The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (IRA), Public Law 117-169, is a United States federal budget reconciliation law signed by President Joe Biden on 16 August 2022. The law aimed to reduce the federal government budget deficit, lower prescription drug prices, and invest in domestic energy production while promoting renewable energy. It was sponsored by Senators Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Joe Manchin (D-WV), and all voting Democrats supported the bill while all voting Republicans opposed it. Estimates of the law's total spending and its likely economic and emissions effects vary across forecasting institutions; see inflation-reduction-act-economic-impact-debate.

The Congressional Budget Office estimated that the act would reduce federal budget deficits by $237 billion over ten years through a combination of revenue increases-including a 15% corporate minimum tax, a 1% excise tax on stock buybacks, and increased IRS enforcement funding-and savings from prescription drug pricing reform.¹⁾ Independent analyses of the act's total climate and energy spending differ substantially, with estimates ranging from roughly $663 billion to $1.2 trillion depending on methodology and assumptions about credit utilization.²⁾

The law's three principal areas of substantive change are energy and climate policy, healthcare and prescription drug pricing, and tax administration. On energy, the act extends and restructures tax credits for renewable electricity generation, electric vehicles, and energy efficiency, and creates a $27 billion Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund.³⁾ On healthcare, the law allows Medicare to negotiate prices for certain prescription drugs for the first time, caps Medicare beneficiaries' insulin costs at $35 per month, and extends expanded Affordable Care Act marketplace subsidies originally enacted under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021.⁴⁾ On tax administration, the act appropriates approximately $80 billion in additional funding to the Internal Revenue Service over ten years for enforcement, operations, and taxpayer service improvements.⁵⁾

The act's name and its likely effect on consumer price inflation have themselves been subjects of dispute since passage; see inflation-reduction-act-name-controversy and inflation-reduction-act-economic-impact-debate. Background on the bill's legislative origins, including its relationship to the earlier Build Back Better Act proposal, is covered at inflation-reduction-act-history.

• Deficit-reduction and anti-inflation framing: holds that the law's revenue provisions, deficit reduction, and prescription drug savings justify its name and were likely to ease inflationary pressure. See inflation-reduction-act-deficit-hawk-viewpoint.
• Climate-policy framing: emphasizes the act as primarily a climate and clean-energy investment law, describing it as the largest piece of federal climate legislation in U.S. history regardless of its title. See inflation-reduction-act-climate-policy-viewpoint.
• Skeptical-of-inflation-impact viewpoint: argues the law's near-term effect on consumer prices was negligible or essentially zero, citing CBO and other estimates showing no statistically significant effect on inflation in 2022-2023. See inflation-reduction-act-inflation-impact-skeptical-viewpoint.
• Fiscal-conservative critical viewpoint: contends that new spending, tax increases, and expanded IRS enforcement would harm businesses, taxpayers, or economic growth, and that deficit-reduction claims are overstated or based on optimistic assumptions. See inflation-reduction-act-fiscal-conservative-viewpoint.
• Industrial-policy and energy-security viewpoint: frames the act primarily as a tool for reshoring clean-energy manufacturing and reducing dependence on foreign supply chains, particularly relative to China. See inflation-reduction-act-industrial-policy-viewpoint.
• Insufficient-ambition viewpoint: holds that despite its scale, the act's climate provisions are inadequate to meet stated U.S. emissions targets or the scale of climate change, and that key proposals (such as a carbon price or methane fee strengthening) were dropped or weakened during negotiation. See inflation-reduction-act-climate-insufficiency-viewpoint.

• Dispute over whether “Inflation Reduction Act” is an accurate or misleading name for legislation whose primary near-term budgetary effects are concentrated in healthcare and climate spending rather than direct anti-inflation measures. See inflation-reduction-act-name-controversy.
• Disagreement among economists, the Congressional Budget Office, and other forecasters (including Penn Wharton, Goldman Sachs, and Credit Suisse) over the act's projected total cost and its effect on inflation and economic growth. See inflation-reduction-act-economic-impact-debate.
• Dispute over Senator Joe Manchin's role in narrowing the bill from the earlier Build Back Better Act and the resulting removal or modification of provisions such as carried-interest tax treatment. See inflation-reduction-act-manchin-negotiations-controversy.

• inflation-reduction-act-history
• inflation-reduction-act-economic-impact-debate
• inflation-reduction-act-name-controversy
• inflation-reduction-act-manchin-negotiations-controversy
• build-back-better-act
• united-states-climate-policy
• medicare-prescription-drug-price-negotiation

1. Congressional Budget Office. “Estimated Budgetary Effects of Public Law 117-169, to Provide for Reconciliation Pursuant to Title II of S. Con. Res. 14.” Washington, DC: Congressional Budget Office, September 7, 2022.
2. McKinsey & Company. “What's in the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) of 2022.” McKinsey & Company, October 24, 2022.
3. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. “Summary of Inflation Reduction Act Provisions Related to Renewable Energy.” Washington, DC: EPA, accessed 2026.
4. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. “Anniversary of the Inflation Reduction Act: Update on CMS Implementation.” Baltimore, MD: CMS, 2026.
5. Congressional Research Service. “Tax Provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (H.R. 5376).” Report no. R47202. Washington, DC: Library of Congress, Congressional Research Service.