[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 147 (Wednesday, October 7, 2015)]
[House]
[Pages H6883-H6890]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
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FUTURE FORUM
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. LaHood). Under the Speaker's announced
policy of January 6, 2015, the gentleman from California (Mr. Swalwell)
is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to kick off the
Future Forum Special Order hour. Today we will be bringing attention,
once again, to the issue of college affordability and student loan
debt. We also have a few surprises in store today, as I will be joined
by my Future Forum colleagues.
I first want to report that just earlier this week, on Monday, the
Future Forum, which is a group of about 16 to 17 of the youngest
members in our caucus, went out to Seattle. Congressman Kilmer, who
represents the Seattle area, was joined by myself and Ruben Gallego of
the Phoenix, Arizona, area.
We went across the Seattle area. We talked to college students,
community college students, college graduates, a millennial workforce,
and also folks in the tech sector in Seattle.
We went to the University of Washington Tacoma and met with veterans.
We went to the University of Puget Sound and talked to students. We
went to an SEIU training center and talked to the next generation of
their workforce.
We were also able to go to Amazon. We went to amazon.com and had a
town hall there with their millennial workforce, and we were able to
listen to them and their concerns about the future.
We heard a common thread through all of these diverse groups,
America's largest generation, millennials, 80 million people. They are
concerned about their future.
They are concerned about their ability to afford and have access to
go to college. They are concerned about how much it is going to cost
them when they get out and the student loan debt that they are going to
be burdened with.
It was another successful Future Forum trip. It was the eighth one we
have taken this year, ranging from New York, Boston, New Hampshire,
Phoenix, Washington, D.C., San Francisco, Los Angeles, and now Seattle.
I encourage anyone watching to engage with us on Twitter. I will be a
part of the conversation. I will read and respond to any questions as
we go along.
First, today I am joined by a colleague of mine, a Future Forum
member from the Dallas/Fort Worth area, Congressman Marc Veasey.
Congressman, we are encouraging a conversation around these issues at
#futureforum.
I have been to the Dallas/Fort Worth area. I have seen the way you
engage with young people in your district.
I want to know just what are you hearing out there about your
constituents and their ability to go to college, your constituents and
their ability to pay for college? And, once they get out, how is
student loan debt affecting their opportunities?
Mr. VEASEY. Congressman Swalwell, thank you very much. I really
appreciate your leadership on Future Forum and bringing up important
issues like student debt. It is a real issue that so many of our young
people struggle with when they graduate from college.
In one of the articles that I was reading about student debt, a
national magazine put some Instagram photos up of young people and the
problems and the issues that they have with student debt. Some of the
kids put up some really creative things.
One of the graduating students, on their graduating hat, instead of
``Game of Thrones,'' it said ``Game of Loans.'' Another sign that I saw
at one of the college graduations said, ``I will soon be joining
millions of other young people that are graduating from college, and I
will be consumed with thousands of dollars in debt.''
But while these Instagram photos are cute and funny and I am sure are
a way for young people to take their minds off of what is going to be
facing them in thousands of dollars of debt, we know that this is a
very serious issue.
Our young people that are graduating from college are putting off
buying a house. They are putting off buying that new car. Those sorts
of things play a role in how well our economy does.
And I think, more importantly, you hear a lot of young people that
are graduating from college saying that they are putting off starting a
family.
That is one of the most important things that we do as young people
as we graduate from college and make our way into the world, is that we
start that next generation.
And in order for us to start that next generation with confidence,
kids need to know that when they graduate from college, they are not
going to be burdened with all of this debt.
[[Page H6884]]
We know that college is becoming less and less affordable each day,
and it negatively impacts the lives of thousands of Americans across
our great Nation, including many of the constituents that I represent
in the Dallas/Fort Worth area.
Right now we have about 40 million young people in this country that
have over $1.3 trillion in debt.
In the State of Texas, the average debt per student is over $25,000,
with over 70 percent of bachelor's degree recipients graduating with a
student loan. About 16 percent of students in Texas have defaulted on
their loans. These numbers can easily create an economic crisis for an
entire generation.
While the cost of higher education continues to rise, grants are not
going up on the same per-student basis. We have seen the Federal Pell
Grant funding levels remain stagnant despite House Democrats urging
Republicans to do something, to step in and help these kids, and let's
increase Pell Grant funding levels. But we have seen absolutely no
action from the Republicans on this.
Mr. Speaker and Congressman Swalwell, I think it is important that we
do work together on commonsense proposals that provide grants to the
most needy and to make Federal loans affordable so that young people
can obtain a degree, contribute to our economy, and keep our country
going strong without the burden of insurmountable student debt.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Congressman Veasey, part of what the
Future Forum has tried to express across the country to young people
has been, first, our members, we understand you, we hear you, because
we know the struggle you have gone through.
Personally, I have over $100,000 today in student loan debt. Half of
my college was paid through an athletic scholarship, and I still had
that much student loan debt that I racked up because of tuition going
up every single year.
Could you tell us just a little bit about your personal story or
those of any family members or friends and how you have personally seen
this debt affecting people.
Mr. VEASEY. Absolutely. When I graduated from college, paying back my
student loans was very, very difficult. And I will tell you that one of
the things that I lucked into when I was still in my twenties was that
I became a congressional aide. I worked for a Member of Congress.
And there was a student loan program for young people that worked on
Capitol Hill for them to be able to have some of their student loan
debt repaid. Had it not been for that, I don't know what I would have
done because the student debt was eating into my discretionary income.
Again, we want young people to contribute to our economy. We want
young people to go and buy that car that they couldn't afford in
college. We want young people to start a family, buy a home.
I mean, the American Dream is being able to start a family and buy
that home and be able to raise your kids in that home and be able to
provide for your family.
But, unfortunately, more and more of our young people are saying,
``You know what. I am going to put off getting married. I am going to
put off buying that home. I am going to put off putting money into our
local economy. I am going to not buy so much for Christmas for my
siblings and my parents and other people. I can't afford to because I
have thousands and thousands of dollars' worth of student debt.''
We have to figure out some way to do something about this,
Representative Swalwell, or we are going to have an entire generation
of young people that just has absolutely nowhere to turn.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. You know what was interesting? We have
had these conversations with people.
A story I will never forget: We were in the Boston area, and we went
to Thermo Fisher. We had this town hall with about 200 young people at
their workforce, talking to us about student loan debt. I was with
Congressman Moulton.
Once we started getting into the back-and-forth of the questions with
the participants, a woman in the back who was around 55, 60 years old
raised her hand and said kind of jokingly, ``You know, I know I am not
supposed to be here. This is a millennial town hall.'' And we told her,
``No. No. It is a mindset. It is not an age.''
But she said, ``I think you are missing the fact that student loan
debt doesn't just affect millennials,'' and she told a story about her
daughter who had gone to college, which is also a part of that American
Dream where we want our young people to go to college, educate
themselves.
But she said that she has found that her daughter has come home from
college, has over $30,000 in student loan debt and, because of that
debt, is not able to even rent near where she works. So what her
daughter has done is she has come back home. We are becoming the
boomerang generation.
So that reinforced for me that this issue affects the 40 million
millennials that you talked about. But, actually, it is a family
matter. It affects everyone in the household.
Have you heard stories like that or seen examples of that?
Mr. VEASEY. Yes. I have absolutely heard so many stories like that.
And it is really interesting. I think, when we are all in our
twenties, we never think that we are going to get older.
I have been working in politics now since I have been in my twenties,
starting off as a congressional aide and spending 8 years in Texas
State Legislature and now as a Member of Congress.
When you meet kids that are in their teens, kids that are in their
twenties, they never ask you about Social Security. They don't ask you
much about what is going on with the national defense. And, for years,
I can tell you that young people in their teens and twenties never
asked me a lot of questions, as an elected official, about many of the
issues that affect our country.
Most of the questions that I would get from individuals were usually
from people that were baby boomers and older that were concerned about
Social Security, concerned about the high cost of food or goods or
whatever it may happen to be.
But let me tell you something. For young people in this country, this
issue is getting their attention, not being able to pay back their
student debt.
And I can tell you that, when I am at townhall meetings, when I am
out doing the different events throughout the Dallas/Fort Worth
metroplex, the one issue that young people come to me about--and I know
that, if someone is in their twenties or early thirties and they are
approaching me about an issue, it is probably going to be about student
debt. It has really galvanized them like I have never seen before.
Again, they are going to social media like some of the examples that
I have talked with you about earlier. They are going to social media.
They are going to Instagram and Facebook, talking about student debt,
begging the Congress to do something about providing more grants.
Again, we want our country to be well-educated. That is how we are
going to be able to compete with the rest of the world.
But guess what. More and more young people are hearing, you know,
``Why go to college? Why go to college and be burdened with student
debt?''
And guess what. If more and more young people hear that, it is going
to make us less competitive in the world at a time where we need to be
more competitive in all sectors, whether it is in technology, whether
it is in manufacturing. We need an educated workforce.
I can tell you that young people are being discouraged because of a
lack of action specifically, really, by Republicans in Congress. So we
have to keep raising this issue.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Again, I appreciate you being with us
today, Congressman Veasey of Texas.
You are right. It is about solutions and who is acting. I think we
all would welcome the bipartisan approach to this. But right now the
silence is deafening, and it is affecting a whole generation that is
just stuck in financial quicksand.
One of the solutions that the Future Forum has put out there is this
idea: Hey, you can refinance an auto loan. You can refinance your home
loan. Why shouldn't our students who are in this financial quicksand be
able to refinance their student loans at the lowest
[[Page H6885]]
available rate? We have got legislation on that, and I hope it becomes
bipartisan legislation. But I agree with you on a call to action on
this.
Mr. VEASEY. Thank you, Representative Swalwell. I appreciate that.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Well, the Future Forum is a group that
has evolved since April, and we are quite interested in engaging with
millennials.
Again, I would invite people tonight to engage with us on
#futureforum, and we will take questions.
But this idea of reaching out to a generation that is not necessarily
yet engaged in new, innovative ways is older than the Future Forum. It
actually started about 10 years ago.
And today we have a little bit of a surprise for our Future Forum
followers. We are going to welcome some of the original members of the
Future Forum who 10 years ago on this House floor redefined what it
meant to reach out and talk to the next generation of leaders.
So it is my honor, it is my privilege, to first welcome Congressman
Tim Ryan of Ohio. Tim said it best in 2005, 10 years ago, when he led
the 30-Something Working Group and they took questions on this House
floor, as we take them now from Twitter. Congressman Ryan took them via
email.
He said, ``Being the 30-Something Group, we are trying to take our
communications to the next level, trying to reach out to the American
people, because we have said for quite some time that if we are going
to solve problems in this country, that we have to engage the best and
brightest talent that is out in the country in order to do this.''
{time} 1830
Does that sound familiar to the gentleman from Ohio?
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I don't remember that, but that sounds like
something I would have said. That is great.
Well, thank you. This is bringing back a lot of memories. I look at
some of our friends that staff the House of Representatives, and we had
a lot of long nights where we would come to the House floor sometimes
once or twice in an evening back in 2003, 2004, 2005, and then going
into 2006 and really used the House floor. There wasn't Twitter back
then, and so a lot has changed with the ability to communicate and
organize.
We had key issues at that point that we were working on with Debbie
Wasserman Schultz, Congressman Kendrick Meek from Miami. We were kind
of the three Members that would come in here every night. It helped us
communicate with not just young people who may or may not be watching
C-SPAN, because there weren't a lot of them, but we were on later at
night, and so we did get some college students who were paying
attention to what was going on. We were also talking to their parents,
and we were also talking to their grandparents.
I think what you guys are doing now with the Future Forum is having a
conversation with everyone about what the future needs to look like. I
think that is critically important. You talk about student loans,
student debt, and all the rest. I think one issue, too, that we are
talking about that doesn't get a whole lot of coverage is how we create
an economy for these young people to go into and what that looks like.
I believe that there is an opportunity for us to kind of bring the
whole thing together.
We talk a lot about the environment because we are concerned with
global warming and what direction we are going in as a country. If you
look at places like Iowa and other places, you will see that they have
25 or 30 percent of their energy coming from renewable sources.
I represent a district in northeast Ohio, heavily manufacturing, lost
thousands and thousands of manufacturing jobs over the last couple of
decades. When I look at what we need to do to reduce our carbon
footprint, to move away from fossil fuels, and to move into a more
renewable economy, to me, wind and solar are an opportunity to do that.
But it is also an opportunity for us to bring manufacturing back.
So not everyone is going to be a Ph.D. and not everyone is going to
be a STEM graduate, but if we can get enough of those graduates to
figure out how we move the country forward, how we manufacture things
again here in the United States, when you think about a windmill that
consists of 8,000 component parts, hundreds of tons of steel,
gearshifts, bearings, hydraulics, all kinds of component parts that
need to be fabricated, to me, if we are going to resuscitate
manufacturing in the United States, moving into a renewable economy
with wind and solar and all the component parts it entails is an
opportunity for us to re-create the middle class.
So when we talk about what the future is, yeah, maybe the college
students are going to be graduating from the STEM college and they may
be engineers, but we have got to deal with the grid. We have got to
deal with battery storage, and we have got to do research and
development to figure out how to do it, how to store the energy and all
the rest, but we also need to resuscitate manufacturing.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. What colleges do you have in your
district?
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. In my district, I have three. We have Youngstown
State University, which had the first STEM college in the entire State
of Ohio, and Akron University, which does a ton of work converting. It
used to be the rubber capital of the world. Now they are doing
polymers, which has a really bright future as well. And we have Kent
State University, which is focused on liquid crystal. So we have these
universities.
But, to me, at the end of the day, if you don't get into
manufacturing, it needs to become a bigger and bigger part to where we
are exporting our products, high-end, high-end manufacturing, advanced
manufacturing, and additive manufacturing to the rest of the world. We
know we are going to lose some manufacturing, of course, to the lower
cost countries, which is a natural evolution of the global economy. The
Future Forum and what you are talking about has to be about and is
about how we create an economy for these young people, and you are in
the process of doing that.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. So, in your district, say Youngstown, or
my district, Cal State, East Bay, what I have found talking to young
people, when we talk about this renewable economy and young people hear
that, we are actually in this Congress, under Republican leadership
slashing the amount of money we invest in renewables and increasing the
amount that we spend on fossil fuels, I find that young people, their
reaction is: Wait. What? You guys, the rest of the world is going
forward in this renewable economy. Germany has 30 percent of its energy
from renewables, and the United States is still stuck around 10 to 11
percent?
I found it generationally, Republicans and Democrats, millennials,
they don't understand why we are kind of stuck in the mud on this
issue. I don't know what you have heard.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Definitely in agreement across generations, across
party lines. Being young, you kind of understand it. I think if we can
move the conversation away from kind of the dark, the world is going to
end, globalization, global warming talk, and more into, okay, how do we
become sustainable and what is the path forward, and how is that going
to benefit everyone moving forward--and I am a kind of an all-of-the-
above guy. I think natural gas can be a transition for us, and I think
there are a lot of opportunities to do that.
I will tell you this, and I don't want to get into a deep discussion
because a lot of people are not in agreement on this. But when you look
at the hydraulic fracturing which allowed a lot of the natural gas to
come up and for us to access it, which is fairly controversial in some
quarters, but the technology was a partnership between the Department
of Energy and the private sector for 30 years, starting in the Carter
administration, that allowed us to be able to go in and then access
this natural gas that is there.
The same concept as what you were talking about is putting the money
into the renewables, driving the costs down, having the tax credits in
place over a long-term period so that we can bring the costs down and
incentivize some investments. At the end of the day, that is how you
move forward with creating new sectors of the economy.
I see the gentleman from Georgia, and I thought he was just hanging
on
[[Page H6886]]
every word I was saying here, and you were so enthralled, and yet you
were here to file a rule.
Mr. WOODALL. I say to my friend, you had me at all of the above. You
had me at American manufacturing. You had me at jobs for the next
generation, and you had me at looking forward instead of backwards, not
doom and gloom, but how we can work together to solve problems.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Look at what just happened here on the House floor.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. We will talk. We will send over some
ideas, and we will take some of yours.
Mr. WOODALL. I will look forward to that.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Congressman Ryan, one of my favorite
things to do in the spirit of what you and Congresswoman Wasserman
Schultz did is you went out and engaged people in new, inventive ways.
We do what is called a word cloud. We go to these townhalls, and they
can text in answers to questions we pose. One that we often ask them
is: What would you spend your money on if you had more money at the end
of the month that wasn't going to student loans? You can see in the
word cloud here, which was taken from a recent event, it ranges from
rent, house, buy a house, groceries, mortgage, and savings.
Have you heard this out in Ohio?
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Same deal, and that is what every one of those
words references is a stronger economy because you have people who are
putting money in buying a car or renting a house or buying a house or
doing any one of these things. And there they are. There they are.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. I have the privilege of having both of
you on the floor now, and you can see it is the 10-year reunion of the
30-Somethings. The two of you really charted the path forward for us to
do this as the Future Forum.
We are now joined by the gentlewoman from Florida, Congresswoman
Debbie Wasserman Schultz.
I went back and I saw many of the different, inventive, and creative
ways that you guys engaged our young people. I was hoping you could
just talk about back then, because some of the issues you talked
about--rising gas prices at the time, the war in Iraq, and
privatization of Social Security--you brought attention on this House
floor of these issues to the next generation. Maybe you could just talk
about how you did that and then how we can do that today.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Absolutely. I thank the gentleman from
California for yielding, and I say to my friend from Ohio that it is
good to get the band back together.
It is really incredible that it has been 10 years. I don't really
want to think about the birthday that I just had and where that puts
me. I guess a few years after we started the 30-Something Working Group
at least I and our former colleague Kendrick Meek from Florida passed
the status of being 30-something, and we were 30-somethings in spirit
while we were doing that for a little while.
I am a little longer past being a 30-something now, but it is
absolutely critical that we have an opportunity now to pass the torch,
Mr. Ryan, to the next generation of 30-somethings who are focused on
making sure that, as we go from generation to generation, as Democrats,
we are focused on making sure about those cornerstones of a middle
class life that we talked about 10 years ago, making sure that you
don't have to choose between buying your groceries or filling your gas
tank so you can get to work, which then, if you can't, would cause you
not to be able to afford your groceries.
Now, 10 years later, Mr. Swalwell--I had young children back then.
Mr. Ryan was single, and now he has young children. My twins are
actually 2 years from going to college, so the student debt crisis that
has been looming and has existed and has overly burdened so many
Americans is now something that my family has trepidation about. So it
is incredibly timely that we relaunch this working group and make sure
that the issues that are important to that next generation get the
attention and the focus on the floor of the United States House of
Representatives.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. We talk a lot about the next generation,
and Congressman Ryan and I were talking about how this affects
millennials--and I invite my colleague from New York (Mr. Jeffries) to
take the other podium.
I don't know if you have heard this in your district, but this issue
of college access and affordability is actually a family matter. We
just got a tweet from @SKAU61, and she said that she wants to get a BA
in accounting, and at 53 she can't afford to do it. So we are hearing
that it is multigenerational, this access.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. SWALWELL of California. I yield to the gentlewoman from Florida.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. In response to your question, whether I have
heard this in my district, absolutely. The average debt that an
individual carries in student loan debt is about $29,000. That is
crushing debt for years to be burdened with. Even President Obama, not
long prior to becoming President, he and the First Lady had both talked
about how they only just had paid off their student loan debt just
before he took office.
Imagine into your not even late fifties, late forties, still paying
off your debt from college and postgraduate school. It is just
outrageous. Yet Republicans--and let's make sure that we zero in on
brass tacks here--Republicans have consistently denied Americans the
opportunity to reform the student loan program so that we can ensure
that when they are paid a salary that it is in line with how much they
have to actually pay back out of their monthly paycheck to actually
make sure that they can make ends meet.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Reclaiming my time, I don't know if
either Mr. Ryan or Mr. Jeffries has heard constituent casework like
this, but we have constituents in our district who are having their
Social Security checks garnished because of student loan debt.
So I yield to Mr. Ryan or Mr. Jeffries, if you heard about this
multigenerational challenge.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I feel like we are here to provide a little
historical context. So when we, back in the day, and that was 2003,
2004, 2005, 2006, before the Democrats took over the House a few years
back, we had a student loan system that the banks would do the loans,
and the rates were 7, 8, and 9 percent. Then, the Federal Government
would back the loan if someone defaulted. So I loan you $100, and if
you default, the gentleman from California will pay me. What a great
business to be in. No lose. Right? So they were covered, regardless. We
came in and made some serious reforms to limit the amount of monthly
payments and for how many years if you are in the public service.
{time} 1845
So we made some reforms that I think were really, really important.
But as the gentlewoman from Florida said, that is the difference. We
are aggressively trying to pursue ways of fixing the problem, and if we
do a piece, we come back and then we try to get to the next piece. In
the last few years since 2010, we keep running into a brick wall where
we are not getting the kind of cooperation.
But these are the kind of things that the government is supposed to
do. I think we are pretty clear about that. That is why it is
important, as Debbie said, for you to keep coming out here night in and
night out, because every night somebody is listening to you, some
nights more than others. Some nights we weren't sure if anyone was
listening.
But somebody is listening. You have to just keep pounding and
pounding and pounding that message because this is what is best for the
economy, for families, and everyone else that really is going to make a
difference. So it is good you are out here pounding away.
Mr. JEFFRIES. I thank the distinguished gentleman, first, from
California for his leadership and for all that you have done to make
sure that issues of importance to the next generation of Americans,
such as the one that we are discussing here today, get prominence on
the House floor, this great vehicle for communicating to the American
people, and, of course, to be here with the still young pioneers of
this wonderful effort, Congresswoman
[[Page H6887]]
Wasserman Schultz and Congressman Ryan. It is just a great honor.
Clearly, we have a student loan debt crisis that commands the
attention of the American people and should command the attention of
people here in the House of Representatives and on the other side of
the Capitol, but does not always do so, which is why communicating the
urgency of the situation is so significant, just the notion.
I have got constituents just shocked by the fact that, collectively,
we have got over $1 trillion of student loan debt here in America. That
is a very real number in terms of its implications, as you pointed out,
Congressman Swalwell, for the capacity of younger Americans to robustly
pursue the American Dream.
When you are saddled with that level of debt burden, it makes it far
more difficult to start a family, far more difficult to purchase a
home, far more difficult to be part of the next generation of great
American entrepreneurs and innovators, because you are less likely to
take a risk if you have got this monthly student loan bill that you are
unsure as to how you would pay if you were to take some time off to
start a business, to invent the next Google or Facebook or Twitter.
And so this is really an issue of great significance to us, as
Americans. And it is a shame. I will make this last observation.
I sat on the Budget Committee for the previous 2 years in the 113th
Congress, and the same is the case this year, that Republicans continue
to put forth a budget that is not designed to alleviate the problem of
higher education affordability. It is designed to make the problem
worse.
It will cut over $220 billion over a 10-year period in Federal
Government assistance in a variety of ways to younger Americans who are
struggling to get a college education and pursue the American Dream.
That is something that we have got to be able to address moving
forward or move in a different direction in terms of who the American
people send to this Congress to do their business.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. I am wondering, especially for our
pioneers here tonight, if it would surprise you to hear that, since
2004, when you started this effort, student loan debt has increased
from $346 million collectively for the country to the $1.2 trillion
that it is today. That is an increase of 235 percent.
What has happened or what hasn't happened?
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Well, what hasn't happened is a focus in a
bipartisan way on making sure that we make college affordability a top
priority.
I will tell you that I know my husband and I are at the intersection
in our family of wanting to make sure that, as we send our twins, two
at once, off to college 2 years from now, we will be able to, one, be
able to supplement as much as possible their college education so that,
knowing what we know about the potential for them to have that debt
burden when they graduate, we can relieve that possibility, and trying
to figure out how the heck we are going to add that double-whammy
expense when they start college and at the same time being pretty
panicked about how much debt they will have to go in themselves if we
can't really make sure--and families all across--less about me and more
about the sort of average middle class family that is trying to make
sure that they can make ends meet for their whole family and make sure
that they can send their kids off to start their lives, which is why
President Obama and congressional Democrats have proposed that the
first 2 years of college be free.
I will tell you that I have a lot of folks at home in south Florida
who have said to me, ``You know, if I only had to worry about my kid's
junior and senior year and how we were going to pay for that and we
knew that at least they could get an AA degree.''
Over 100 years ago, when we established free universal access to
public education in elementary grades and eventually secondary grades,
no one would question. That was considered controversial back then. No
one today would consider universal free public education, except maybe
some of our friends on the other side of the aisle. Actually, I take
that back. But you wouldn't question, you wouldn't think, that
universal access to public education should be free.
We are at the point now in the 21st century where there shouldn't be
any question that the first 2 years of college should be free, and we
need our colleagues on the other side of the aisle to join us in that.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. And part of this is not just the first 2 years of
college free, but Democrats are also pushing initiatives like how do
you streamline and get high school kids into community college classes
early while they are still in high school to start taking and reducing
some of those costs.
We have programs in Canton at Stark State where you can get 13 credit
hours towards a welding certificate. Thirteen of 30 hours can be done
before you even graduate from high school. So that reduces and it is
free because it is part of your high school public education. So now
you are already starting.
So it is not just about reducing student loans and reducing debt and
Pell Grants and streamlining the first 2 years. But we also, I think,
have an obligation to streamline the current system that is K-12 or K-
14 and make sure we narrow that down.
I have got to step out, but I just want to say thank you. You have
got another Irish guy here to carry the flag.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Another Floridian, too.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Another Floridian. I do want to say just keep
pounding away. This is a great way to communicate. You guys are doing
it. We have to get more and more from your classes to be up here. So
keep up the good work. And I am out.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. I am glad this reunion happened. You
inspire us to continue going forward.
I want to ask the gentleman from New York--I have been to Manhattan.
It reminds me a lot--Manhattan and Brooklyn and Queens and Harlem--
reminds me a lot of what we see in Silicon Valley and San Francisco,
just the young entrepreneurial minds.
But when we go to these startup spaces or these incubator hubs, I
constantly hear how much student loan debt affects their ability to
invest in themselves and their businesses, and we are finding that our
generation is the least entrepreneurial generation America has ever
known at our time.
I am wondering if you have heard stories about that and how it is
limiting investment.
Mr. JEFFRIES. That is absolutely correct. I think what we have to do
is really work on changing the equation to facilitate the great minds
that we have got in this current generation of younger Americans to be
able to go out and be innovators and entrepreneurial in the context of
a vastly changing economy as well as a changing dynamic in terms of the
affordability of college education.
I am troubled by the fact, one, if you look at the productivity of
the American worker, what we have seen, of course, since the early
1970s is that it has increased dramatically, in excess of 275 percent
in terms of American worker productivity.
At the same time, wages during that period from the early 1970s to
the present have remained largely stagnant, less than 10 percent. So
the equation for the American worker has changed.
So what we have is that we have got younger Americans entering into a
workforce where the fundamental equation in terms of their compensation
has changed dramatically for the worse, the cost of a college education
has increased, the amount of financial assistance relative to the cost
of that college education has remained stagnant, if not declined in
real dollars, and the expectation in terms of the student debt loan
burden one is expected to shoulder upon graduation has exploded
exponentially.
You add all those things together and it is no surprise that you are
going to find yourself in a situation where people don't have the same
capability of being entrepreneurial as prior generations.
FDR, of course, brought forth the New Deal. What we need for this
current generation of Americans is just a fairer deal in the context of
giving them the same opportunities to robustly pursue the American
Dream, start great companies, innovate as prior generations, so we can
continue to be great.
[[Page H6888]]
I would also note that downtown Brooklyn, interestingly enough, which
I represent in the wonderful Eighth Congressional District----
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Is that where Silicon Alley is?
Mr. JEFFRIES. That is part of Silicon Alley. I am so glad that you
are familiar with our East Coast lingo.
But it also has more college students in downtown Brooklyn than
Boston and Cambridge combined. So there has been a great number of
young people who have come to Brooklyn who are contributing to our
fantastic innovation culture, but who are struggling with the
fundamentals of today's economy and higher education structure that is
working against them.
That is why we are here on the floor of the House of Representatives
fighting to change that.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Here on the floor any Californian would
be nervous when he or she is outnumbered by Floridians.
We are joined by the gentleman from Florida who represents West Palm
Beach, Jupiter/Martin County area.
What are you hearing in your district about student loan debt?
Mr. MURPHY of Florida. First of all, I want to thank the gentleman
from California for putting this together and, really, your leadership.
You have been at this for years now, talking to other Members of
Congress on both sides of the aisle, reminding them about what a
critical issue this is.
Whether I am talking to constituents in my district throughout the
State of Florida or people here in the House, we have to do more to
help more people get access to quality and affordable education at all
levels, but certainly higher education.
When you look at what I would argue is one of the biggest problems in
our country right now--and that is the disappearing middle class and
this growing divide we have in our country--unfortunately or
fortunately, depending on how you look at it, as economies continue to
evolve and progress, education becomes more and more of a critical
component of that.
Yet, you look at the policies and you look at really what is holding
so many people back, just listening to the gentleman from New York here
talking about that lack of opportunity and the debt that is holding so
many people back from taking that risk to go ahead and become that
entrepreneur, to be that innovative spirit that made America so great
because they might have $100,000 of debt, they might have a family,
they might have some kids, and they are so concerned about this debt,
they don't want to take that risk.
That is not what America is about. America is about taking that risk
with having education to do it and then turning it into something
great. And understanding that not every risk is going to always pay
off, but you have to have that background, that education, to get you
there.
And if you are saddled with hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt
and overly complex methods to repay them, not being able to refinance,
et cetera, then you have a problem.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. MURPHY of Florida. I yield to the gentlewoman from Florida.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Because I want to engage as we used to do. And
I know that you do this as well. But I just want to follow up on what
you just said because the gentleman from California posed the question
and stated the fact that millennials today really aren't starting new
businesses. You would think--and we envision them to be the start-up
generation. They are living in a start-up era, but, yet, they can't see
it.
To use the vernacular of the gentleman of Florida, Congressman Meeks,
when we were throwing things around on the House floor 10 years ago,
let's put the cookie on the bottom shelf here.
If, as you just said, they are saddled with the burden of significant
debt coming out of college when they get a degree, it is very difficult
for them to see a pathway to develop that small business, to envision
being a pioneer of the next great industry.
So we are literally saddling them with a heavy burden as they leave
what is supposed to be the jumping-off point for the next phase of
their lives. We are supposed to be passing them the baton so that they
can move America forward. It is just not fair. It is not right. And our
friends on the other side of the aisle are part of the problem.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Millennials are very collaborative. They
are, I would believe, a problem-solving generation.
What is so frustrating when we talk to them at college campuses or at
their work sites is they ask, ``Well, what are you doing about it?''
And I believe my colleagues here would be happy, thrilled, to work with
our colleagues across the aisle on solutions on this.
But I am just curious. Do you know how many bills we voted on to
address student loan debt this Congress? Zero. Zero bills.
{time} 1900
At the end of the day, it is not just the least entrepreneurial. We
are the least home owning. We are more likely to delay starting a
family by about 5 years. So everything that the generation before us
had, we are delaying: buying a home, starting a family, starting a
business. As the gentleman from New York pointed out, it is affecting
the economy.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. I wanted to share my own personal story very
briefly.
You know, I happened to get married fairly young at 24 years old.
Graduating from a public university, the University of Florida, without
debt, the progress I was able to make at the beginning of my adult
life, at the beginning of my professional life, enabled me to have a
much longer ramp and see many more possibilities because I didn't have
that debt.
My husband and I were able to buy our first house right after we got
married, and we have been able to make sure that we can make choices
that will maximize our opportunities to ensure that our children, when
we had them and now are raising them, have opportunities.
It is so sad that the millennial generation really doesn't see it,
doesn't believe it, and that is because there is obstacle after
obstacle being thrown in their way right from the start of their most
formative years.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. On an issue you would never imagine to be
partisan.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Unbelievable.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Well, I thank the gentlewoman from
Florida for joining us. I hope to see her back.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Thank you.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Mr. Speaker, I don't know if the
gentleman from New York heard, but in 2012, the New York Fed reported
that for the first time in a decade, 30-year-old student borrowers were
less likely to take out a home mortgage than other young people.
Are you seeing in the New York area or hearing from your constituents
about how student loan debt is affecting their ability to buy a house?
I yield to the gentleman from New York.
Mr. JEFFRIES. Mr. Speaker, that is absolutely the case. Certainly in
Brooklyn, which has become now an attractive place for so many people
to reside, not just from the city, the region, all across the country
and, indeed, the world, yet many of the young people who have moved to
Brooklyn who are starting a life in Brooklyn are renting in Brooklyn.
They are unable to purchase a home.
Some of that has to do with the significant appreciation in home
value that we have witnessed over the last decade, but a lot of that
has to do with the fact that they can't see their way to either a
downpayment on a home or carrying a monthly mortgage, given the student
loan debt burden that they have been forced to shoulder as a result of
the structure that has been put in place in terms of higher education
in America.
You made an important observation earlier in referencing the
President's plan for free community college education. If we can just
dwell there for a second, what is important to note is it used to be
the case, for prior generations who started the great American middle
class after helping to liberate the world coming back home to America
after World War II, that if you just had a high school diploma, for
many individuals, that was a pathway into
[[Page H6889]]
the middle class. That is no longer the case in today's 21st century
economy.
You can get a high school diploma at a high-quality public school for
free without any debt. So, at that point, as you entered into the
workforce, you could think about starting a family, purchasing a home,
and doing other things consistent with what it means to be part of the
great American middle class. That is no longer the case. A high school
diploma is not a pathway into the middle class. You have got to at
least go to college, if not get a graduate degree.
Given the high cost of a college education, it has changed the
equation for younger Americans in terms of their entry into the middle
class. That is why looking at bold proposals, such as dramatically
reducing, if not eliminating, the cost of public higher education at
the community college level, if not beyond, is something that we have
got to put front and center on the agenda here in the House of
Representatives.
Mr. MURPHY of Florida. Mr. Speaker, adding on to what the gentleman
from New York said, not only should we be looking at those sorts of
proposals, but we should be looking at some of the existing programs we
have, like Pell grants. The numbers that we have been talking about,
this skyrocketing cost of education has increased 200-some percent over
the last decade. That is unsustainable.
Yet look at what Pell grants have done. The maximum Pell grant has
not gone up ratably in the same amount of time. So let's talk about
expanding these programs.
I think we need to really change the dynamic of the conversation to
your point where it is really about return on investment. You know, we
need to look at this from a business perspective: What is the best ROI
of taxpayer money?
I look at some of the bills that we have all worked on together here.
One bill that comes to mind is called the SAVE Act. It is a bill where
we identified $479 billion of wasteful, duplicative, fraudulent
government spending. Let's start implementing and start finding those
savings and putting that into education, ensuring that that return on
investment for taxpayer money is truly there. We all know a dollar
spent on education is going to come back in droves for future
generations in this economy.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Congressman Murphy, your district, the
State of Florida, has a lot of veterans. People always ask: What is the
biggest surprise you have found since going to Congress?
I don't know if you guys have had that question posed to you.
For me, the biggest surprise I have found since coming to Congress is
just how poorly our veterans have been treated. Something that is even
more surprising, which I found doing these Future Forum tours--I don't
know if you have heard about this--but a GI Bill doesn't even cover the
full cost of college anymore.
So the veterans who have served our country, fought abroad, risked
their lives, saw their friends and sometimes family members killed,
when they come back home, the GI Bill can't even get them all the way
through college. That is how expensive college has become, and we can't
even take care of our veterans.
So when you talk about Pell grants, I am wondering if you have talked
to veterans and heard about the gaps in funding that they are
experiencing as they try and advance their skills when they get back
home.
I yield to the gentleman from Florida.
Mr. MURPHY of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I have, and I think it is a great
topic to talk about, and one that we should be able to find bipartisan
support on.
Because of some of the conversations I have had with some veterans
and folks in my district, we introduced some legislation that would
help veterans with their application costs. It's not just the cost of
education. Sometimes it is just getting there. And these application
costs getting into college can be $200, $500, and it could be even more
than that.
So when you are coming back and you are thinking about a decision,
you might only have a couple of hundred bucks and you might have to
make a decision, I am only going to apply to one school. That is not, I
don't think, the intent. You should be able to have some options and
see what options come back to you where you get accepted, et cetera.
So, in this legislation, the intent is to waive some of these fees
for application costs for these veterans to help them get onto that
higher education.
Mr. JEFFRIES. Mr. Speaker, if I can add to that observation that was
made by my good friend from the Sunshine State, the three of us had a
wonderful opportunity to visit Israel together, along with several
other members of our class and, of course, Steny Hoyer, who led the
delegation in August of 2013.
I was struck in our conversations with some of the members of the
Israeli society how well those individuals who had served in the IDF
and then matriculated into society were treated. Their service in the
IDF was highly valued--not just via words, but through deeds--and it
enabled them to really build a successful career. They were treated
with reverence.
Congressman Swalwell, one of the things that perhaps was most
disconcerting about my first few years in this institution is there is
a lot of rhetoric--I guess I shouldn't be surprised that this is a
place where there is a lot of hot air often spewed--that is devoid of
substance. And in the area of veterans, in particular, what we find is
that there is a lot of talk about treating veterans appropriately in
terms of the sacrifice that they have made, their service, but we
haven't really filled in the blanks in terms of substance.
One of the areas that clearly is problematic is the fact, though we
are promising to enable them once they leave their service to assist
with furthering their educational goals, we are not providing them with
the financial assistance and the resources necessary to actually make
that happen. So I embrace efforts by Congressman Murphy and others to
try to fill in the blanks in that regard, but a whole lot more needs to
be done. We should be treating our veterans with the same reverence and
respect, not just rhetorically, but substantively, as is done in
Israel, our good friend and ally, and many other places in this world.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Mr. Speaker, it was an unforgettable
trip. We learned a lot about their innovation economy, but we also saw
firsthand how they valued the service of those who stood on the front
lines for their country.
So we are hitting the end of our hour here.
The gentleman from Florida, any parting thoughts or actions?
Our generation, we are an action-oriented generation. We are not very
patient. We are a little stubborn. We like to see results.
And you come to Congress under the leadership of this House across
the aisle, and we don't see many results. I think we collectively want
to work with anyone who is willing to work with us on our Republican
colleagues' side to find results.
Any thoughts on what can we do to help a whole generation that is in
financial quicksand right now?
I yield to the gentleman from Florida.
Mr. MURPHY of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I want to remind those watching
and our friends on the other side of the aisle that this is, I think, a
great opportunity for bipartisanship.
When I talk to voters, whether it is around the district or around
the State, they are tired of seeing the nonsense. You know, they look
at their jobs and they haven't seen a raise in 10 years. They look at
their children who either maybe haven't gotten into college or do get
into college and graduate and they have got hundreds of thousands of
dollars of debt. When they turn on C-SPAN, they see us bickering and
arguing about nonsense.
This is a serious problem. This is something that has to be addressed
soon. It should have been addressed years ago. Let's stop the rhetoric
and let's start talking to each other and solving these problems and
making sure that, not only are we bringing down the cost of higher
education, but we are making sure that those who do have the student
loans are on an orderly repayment structure, one that makes sense, one
that is reasonable per
[[Page H6890]]
their income. Let's make sure that the dream of America is still alive
for future generations.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from
Florida for participating in this.
I invite anyone at home to follow along, follow the conversation at
#futureforum. Engage with these Members and others.
I yield to the gentleman from New York. Any parting thoughts on what
we can do as a Congress to unite and solve this problem?
Mr. JEFFRIES. Mr. Speaker, I thank the distinguished gentleman from
the Golden State for his leadership and for putting forth this effort,
bringing in younger Members of Congress to be able to speak to issues
of relevance, not just to the entire body of the American people, but
specifically to the next generation of Americans that will continue to
make this country great as long as we provide them with the tools and
the opportunity.
I agree with my good friend from Florida that this is an issue that
should not be partisan in nature. This is an issue that impacts people
from north to south, to the east and the west, from urban communities,
suburban communities, rural communities, red States, blue States, all
over America. I think what we are saying here today is that we extend
out our arms, our olive branch of friendship and partnership on behalf
of the American people to try to solve this problem together.
It is clear that there is a problem, it cannot be denied, and it is
one that requires urgent intervention in order to make sure that we can
continue to preserve the American Dream for the greatest number of
younger Americans possible. Right now, the dream is being suffocated in
ways that threaten our economic vitality moving forward, and that is a
tragedy. But I remain optimistic. We were sent here all collectively to
get things done, and I look forward to working together in that regard.
Mr. SWALWELL of California. Mr. Speaker, that is right. We were sent
here to do our job, to be problem solvers and really be voices, I
think, for all generations of Americans, but especially this generation
which is the largest generation America has ever known. It is the most
diverse generation America has ever known, and I think it is one of the
most aspirational generations America has ever known. They are waiting
for anybody in this body to help them get out of this financial
quicksand and start being able to be empowered and really realize their
own American Dream.
So I thank the gentlemen for participating today. I thank our
pioneers from the 30-Somethings and invite them to come back for a 10-
year reunion.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
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