[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 31, Number 7 (Monday, February 20, 1995)]
[Pages 234-237]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks on Receiving the Economic Report of the President and an 
Exchange With Reporters

February 13, 1995

    The President. As you know, we are here to receive the annual 
Economic Report of the President. So I want to begin by thanking the 
Council of Economic Advisers: Dr. Laura Tyson, our Chair; Dr. Joseph 
Stiglitz; and Dr. Martin Baily.
    This economic report is an important milestone for me. It measures 
our success in fulfilling the mission that I brought to the Presidency. 
I ran for this office to help to restore the American dream and to 
guarantee its availability for all Americans into the 21st century, to 
make sure that the middle class would still be growing and that work 
would still be rewarded. The best way to do that is by building a new 
partnership between Americans and their Government and Americans and 
each other, the partnership that I have called the New Covenant.
    Essentially, it means that our responsibility here in Washington is 
to expand opportunity while shrinking bureaucracy, to empower people to 
make the most of their own lives, and to enhance our security, not only 
abroad but here at home as well. At the same time, it means that we must 
demand more responsibility from every citizen, especially those who seek 
the benefits of Government action, responsibility for our country, for 
our communities, for our families, and for ourselves.
    These responsibilities have defined our economic strategy. We have 
pursued deficit reduction to make more of our Nation's resources 
available for private investment, growth, and jobs. We have reduced the 
size of the Government's bureaucracy, cutting the Federal work force to 
its lowest level in 30 years. We have expanded trade to provide more 
opportunity for jobs and higher incomes. And we have invested in the 
American people, from Head Start to the Goals 2000 program, to the 
program to help young people who don't go to college but do need further 
training, and of course what we've done in national service and student 
loans.
    We've done all of that to help our people get the skills they need 
so that they can grow and prosper in a global economy. And now, 2 years 
into our administration, we can see the positive results of this 
strategy: almost 6 million new jobs, the lowest core rate of inflation 
in 30 years, the deficit reduced by over $600 billion.
    It's not enough. Too many of our people are still working harder for 
less, with less security. So today I'm sending Congress two new bills 
that are the next installment in our comprehensive effort to raise the 
wages and the incomes of working Americans and to give them more 
opportunity in return for their responsibility of learning and working. 
These bills reward work. They raise living standards. They allow people 
to invest in themselves and to make the most of their own lives.
    The ``Working Wage Increase Act'' would increase the minimum wage by 
90 cents over 2 years. This would benefit over 11 million workers and 
their families. It would be the equivalent of an $1,800 raise or about 7 
months of groceries for a family.
    The middle class bill of rights has four provisions that will also 
benefit those who are working to help themselves: a $500 tax cut for 
families with children under 13; a way to allow more families to invest 
in an IRA and withdraw those investments tax free to pay for education, 
health care, purchase of a first home, or the care of an elderly parent; 
a voucher to improve worker skills worth $2,600 a year for 2 years for 
people who are unemployed or who are working for wages low enough to 
qualify for Federal training; and of course, I think, over the long run 
most importantly, a tax deduction for the cost of education beyond high 
school.
    The success of the United States is clearly dependent upon our 
ability to educate and develop the capacities of every one of our 
citizens. That's what the middle class bill of rights is all about. It 
goes with our previous efforts to expand Head Start, to work to help 
public schools achieve excellence, to move people into the work force 
who don't go to college, and of course, to expand the student loan 
program.
    This Economic Report of the President shows that this strategy is 
working. We should not abandon it. Instead, we should build on it. We 
should deepen it. When you're doing something that's working, you

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shouldn't turn around and do something else. You should do what you're 
doing better, do more of it, keep going in the same direction. That's 
what we're trying to do. We're reducing Government spending. We're 
cutting Government bureaucracy. But we are increasing our investment in 
the American people. The middle class bill of rights, raising the 
minimum wage, these are things we ought to do. The evidence that we 
ought to do them is in the success of the last 2 years' strategy in the 
Economic Report to the President.
    I thank Dr. Tyson and the others and, of course, all of those on our 
economic team and all of those in the Congress and throughout the 
country who've done so much to make this report a reality.
    Thank you.

Minimum Wage

    Q. What do you think the chances are of getting the minimum wage, 
Mr. President?
    The President. Well, I think they should be pretty good. The more we 
see the evidence--you know, there was a very moving piece in one of the 
papers yesterday on that community in North Carolina that has such a 
high percentage of minimum wage workers.
    I saw a television interview the other night with a lady working, I 
believe, in southwest Virginia, who gave an answer to the question that 
has become the battle cry for the minimum wage around here when she 
said, ``Well, some people say if we raise your minimum wage that you 
could lose your job because more of the work will be done by machines,'' 
and she looked at the interviewer and said, ``Honey, I'll take my 
chances.'' [Laughter] That's sort of become our battle cry around here 
for the minimum wage.
    I will say this, in 1989, or the last time the minimum wage was 
raised, whatever year it was, '91, the bipartisan support was truly 
impressive. It ought to be there again. Half of this minimum wage 
increase is necessary just to bring the minimum wage back up to the 
point where it was when it was raised the last time. The other half 
would be a modest increase in the living standards of people who are 
working hard to support themselves and often their children. So I'm 
going to keep fighting for it. I'm going to keep working for it. And my 
instinct is, we've got a pretty good chance to pass it.

Deficit Reduction

    Q. Mr. President, you've taken a lot of criticism for your budget, 
and a lot of people are saying that you haven't done enough to reduce 
the deficit in the coming 5 years, that you actually have stopped doing 
what we were doing before. I think Speaker Gingrich today said that 
maybe your budget was even--that it could even be a factor that would 
tip the country into recession. What do you say to these critics?
    The President. Well, let me just say, first of all, all those 
people, including the Speaker, were here for 12 years when we had a 
bipartisan conspiracy to quadruple the debt of this country. With 
Republican Presidents and Democratic Congressmen, they quadrupled the 
debt of the country. If it weren't for the interest we have to pay on 
the debt that was accumulated between 1981 and 1993, we would have a 
balanced budget next year and a surplus thereafter. And we have cut the 
deficit more than it has ever been cut before in history, I might say, 
with no help--no help--not a single vote from the Republicans.
    Now, they're in the majority, and it's their turn. If they don't 
like my budget, let's see what theirs is. They promised--they made 
promises that would make the deficit bigger with all the tax cuts and 
spending increases they talked about. Now the real world is crowding in 
on them. I have done my duty. I have sent a budget to the Congress that 
contains another $140 billion in spending cuts, that pays for the middle 
class bill of rights, including the education tax deduction, that 
reduces the deficit by $80 billion more, and that does it without 
cutting Social Security, Medicare, veterans, or education. It is time 
for them to take a little responsibility.
    They were here during the years of the eighties when we created this 
deficit problem. America was never buried in a deficit problem until 
1981. They voted and voted and voted and voted. I got here 2 years ago. 
I have been fighting this as hard as possible. I have welcomed them to 
give me their ideas. I have said, I will work with you to reduce the 
deficit more. And I will do that, but let's

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see what they want to do to do it. They have some responsibility, too. 
Where is their budget? What are they for? Let's see what they're for. I 
want to work with them. You know I find it amazing that people who are 
here every year, digging the country in the hole I've been digging us 
out of, are now saying I'm not getting this out quick enough. I mean, 
where were they, and where are they? It's time for them to suit up and 
show up.

Surgeon-General-Designate

    Q. Are you going to the mat on Dr. Foster?
    The President. Yes.
    Q. Mr. President, there are some who would argue now that you're 
going to be spending so much time trying to get Dr. Foster confirmed, 
it's going to detract from your other priorities, because this looks 
like it's going to be one hell of a fight. Are you prepared for that 
right now?
    The President. Yes, but I want to say, just because you've spent a 
lot of time talking about it, doesn't mean it's going to take us a lot 
of time to do it. [Laughter] We've got a lot of folks that work here and 
a lot of things to do. And every day we may only be talking about one or 
two things, but we're working on a lot of things. It will not in any way 
undermine the impact of the Presidency on the other work we have to do.
    And let me also say--let me go back to that other question. I don't 
see how anybody could seriously say that our budget would cause a 
recession. They caused the recession before I ever showed up here. Since 
I have been here, we have reduced the deficit, we have grown the 
economy. After we presented our budget, the markets had a very positive 
response to it: Long term interest rates dropped; the stock market went 
up. It was seen as a very prudent budget. Now if they can do better, 
then we ought to get beyond the politics and let them put their proposal 
on the table and let us work through. At some point, they have to vote. 
They've got to get beyond the talking. I've gotten beyond the talking. 
I've given the budget. Let's see theirs.

Entitlements

    Q. Why haven't you taken on entitlements, Mr. President?
    The President. I did take on entitlements. The Republicans ran out 
against me last time. Don't you remember that, in '94? And don't you 
remember all the surveys that said, ``Democrats losing their edge among 
elders'' because the Republicans, the people now in the majority of 
Congress, launched those vicious ads claiming we had tried to tax Social 
Security recipients, when in fact the upper 13 percent of Social 
Security recipients were only asked to pay taxes on their Social 
Security on the same basis that private pensioners were.
    We took on entitlements. We had savings in Medicare. We had savings 
in Medicaid. We did that. And the Republicans said they hated that. Now 
let's see what they do. It's their turn. They're in the majority in 
Congress. It is time--I don't have a vote; let them do it. Do you 
remember when Ronald Reagan--they protected him for years. They said 
President Reagan and President Bush, in 12 years between them, vetoed 
one appropriations bill because it didn't spend enough money and got 
away with blaming the Congress for raising the deficit. It beat anything 
I ever saw.
    Now, I have tried to work with the Congress. I have tried not to be 
political. I have tried to say, ``Here's my budget. If you've got a 
better idea, you put your ideas up. Then we'll work together.'' So far 
their reaction is, ``It hurts us too much to put our ideas forward. We 
think we'll criticize yours.'' The American people are sick of this. 
They want us to work together.

White House Conference on the Economy

    Q. Why are you going to have an economic conference in March?
    The President. What?
    Q. Why are you having an economic conference in March?
    The President. Because I think it would be a good thing to get those 
people back together that gathered 2 years ago, not only to review the 
progress that has been made but, more importantly, to look at the thorny 
problems that remain. The middle class still feels squeezed in the midst 
of a recovery.

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    And I want us to focus on the challenges that we face for the 21st 
century in terms of ordinary middle class people. What can we do to 
raise living standards and increase security for people who are working 
harder and harder? How are we going to spread the benefits of economic 
recovery to the middle class? How are we going to grow the middle class 
and shrink the underclass and still keep this marvelous environment for 
entrepreneurs in which so many people are doing better than they ever 
had before? That is a separate set of questions.
    Two years ago when that group gathered, we had to focus on just 
getting the economy out of the recession, getting the deficit down, 
getting the overall growth up. That has happened. Now we need to focus 
on what still needs to be done to make sure we're solidifying and 
strengthening and growing the middle class instead of dividing and 
shrinking it.

The Republican Party

    Q. Mr. President, is the Republican Party being taken over by 
extreme right-wing, anti-abortion elements? [Laughter]
    The President. Well, I hope not, but that's up to them, isn't it?

Surgeon-General-Designate

    Q. Do you have the votes for Dr. Foster now, Mr. President?
    The President. He hasn't even had a hearing yet. I haven't even 
canvassed them.
    Q. Do you think you'll have the votes?
    The President. I think if he's judged on his life's work, on the 
merits, I think he'll be confirmed. I think that if he gets the kind of 
hearing I would expect him to get from a fair-minded Senate, I think 
he'll be confirmed.

Border Crossing Fees

    Q. Mr. President, are you going to change your border crossing fees? 
Some Texans saw advisers of yours today and thought--[inaudible]--Mr. 
Panetta was going to take a closer look at it.
    The President. I certainly think we have to look at it.

Presidential Candidates

    Q. Are you happy that Speaker Gingrich is not going to run against 
you for the Presidency?
    Q. They're dropping like flies, Mr. President.
    The President. Did he say that today? They're dropping like flies? 
Is that what you said? I notice there's still a few. [Laughter] I wish 
the absence of Republican opposition was my main worry, but I don't 
think it is. Somebody will show up, sure as the world. [Laughter] Thank 
you very much.

Note: The President spoke at 2:23 p.m. in the Oval Office at the White 
House.