[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: WILLIAM J. CLINTON (1999, Book II)]
[October 23, 1999]
[Pages 1868-1869]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



The President's Radio Address
October 23, 1999

    Good morning. Today I want to talk about what we must do to meet one 
of the critical challenges of the next century: the aging of America.
    This week I sat down with congressional leaders of both parties at 
the White House to ask them to work with me to construct an overall 
framework for completing our work on the spending bills that reflect the 
priorities and the values of our people. The cornerstone of that 
framework must be paying down our debt, investing in education and other 
critical priorities, strengthening and modernizing Medicare, and saving 
Social Security for the retirement of the baby boom generation.
    If we value the financial well-being of our parents and 
grandparents, if we believe that all Americans deserve to retire with 
dignity, if we want to make sure we don't place an unfair burden on the 
backs of the next generation of young parents, then we must seize this 
moment of unprecedented prosperity and budget surpluses to extend the 
life of Social Security.
    Unfortunately, so far, instead of making the tough choices to save 
Social Security and extend its life to 2050, the Republican majority in 
Congress, especially some of the House Republican leaders, have been 
accusing the Democrats of spending the Social Security surplus. They've 
also been claiming that their budget doesn't spend the Social Security 
surplus.
    As it happens, neither claim is true. Oh, they've used a lot of 
budget gimmicks--like claiming the census and ordinary Pentagon 
expenditures are actually emergencies--in an effort to claim they're not 
spending billions from the Social Security surplus. But unfortunately 
for their argument, their own Congressional Budget Office has said 
they've already spent more than $18 billion of the Social Security 
surplus. But the main problem is, while spending this money, their plan 
doesn't extend the solvency of Social Security by a single day. I

[[Page 1869]]

think we can do better. The American people deserve more than confusion, 
doubletalk, and delay on this issue.
    So it's time to have a clear, straightforward bill on the table, and 
next week I plan to present one, legislation that ensures that all 
Social Security payroll tax will go to savings and debt reduction for 
Social Security. Over 15 years, this will allow us to pay down more than 
$3\1/2\ trillion of debt, to be debt-free as a nation for the first time 
since 1835 when Andrew Jackson was President.
    But my plan goes further. After a decade of debt reduction from 
protecting Social Security funds, all the interest savings from this 
debt reduction will then be reinvested in Social Security, extending its 
solvency into the middle of the next century. This is the first big step 
toward truly saving Social Security. It will take the Trust Fund out 
beyond the lifespan of the baby boom generation--no gimmicks, no 
budgetary sleight of hand; just the right choices that really add up to 
protecting the Social Security surplus, extending the life of Social 
Security, and paying down the debt by 2015.
    Let's remember what's at stake. Since 1935, Social Security has 
provided a solid foundation for retirement and lifted millions of our 
people out of poverty. But the number of older Americans will double as 
the baby boomers retire and the number of workers supporting each 
beneficiary will decline. Today, there are 3.4 workers for each Social 
Security beneficiary. By 2030, the ratio will be down to two to one. 
That will put a big strain on the system. If nothing is done, the Social 
Security Trust Fund will be completely depleted by the year 2034. We 
can't let that happen, and we don't have to. We can easily go back to 
2050.
    Social Security was created in the depths of the Depression. Today, 
we have the longest peacetime expansion in history, with 7 consecutive 
years of fiscal improvement and back-to-back surpluses for the first 
time in 42 years. This gives us an historic opportunity and a 
responsibility to protect and guarantee Social Security for future 
generations. Again, I urge the congressional majority to put aside 
partisanship and achieve something of lasting value for all our people.
    Thanks for listening.

Note: The address was recorded at 5:30 p.m. on October 22 in the Oval 
Office at the White House for broadcast at 10:06 a.m. on October 23. The 
transcript was made available by the Office of the Press Secretary on 
October 22 but was embargoed for release until the broadcast.