who got vaccinated early won’t get diddly squat.
“I know that paying people to get vaccinated might sound unfair to folks who’ve gotten vaccinated already, but here’s the deal: If incentives help us beat this virus, I believe we should use them,” Biden said. “We all benefit if we can get more people vaccinated.”
Well, that’s a bit of a hard sell now that the CDC says vaccinated people need to mask up indoors again because of the Delta variant, which, contrary to what Biden has claimed in the past, isn’t more deadly than the original strain of the virus (it’s not even close).
So, here we are. Joe Biden botched the vaccination rollout and is trying to fix it by throwing money at the problem — the typical Democrat solution to everything.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member