[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 38 (Tuesday, March 16, 2010)]
[House]
[Page H1443]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     RESTORING AMERICANS' NET WORTH

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Virginia (Mr. Connolly) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. CONNOLLY of Virginia. Madam Speaker, last week I brought the same 
chart to the House floor to visibly demonstrate how, starting in 2007, 
the Great Recession destroyed $17.5 trillion of household aggregate 
wealth in the United States. I noted that it represented a loss of more 
than $56,000 for every man, woman, and child in America. Trillions of 
dollars of home equity were lost, retirement savings and college funds 
lost.
  As you can see by the red line here, the worst recession since World 
War II continually destroyed value from American households for seven 
straight quarters, from June of 2007 until March of 2009; 21 months of 
lost net worth. The economy was on the brink of collapse, and the 
tremendous losses to every American household were directly evident.
  But this Congress acted. And as you can see from the blue line, since 
passage of the Recovery Act, Americans recovered $5 trillion in net 
worth during the second and third quarters of 2009. Today I have even 
better news. Last week, data came out for the fourth quarter of 2009, 
and once again Americans' net worth increased for the third straight 
quarter. There was an additional $800 billion returned to American 
households over just the past 3 months.
  Let me put this in context. The Recovery Act was an investment in 
this Nation, in this economy, in the American people, to help bring us 
out of the Great Recession. It kept hundreds of thousands of teachers 
from being laid off, including 800 in my own district. That is not just 
a short-term investment in economic recovery, it is a long-term 
investment in our communities and in the education of our children.
  The Recovery Act also provided for thousands of needed transportation 
improvements. Again, that is a short-term investment in construction 
jobs, but a long-term investment in our communities and national 
infrastructure. The Recovery Act's investments, including more than 
$200 billion in tax cuts, totaled $787 billion, and it will be spent 
over 2 years time. Where is the return on that investment, you just 
have to look at the blue line showing $5 trillion in net worth that has 
been recovered since we passed that bill for American families in the 
first 9 months of this year. We can now add another $800 billion to 
that figure for the last 3 months of 2009, nearly $6 trillion in 
recovered wealth.
  The recovery of America's net worth is vital to the overall recovery 
of our economy. Consumer spending makes up 70 percent of our GDP. 
However, so long as consumers' net worth remains depressed, consumer 
spending will naturally suffer. When consumer spending suffers, 
businesses pull back and lay off employees. It is a tragic downward 
spiral, one that unfolded starting in the Bush administration in 2007.
  But this chart, this blue line of recovery shows we are back on the 
right track. Despite historic blizzards that many thought would imperil 
the recovery, retail sales actually increased 0.3 percent in February, 
outpacing expectations. Housing prices increased 7 straight months, 
reversing 22 straight months of decline. New orders for manufactured 
goods are at their highest level since 2008. The manufacturing index 
has been growing for 6 straight months, and manufacturing jobs have 
been growing for 3 months. GDP grew at 5.9 percent, its fastest growth 
in 6 years, in the fourth quarter of 2009. And today, the stock market 
is up more than 70 percent since its March of 2009 low.
  We are not out of the woods yet, and we have some ground to cover 
before the value of the economic losses are fully recovered. But we are 
making steady progress, as we can see from this chart. We must now 
continue on that path to restore financial stability for our residents 
and the economy as a whole.

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