Are You Better Off?

ARE YOU BETTER OFF? -- (House of Representatives - May 18, 2004)

(Ms. PELOSI asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to ask the question that President-to-be Ronald Reagan made famous in the debate in 1980: "Are you better off today than you were 4 years ago?"

The answer, of course, for most Americans is "no." Under President Bush and the Republican Congress, most Americans have suffered. If you are a taxpayer, you are not better off. We went from a budget that was in balance in 1999, the deficit was zero, and on a path to a $5.6 trillion surplus to one now that is half a trillion dollars in debt this year alone.

If you are a senior, you are not better off because prescription drug costs for seniors have skyrocketed 44 percent in the last 4 years. And what do they get but a hoax of a prescription drug bill.

If you are a student, you are not better off because the Bush administration has underfunded the No Child Left Behind Act by $27 billion since 2001 and wants to cut funding for higher education by $1.3 billion while college tuition has increased by 28 percent.

If you are a worker, you are not better off because 2.2 million jobs have been lost and the unemployment rate is 5.6 percent, one-third higher than the 4.2 percent when President Bush took office. And workers are not better off because wages have failed to keep pace with inflation. Wages rose a mere nickel between March and April.

If you are a consumer, you are not better off because gas prices have increased from $1.26 to a record $2.01 a gallon since President Bush took office.

In the next few days, we will be offering further lists of grievances of the reckless policies of the Bush administration and the Republican Congress. Clearly, we are not better off since President Bush took office.

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