(WSIL) -- The White House is brimming with confidence after Tuesday's signing of the landmark Inflation Reduction Act.
Despite its name, it may not do much to tame inflation according to John Shaw, director of the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at SIU-Carbondale.
"They're calling it the Inflation Reduciton Act, which I think is a bit of a marketing strategy," Shaw said.
Shaw says Congress can't change inflation, only action from the Federal Reserve. Nonetheless, Shaw says it's a big win for the Democratic Party.
"It's also very helpful for Democrats who have been trying to prove to the American people that they can govern that they can actually put together a bill and pass it," Shaw said.
The $750-billion measure caps insulin prices for Medicare customers at $35 and caps prescription price costs to $2,000 a year. It also helps 13 million people pay for health insurance.
Jared Bernstein, an economic advisor to the Biden Administration, says the impact will be instant for those needing insurance assistance.
"Were it not for the inflation reduction act, those bills would go up 800 dollars for every one of those 13 million people," Bernstein said. "That's a savings that kicks in right away."
The bill would also reduce the federal deficit by $300 billion over the next 10-years according to Bernstein. Part of that will be funded by a 15% tax on multi-billion dollar corporations.
But Bernstein says one of the law's biggest takeaways is allowing Medicare to negotiate lower prescription drug prices for consumers.
"We broke that. President Biden [other lawmakers] ... got this over the line. They broke that chokehold that Big Pharma had," Bernstein said.
SIU-Carbondale plans to sponsor a workshop in the wake of the Inflation Reduction Act's signing. It's happening at the Student Services Building on September 29 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.
The workshop invites lawmakers and economic groups to educate and inform them of the potential opportunities the new law can have on growing renewable energy locally.