[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 139 (Monday, September 19, 2011)]
[House]
[Page H6236]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


 LIVING WITHIN OUR MEANS AND INVESTING IN THE FUTURE--MESSAGE FROM THE 
          PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES (H. DOC. NO. 112-55)

  The SPEAKER pro tempore laid before the House the following message 
from the President of the United States; which was read and, together 
with the accompanying papers, referred to the Committees on 
Agriculture; Armed Services; Education and the Workforce; Energy and 
Commerce; Financial Services; House Administration; the Judiciary; 
Natural Resources; Oversight and Government Reform; Rules; Science, 
Space, and Technology; Small Business; Transportation and 
Infrastructure; and Ways and Means and ordered to be printed:

To the Congress of the United States:
  This continues to be a time of challenge for our country. We face an 
economic crisis that has left millions of our neighbors jobless, and a 
political crisis that has made things worse. Millions of Americans are 
looking for work. Across our country, families are doing their best 
just to scrape by--giving up nights out with the family to save on gas 
or make the mortgage, or postponing retirement to send a child to 
college.
  These men and women grew up with faith in an America where hard work 
and responsibility paid off. They believed in a country where everyone 
gets a fair shake and does their fair share; they believed that if you 
worked hard and played by the rules, you would be rewarded with a 
decent salary and good benefits. If you did the right thing, you could 
make it in America.
  For decades now, Americans have watched that compact erode. They have 
seen the decks too often stacked against them. And they know that 
Washington has not always put their interests first. Too often, our 
Nation's capital has been consumed by partisanship. Too often, the 
needs of special interests or politics have been put ahead of what is 
best for the country.
  That is what must change. The American people work hard to meet their 
responsibilities. Now, as the Nation faces an economy that is not 
growing and creating jobs as it should, so must its leaders. While the 
continued recovery of our economy will be driven by the businesses and 
workers across our land, policymakers in Washington can take steps to 
help Americans right now and set the most favorable conditions we can 
for growth and job creation for years to come. We can live within our 
means and invest for the future.
  That is why last week I presented to the Congress and the American 
people the American Jobs Act, to provide a jolt to the economy and give 
companies confidence that if they invest and hire, there will be 
customers for their products and services. This jobs bill will put more 
people back to work and more money in the pockets of those who are 
working. It will create more jobs for construction workers, more jobs 
for teachers, more jobs for veterans, and more jobs for the long-term 
unemployed. It will provide a tax break for companies that hire new 
workers, and it will cut payroll taxes in half for every working 
American and every small business. It will create jobs for people to 
rebuild our aging infrastructure and repair and modernize at least 
35,000 schools. Moreover, the proposals in the American Jobs Act are 
the kind of proposals that have been supported by Democrats and 
Republicans in the past.
  I am committed to paying for this jobs bill. The Budget Control Act 
that I signed into law last month will cut annual Government spending 
by about $1 trillion over the next 10 years. It also charges the Joint 
Select Committee on Deficit Reduction with finding an additional $1.5 
trillion in savings. As part of this jobs bill, I am asking the 
Congress to increase that amount so that it covers the full cost of the 
American Jobs Act. In addition, I believe that the Congress should 
seize the opportunity that this new Committee presents and do much more 
so that we can put the country on a sustainable fiscal path, which is 
critical for our long-term economic growth and competitiveness.
  For this reason, I am sending to the Congress this detailed plan to 
pay for this jobs bill and realize more than $3 trillion in net deficit 
reduction over the next 10 years. Combined with the approximately $1 
trillion in savings from the first part of the Budget Control Act, this 
would generate more than $4 trillion in deficit reduction over the next 
decade. This would bring the Nation to the point where current spending 
is no longer adding to our debt and where our debt is no longer 
increasing as a share of our economy--an important milestone on the way 
to restoring fiscal discipline and moving us toward balance.

  This plan is a balanced one that asks everyone to do their part. It 
includes nearly $580 billion in cuts and reforms to mandatory programs 
of which $320 billion is savings from Federal health programs such as 
Medicare and Medicaid. These changes are necessary to maintain the 
promise of Medicare as we know it.
  The plan also realizes more than $1 trillion in savings over the next 
10 years from our drawdowns in Afghanistan and Iraq. And the plan calls 
for the Congress to undertake comprehensive tax reform that lowers tax 
rates, closes loopholes, boosts job creation here at home, cuts the 
deficit by $1.5 trillion, and observes the Buffett Rule--that people 
making more than $1 million a year should not pay a smaller share of 
their income in taxes than middle-class families pay.
  To assist the Committee in its work, I also included specific tax 
loophole closers and measures to broaden the tax base. Together with 
the expiration of the high-income tax cuts from 2001 and 2003, these 
measures would be more than enough to reach this $1.5 trillion target. 
They include cutting tax preferences for high-income households, 
eliminating tax breaks for oil and gas companies, closing the carried 
interest loophole for investment fund managers, and eliminating 
benefits for those who use corporate jets.
  In sum, the plan I am sending to the Congress today is a blueprint 
for how we can reduce this deficit, pay down our debt, and pay for the 
American Jobs Act in the process. I have little doubt that some of 
these proposals will not be popular with those who benefit from these 
affected programs. And some of these changes are ones that we would not 
make if it were not for our fiscal situation. But we are all in this 
together, and all of us must contribute to getting our economy moving 
again and on a firm fiscal footing.
  After all, we are all connected. No single individual built America 
on his or her own. We built it together. We have been, and always will 
be, ``one Nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for 
all.'' We have always been a people with responsibilities to ourselves 
and with responsibilities to one another. This means that as Americans 
work hard to find a job, keep their businesses afloat and grow, and 
provide for their kids, their representatives in Washington must meet 
their responsibilities and make the tough choices needed to get our 
economy back on track.
  This plan lives up to a simple idea: as a Nation, we can live within 
our means while still making the investments we need to prosper. It 
follows a balanced approach: asking everyone to do their part, so no 
one has to bear all the burden. And it says that everyone--including 
millionaires and billionaires--has to pay their fair share.
  These may be tough times for our country, but I have a deep faith in 
the American spirit, and we are tougher than the times we live in and 
bigger than the politics we have recently seen. If we all put 
partisanship aside and roll up our sleeves, I have no doubt that we can 
meet the challenges of the moment and show the world once again why the 
United States of America remains the greatest country on Earth.
                                                        Barack Obama.  
The White House, September 19, 2011.

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