President Joseph Biden's first year as US President was marked by some important legislative successes - notably passage of the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan and the $1.0 trillion Infrastructure Investment Act - but also by a major confidence-shaking, foreign-policy crisis, in America's chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan. The President's Build Back Better Bill is currently stalled in Congress, where divisions among Democrats - who enjoy the narrowest possible advantage in the Senate and only an eight-seat majority in the House of Representatives - seem to be becoming increasingly intractable. The US economy shows mixed signals, with low unemployment (3.9 per cent) partly offset by sluggish labour-force participation, and inflation rising to its highest rate (7.0 per cent) since the 1970s.