Buttigieg unveils $1 trillion child care, college, housing plan

Top-tier Democratic presidential hopeful and South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg on Friday unveiled an economic plan that includes more than $1 trillion in spending on affordable housing, education and child care. 

The 2020 contender said he would invest $700 billion in education and child care, including making early learning and care from birth through age 5 free for low-income families and more affordable for all others.

{mosads}He would also give cost assistance to working and middle-class families for after-school and summer programs.

Buttigieg’s plan also includes spending $430 billion to give affordable housing to more than 7 million families, including the building or restoring 2 million units for low-income families. 

Under the plan, families that make up to $100,000 won’t pay any public college tuition. It also calls for $50 billion in new investments in historically black colleges and universities and minority-serving institutions. Buttigieg would also expand Pell Grants to help low-income students graduate from college without student loan debt. 

Buttigieg also proposes to help workers by expanding the earned income tax credit, which he said would increase incomes by an average of $1,000 annually, and passing a $15 minimum wage. 

“As president, I will measure success not just by the size of the stock market or gross domestic product, but by whether working and middle class families are succeeding,” Buttigieg said in a statement on the plan. “In the United States of America, economic gains should be shared by everyone and everyone should have a fair shot at real opportunity.” 

Buttigieg is among more than a dozen people running for the Democratic presidential nomination. His campaign has seen a surge in momentum in recent weeks.

According to the RealClearPolitics average of polls, Buttigieg sits in fourth place with 7 percent of the vote. 

In the same index, Buttigieg is in second place in the important first caucus state, Iowa. He has 17.5 percent of the vote in the Hawkeye State, trailing just Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) by 4 points.