Subject: [big campaign] Fwd: Rep. Schakowsky on Fiscal Commission Report, Final Vote
From: [email-masked]
To: [email-masked], [email-masked], [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 3 Dec 2010 13:17:21 -0500 (EST)
List-Id: <bigcampaign.googlegroups.com>

____________________________________

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 
CONTACT: Sarah Baldauf;  202.225.2111 
[email-masked] (mailto:[email-masked])  

Schakowsky on Fiscal Commission  Report, Final Vote 

WASHINGTON, DC (December 3, 2010) –  Today  Rep. Jan Schakowsky  (D-IL), a 
member of President  Obama’s bipartisan National Commission on Fiscal 
Responsibility and Reform,  issued the following statement as prepared for  
delivery.  

While I cannot support the  Simpson-Bowles plan, I want to thank the 
co-chairmen for their dedication to  this difficult task over the last eight 
months, and I agree with them that the  work was constructive despite our 
inability to get fourteen  votes.  

I offered my own plan to achieve the goal outlined  by the President to 
achieve primary budget balance by 2015 with one very  different assumption.  I 
believe that we can do it without further  eroding the middle class in 
America. 

It pays to  remember that just 10 years ago we had a budget surplus and the 
debt was  rapidly decreasing.  During the Bush years, those surpluses 
disappeared  and huge debt accumulated due to two unfunded wars, two unfunded tax 
cuts that  mainly enriched the already wealthy, and a blind eye to the 
recklessness of  Wall Street which caused 8 million Americans to lose their jobs 
and millions  more to lose their savings, the value of their homes and the 
homes  themselves. 

Now we are on an “unsustainable fiscal path,” to  quote the report, which 
threatens our future economic viability.  But  there is another grave threat 
to both our economy and our democracy, and that  is the alarming 
redistribution of wealth that is shrinking the middle  class.  The top 1% of Americans 
now owns 34% of our nation’s wealth –  more than the combined wealth of 
90% of Americans.  Even during this  great recession, the top 5% of households 
have seen their income rise.   Just this week, two million Americans lost 
their unemployment insurance  benefits.  If we fail to extend them, not only 
will that be another slap  to the middle class, but it will hurt the economy 
by depriving our businesses  – large and small – of money these struggling 
Americans will rush out and  spend. 

And now we have a commission report that glibly  talks about “shared 
sacrifice” and making “painful” decisions.  I ask,  “Painful for whom?”  These 
recommendations ask those who have already  been and are sacrificing, to 
sacrifice further.  Those who have not  enjoyed the prosperity party over the 
last many years are being asked to pick  up the tab. 

We do not need to do this.  There is another  way.  

* My plan recognizes the need to create jobs – a  deficit-reducing strategy 
– that some, incorrectly, view as just more  spending.  Their plan does not 
include up front investments to lower the  unemployment rate. It is 
important to note that if America’s unemployment rate were  still at its 
pre-recession level of 4.5%, we would only be facing a modest  deficit.

* Their plan addresses rising health care costs by asking  elderly Medicare 
beneficiaries to pay more out of their own pockets, even  though they 
already pay about 30% of their mostly meager incomes (the median  income for 
seniors is $18,000 per year) on their own. Their plan cuts Medicare  by $110 
billion by imposing higher cost-sharing requirements on seniors and  people 
with disabilities.  Mine requires Medicare to negotiate with  pharmaceutical 
companies for lower prices like the Veteran’s Administration  does, bringing 
down the cost to seniors and the government by billions of  dollars.  It also 
would implement a public option, which we already know  would save $10 
billion by 2015.    

* Their plan cuts  the bloated military budget, which is a very good thing. 
 Mine does as  well, but not by freezing noncombat military pay for three 
years or by cutting  military health care benefits.  These military families 
are not getting  rich serving our country and should not be the target of 
deficit  reduction. 

* Responding to Republican calls to slash spending,  the Bowles-Simpson 
plan calls for deep cuts in domestic discretionary  spending.  Using the 
Bowles-Simpson formula, the Center for Budget and  Policy Priorities calculates a 
22% cut in current funding levels in 2020,  jeopardizing everything from 
nutrition and education to medical research and  job training.  

* Amazingly, their plan opens a new huge  loophole to incentivize companies 
to outsource jobs.  By adopting a  territorial tax system, U.S. based 
multi-national  corporations will never have to pay taxes on profits earned from 
subsidiaries  in foreign countries.  

* Finally, the Bowles-Simpson plan  would require cuts in Social Security 
benefits.  The good news is that  they acknowledge that Social Security has 
nothing to do with the deficit, and  their plan is to make Social Security 
solvent for the next 75 years and not to  use it for debt reduction.  The bad 
news is that average benefits for  middle-income workers (average lifetime 
earnings of between $43,000 and  $69,000 per year) could be cut up to 35% 
depending on when they retire.   There is no need to cut Social Security in 
order to save it as my plan  proves. 

I have highlighted just a few of the ways that the  Bowles-Simpson plan 
further erodes the middle class and threatens low-income  Americans.  There are 
many things in their plan that are also in mine,  however.  I appreciate 
that there has been consensus that the defense  budget must be subjected to 
scrutiny and trimming in ways never seriously  suggested before.  It is very 
significant that tax expenditures, or as  they call “tax earmarks," all those 
deductions that are largely skewed to the  wealthy, are finally being 
recognized for what they are – spending, but  through the tax code.  

Some will criticize my approach to  deficit reduction as politically 
impossible.  But I gladly subject my  ideas to the public, knowing that protecting 
Social Security and Medicare  benefits, investing in jobs, and asking the 
richest Americans to contribute  more, represents a majority view despite the 
inside-the-beltway conventional  wisdom of what is possible.  No wonder 
people are angry.  They watch  Wall Street tycoons getting bonuses and 
government bailouts, shopping for  holiday gifts at Tiffany’s, while they are trying 
to scrape together enough  money for the rent.

Bottom line, this Commission on Fiscal  Responsibility and Reform has 
proven that fixing our nation’s fiscal  challenges is not mission impossible.  I 
look forward to the constructive  debate that has been started and I will 
continue to stand up for low-income  and middle class Americans so that we can 
uphold the truly American notion of  leaving each generation better off 
than the one that came before  it.

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