[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 19 (Wednesday, February 4, 2015)]
[House]
[Page H761]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




         IN SUPPORT OF THE PRESIDENT'S FISCAL YEAR 2016 BUDGET

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from New 
York (Mr. Jeffries) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. JEFFRIES. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in full support of President 
Obama's fiscal year 2016 budget.
  It is a budget that is firmly rooted in middle class economics, 
designed to benefit working families and middle-income Americans. It is 
a budget that will facilitate access to quality, affordable child care 
and will dramatically expand prekindergarten education in a way that 
will allow the children of middle class Americans to get off to a 
faster start in life.
  President Obama's budget, with the full support of House Democrats, 
will also address wage stagnation. It is designed to put more income--
more money--in the pockets of middle class Americans and of those who 
aspire to be part of the middle class. It will address the fact that, 
since the early 1970s, the productivity of the American worker has 
increased consistently, yet middle class wages have remained stagnant. 
That is a systematic problem that President Obama, Leader Pelosi, and 
House Democrats are determined to address on behalf of the middle 
class.
  President Obama's budget is also designed to increase the 
affordability of a college education. We know that Americans right now 
are burdened with more than $1 trillion in student loan debt. That type 
of debt limits the ability of younger Americans to purchase a home, to 
start a family, to open up a new business, to take a chance. It limits 
their ability to robustly access the American Dream. President Obama's 
budget is designed to allow the sons and daughters of the middle class 
to pursue their dreams in a more meaningful fashion.
  When President Obama took office, he inherited an economic train 
wreck as a result of the Great Recession that was handed to him by the 
policies of the previous Republican administration. Through the 
leadership of President Obama, working closely with Democrats in the 
House and the Senate, we have turned the economy around. We have gotten 
it back on the right track.
  So the question that we in this Congress face today is: Will we 
continue the policies of middle class economics, which are designed to 
benefit working families and moderate income Americans, or are we going 
to regress to the policies of trickle-down economics, which have failed 
middle class Americans time and time again?
  I am in my second term. When I first got to the Congress, I assumed 
that trickle-down economics was dead, doomed by the fact that it has 
failed over and over again. Apparently, it has been revived.
  In its most recent incarnation, House Republicans would like to drop 
the top tax rate from 39.6 percent on the wealthiest Americans all the 
way down to 25 percent. Their argument is: ``Don't worry, everybody is 
going to benefit.'' But that hasn't worked in the past. In fact, I am 
convinced that middle class economics is far more preferable to 
trickle-down economics, which, as it relates to the middle class, 
simply means you may be lucky to get a trickle, but you are guaranteed 
to stay down. That is what the record says.
  Bill Clinton inherited a recession. The top tax rate on high-income 
earners was 31 percent. He raised it to 39.6 percent, and the purveyors 
of trickle-down economics predicted economic doom and gloom. What 
happened when President Clinton focused on the middle class? More than 
20 million jobs were created. He then handed over a budget surplus to 
President Bush and his coconspirators in the Congress, and like drunken 
sailors, they blew that budget surplus on failed wars in Iraq and 
Afghanistan and on a tax cut that disproportionately benefited the 
wealthy and the well off. Did trickle-down economics work when they 
dropped the top tax rate to 35 percent? No. During the Bush Presidency, 
650,000-plus jobs were lost.
  President Obama inherited this economic mess, and in partnership with 
Democrats in the House and in the Senate, he renewed his focus on the 
middle class. He even raised the top tax rate back up to 39.6 percent. 
Doom and gloom was predicted, but what happened? The economy is 
humming. The stock market is way up. Gas prices are way down. The 
unemployment rate has come down. Economic growth is exceeding all of 
the competitors across the world.
  There is more to be done, but for us to be successful, we have got to 
abandon the focus on the wealthy and the well off and pursue middle 
class economics.

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