[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 39, Number 36 (Monday, September 8, 2003)]
[Pages 1131-1136]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks on Labor Day in Richfield, Ohio

September 1, 2003

    Thank you all. I don't know about you, but we needed a little rain 
in Crawford. [Laughter] Send it that way, if you don't mind. [Laughter] 
Thank you so much for coming out on Labor Day. I appreciate so many 
folks

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enduring the rain to say hello to the President. I am thrilled you are 
here, and I'm thrilled I'm here.
    The working people of this country deserve a day off, and it looks 
like you're enjoying it. [Laughter] I want you to know that I know the 
strength of the American economy comes from hard-working men and women. 
This country prospers because of people who give their best effort every 
day to support their families, to go to work, to make America a better 
place. One man who traveled with me today, who understands this, and who 
loves his country, is Mr. Frank Hanley. I'm proud to be traveling with 
him, and I know you're proud to have him as your president.
    You know, it's interesting that it was union leaders who first 
suggested a day to honor America's workers. And I'm glad we do. And I'm 
proud to be here in Ohio with Ohio families celebrating Labor Day. I'm 
grateful to the Operating Engineers for hosting us today. This union 
represents men and women of great skill and great professional pride.
    I want you to think back to that fateful day, September the 11th, 
and what happened afterwards. It was then that the whole world saw the 
skill and commitment and incredible work of the Operating Engineers who 
manned the heavy equipment to clear Ground Zero. You overcame 
unimaginable challenges; you removed the rubble in record time. You are 
now working to make sure America is prepared for any emergency, and this 
Nation is grateful for your skill and your sacrifice.
    We're also grateful to some other hard-working Americans who don't 
have the day off, the people of the United States military who are 
winning the war against terror. The war against terror goes on. It goes 
on because we love freedom, and we're not going to change, and our 
enemies hate freedom. It goes on because there are coldblooded killers 
who have hijacked a religion. It goes on because we refuse to relent. 
And the best way to protect our homeland, the best way to make sure that 
we listen to the lessons of September the 11th, 2001, the best way to do 
our solemn duty to the American people is to chase the killers down, one 
by one, and bring them to justice.
    And so on this Labor Day, when many have the day off, we thank our 
men and women who wear our uniform. We thank them and their families. We 
thank their sacrifice, and we want all to know, you make our Nation 
proud.
    I appreciate our Secretary of Labor, Elaine Chao, for her hard work 
and her outreach to labor leaders all across the country.
    I want to thank Jim Gardner, the general vice president and business 
manager of Local 18 for--he's the host of this event. I want to thank 
Jim for setting up this beautiful site and for the weather. [Laughter]
    I traveled today as well with Chuck Canterbury. He's the president 
of the Fraternal Order of Police. I appreciate you coming, Chuck. I want 
to thank those who wear our Nation's uniform when it comes to providing 
police protection and fire protection. We appreciate your service.
    I like to remind people that a culture of responsibility is coming 
in America. One of the reasons why is that we see every day people who 
are willing to serve something greater than themself in life. Our 
children see heroes again, because they see police men and women and 
firefighters and emergency teams and military personnel who sacrifice 
for something greater than themselves in life. And for all the officers 
who are with us today, I thank you for your line of service for America.
    I want to thank Governor Bob Taft for greeting me at the airport 
today. I appreciate so very much two United States--the two United 
States Senators from the State of Ohio who are with me today, and I 
suspect may be looking for a ride back to Washington--[laughter]--
Senator George Voinovich and Senator Mike DeWine. Steve LaTourette and 
Ralph Regula, Members of the House of Representatives, are with us today 
as well, and I appreciate them coming. I mentioned Governor Taft, and 
Jennette Bradley, the Lieutenant Governor, is with us. Jim Trakas is 
with us, who is the Ohio State house majority leader. I want to thank 
all the local officials for coming out to say hello.

[[Page 1133]]

    Today I want to talk about our economy. I want people to understand 
that when somebody wants to work and can't find a job, it says we've got 
a problem in America that we're going to deal with. We want everybody in 
this country working. We want people to be able to realize their 
personal dreams by finding a job. And we've got a lot of strengths in 
this economy. One of the greatest strengths, of course, is the 
workforce. We've got the best workers in the world. We're the most 
productive workers in the entire world. Productivity is up. What 
productivity means is that we've got a lot of hard work, and we're using 
new technologies to make people more effective when it comes to the job, 
and that's important.
    You see, in 1979, it took more than 40 hours of labor to make a car, 
and now it takes 18 hours. We're productive. Our workers are really 
productive in America. Higher productivity not only means we can produce 
better products, but it means our people are better off. The more 
productive you are, the better off our workers are. You see, it's better 
to operate a backhoe than it is a shovel. That's what we mean by 
productivity. Higher productivity means that workers earn more, and it 
means it takes less time for workers to earn the money to buy the things 
they need.
    In 1908, the average factory worker had to labor for more than 2 
years to buy a Model T--more than 2 years of work to buy a car. Today, 
you can buy a family vehicle for about 7 months of salary. The higher 
the productivity rates, the better it is for American workers. We're a 
productive nation because of the good, hard-working Americans, and 
that's what we're here to celebrate today.
    You know, I also want you to focus on what we have overcome. I mean, 
we're a strong nation. We've got great foundations for growth, and we've 
overcome a lot as a country over the last couple of years. In early 
2000, the stock market started to decline. That affects you. It affects 
your savings. It affects your pension accounts. It was a forerunner of 
the recession that came. First quarter of 2001, we were in recession, 
but we acted to come out of that recession. We acted with tax relief, 
and it created big noise and big debate in Washington. But here's what I 
believe, and here's what I know: When you've got more money in your 
pocket, it means you're going to spend or save and invest. And when you 
spend and save or invest, somebody is going to produce a product for you 
to be able to spend your money on. When somebody produces a product, 
it's more likely somebody is going to be able to find a job. Tax relief 
was needed to stem the recession.
    They tell me it was a shallow recession. It was a shallow recession 
because of the tax relief. Some say, ``Well, maybe the recession should 
have been deeper.'' That bothers me when people say that. You see, a 
deeper recession would have meant more families would have been out of 
work. I'm interested in solving problems quickly. I want more people 
working.
    No, we did the right thing with tax relief, and we were beginning to 
pull out when the terrorists hit us. And they struck us hard. Cost our 
American economy about $80 billion. The attack of September the 11th had 
a high price tag to it. That's the equivalent of wiping out about one-
fifth of Ohio's economy. But we acted. Not only did we go on the 
offensive with a mighty and skilled military; we did some things to keep 
our people back at work.
    And one of the things that the Operating Engineers know we did--and 
I want to thank Frank for working with us--is that we fought for 
terrorism reinsurance to make sure big construction projects stayed on 
schedule. We worked to preserve thousands of jobs for America's 
construction workers, because we want people working in America. We want 
people to put food on the table. We want moms and dads to be able to do 
their duty as a mom or a dad.
    And so we began to recover from the terrorist attacks, and then we 
found out some of the citizens, some of the corporate CEOs, forgot what 
it means to be a responsible American. They forgot to do their duty. 
They didn't tell the truth to their shareholders and their employees. So 
we acted. We passed two new tough laws. And now the message is clear: If 
you don't tell the truth, there is going to be serious consequences. We 
expect the best out of corporate America.
    Yet the economy was still bumping along. We hadn't recovered from 
all the challenges,

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and so we passed tax relief again. I called upon Congress to pass the 
jobs-and-growth package, and we lowered taxes once again to create jobs. 
When you reduce taxes, people have more money. And I'm going to remind 
you of what we did. If you're a mom or a dad, we increased the child 
credit to $1,000 per child, and we put the checks in the mail, $400 
additional per child for American families, so you get to decide to do 
with--with the money. It's your choice. You see, after all, in 
Washington, we don't spend the Government's money; we spend your money.
    We reduced the marriage penalty. What kind of Tax Code is it that 
discourages marriage? [Laughter] We want to encourage marriage. We gave 
incentives to small businesses so that they can hire more people. We 
reduced taxes on capital gains and dividends to protect your savings 
accounts. We want the pension plans strong. We want the 401(k)s doing 
well. We reduced all taxes. We thought it was fairer not to try to pick 
and choose winners. If you pay taxes, you deserve relief. Three million 
people are now off the tax rolls; 3.9 million households received tax 
relief.
    No, we're making a difference. And the economy is beginning to grow, 
and that's what I'm interested in. I come with an optimistic message. I 
believe there are better days ahead for people who are working and 
looking for work. Economic output is rising faster than expected. Low 
interest rates mean that families can save billions by refinancing their 
homes. I bet some of you have refinanced your homes, put a little extra 
money into your pocket. Consumer spending is on the rise. Companies are 
seeing more orders, especially orders for heavy equipment.
    No, things are getting better. But there are some things we've got 
to do to make sure the economy continues to grow. I want you to 
understand that I understand that Ohio manufacturers are hurting, that 
there's a problem with the manufacturing sector. And I understand for a 
full recovery, to make sure people can find work, that manufacturing 
must do better. And we've lost thousands of jobs in manufacturing, some 
of it because of productivity gains--in other words, people can have the 
same output with fewer people--but some of it because production moved 
overseas.
    So I told Secretary Don Evans of the Commerce Department, I want him 
to appoint an Assistant Secretary to focus on the needs of 
manufacturers, to make sure our manufacturing job base is strong and 
vibrant. In other words, any part of a good recovery for the State of 
Ohio and other manufacturing States has got to be for the manufacturing 
sector to come around. One way to make sure that we--the manufacturing 
sector does well is to send a message overseas, say, ``Look, we expect 
there to be a fair playing field when it comes to trade.'' See, we in 
America believe we can compete with anybody just so long as the rules 
are fair, and we intend to keep the rules fair.
    We have a responsibility that when somebody hurts, Government has 
got to move. And that's why we've signed extensions to the unemployment 
insurance, so people can get their feet back on the ground. Elaine's 
Department, the Department of Labor, passes out emergency grants for 
people who are hurting to cover health care costs and child care costs 
and other critical needs. And that's a useful role for the Government.
    I proposed to Congress a new idea to help people get back to work, 
particularly those that are--have the hardest time finding work. We call 
them reemployment accounts. I proposed spending $3.6 billion to help a 
million Americans find work. We'd write--put some money aside for 
somebody to use for daycare or retraining, to be able to move. If 
they're able to find a job in a prescribed period of time, they'd be 
able to keep the difference between what we gave them to begin with and 
what was unspent, in other words, a reemployment bonus. It's a novel 
approach to help a million Americans who are having a tough time finding 
work to find work. Reemployment accounts make sense. Congress needs to 
act.
    We've also got to make sure that our people get the right skills. 
Listen, technology changes. I understand that. You know that. We want 
our people to be trained, to keep up with new technology, just like they 
do right here. I want to thank the Operating Engineers. I want to thank 
Frank for his leadership. I want to thank the local leaders for

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their leadership and understanding that in order for a man or woman to 
stay up, there needs to be retraining opportunities. As our economy 
changes, people need to be retrained. The Operating Engineers do a great 
job right here of helping people. That's all the worker wants, is to be 
helped, be given the skills necessary to realize his or her dreams.
    The high-growth job training initiative in this administration is 
aiming just to do that. It's a collaborative effort with community 
colleges to help team up people with the jobs that are needed, to make 
sure that the changes in our economy don't leave people behind. And 
education can help a lot, and we're going to continue to stay focused on 
education in this administration. We not only want our little ones to be 
able to read and write and add and subtract; we want to make sure the 
older ones have a chance to realize the opportunities of tomorrow as 
well. And we will.
    And finally, I want to talk about another issue right quick--or two 
other issues right quick. One of them is, this country needs an energy 
policy. If you rely upon a manufacturing base for job employment, you 
need energy. We need a policy. I've been talking about this for a couple 
of years. Congress needs to get me an energy bill. You learned firsthand 
what it means to have a--what it means to modernize the electricity 
grid, if you know what I mean. [Laughter] The grid needs to be 
modernized.
    First, we need to find out--and will find out--what went wrong, why 
you had your electricity shut down out here. But we ought to use this as 
an opportunity to modernize the system. They used to have--in the law 
they had, you know, said these electricity deliverers could have 
voluntary reliability standards. We don't need voluntary reliability 
standards. We need mandatory reliability standards. We want to make sure 
there's incentives for people to put new poles in the ground and invest.
    The energy sector has been hamstrung by old laws. We need new laws. 
And I've been calling on Congress to do this. And when they get back, 
they need to stop politicking and get a good energy plan, so that we can 
make sure the economy continues to grow.
    I'll tell you what else we need to do. We need to use our 
technologies to be able to explore for energy in environmentally 
friendly ways. For the sake of national security, for the sake of 
economic security, we need to become less dependent on foreign sources 
of energy.
    A sound energy policy makes sense. And so does good highway policy. 
We proposed some increases over the last 6 years. These highway bills 
come in 6-year increments. I proposed $30 billion more spending on 
highways over the next 6 than the last 6. We not only want to make sure 
our people can find jobs and work, like the people who are pushing these 
big equipment around, but we want people driving on better roads. We 
want to be able to deal with congestion so we can get our people moving 
around.
    There's a lot we can do. We've done a lot to lay the foundation for 
economic growth. And there's a lot we can do when Congress gets back to 
make sure that this economic recovery continues so people can find work. 
On Labor Day, we're committed to helping those who have got a job keep a 
job and committed to those who are looking for work to find a job. 
That's the commitment of this Labor Day.
    We're also committed to our freedom and to peace, and we will stay 
on the offensive to protect our freedom. And we will stay with the 
notion that the more free societies are, the more peaceful they become. 
See, we love freedom and we love peace in America, and we intend to make 
the world a more peaceful place. This country will lead the world to 
peace.
    I really enjoy coming out and seeing people bring their kids out. I 
want to thank you for bringing them. It reminds me of one of the things 
that's happening in our country. It's a new spirit in America. There's a 
cultural change taking place, it seems like to me, and that is, we're 
getting away from the era that said, ``If it feels good, just go ahead 
and do it,'' and ``If you've got a problem, blame somebody else,'' to an 
era where in which each of understands we're responsible for the 
decisions we make in life.
    If you're a mom or a dad, if you're lucky enough to be a parent, 
you're responsible for loving your child with all your heart and all

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your soul. That's your job. If you're worried about the quality of 
education in the neighborhood in which you live, then you're responsible 
for doing something about it. As I mentioned, if you happen to be a CEO 
in corporate America, you're responsible for telling the truth. You're 
responsible for treating your employees with respect. If you're an 
American in the responsibility era, you're responsible for loving a 
neighbor like you'd like to be loved yourself.
    I want to thank those of you who reach out to somebody who hurts, 
somebody in need. You see, the great strength of the country is not our 
military might or economic prowess; the great strength of the country is 
the heart and soul of the American people. Millions of acts of kindness 
and decency go on on a daily basis. Millions of acts of decency and 
kindness help define the true worth and the true strength of this great 
American country.
    And so on Labor Day, a day in which we honor the worker, let us 
honor those who work to make our society and country a more 
compassionate place by helping a neighbor in need, by doing your job as 
a citizen of the country, by being a patriotic person, which means more 
than just putting your hand over your heart. It means serving your 
country in ways large and small, all aimed at lifting up this Nation, 
all aimed at keeping us the greatest nation on the face of the Earth.
    May God bless you all, and may God continue to bless America. Thank 
you all.
      

Note: The President spoke at 11:12 a.m. at the Richfield Training 
Center. In his remarks, he referred to Frank Hanley, general president, 
International Union of Operating Engineers; James H. Gardner, business 
manager, International Union of Operating Engineers Local 18; Chuck 
Canterbury, national president, Fraternal Order of Police; Gov. Bob Taft 
and Lt. Gov. Jennette Bradley of Ohio; and James Trakas, majority whip, 
Ohio State house of representatives.