Patent Reform Act of 2011 -- Continued --
Floor Speech
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BUDGET CHOICES
Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, as you well know, Congress is now engaged in a debate of huge consequence; that is, the budget. The budget of a nation, like the budget of a family, expresses who we are as a people and what our priorities are. Where you spend your money, where you make your investments tells you everything about what we believe in.
I am more than aware that this country faces a $1.6 trillion deficit and a $14 trillion national debt. And these are enormously important issues, but they are issues that have to be dealt with in a sensible way, and they are issues that have to be dealt with within a broader context.
So I think the very first question we have to ask is, How did we get to where we are today? Is the problem, in fact, that we spend too much money on Head Start and childcare, that we just shower so much on our children, or is the converse the truth in that we have the highest rate of childhood poverty of any major country on Earth?
How did we get into the deficit? Well, let me tick it off. And when we discuss how we got into the deficit situation, the irony here is that those people who are yelling loudest about the deficit, who are fighting hardest to make savage and Draconian cuts on basic programs, are precisely the people who led us to where we are today.
I voted against the war in Iraq for a number of reasons, one of them being that it was not paid for. Do you happen to recall that as we went into the war in Iraq--which will end up costing us about $3 trillion by the time we take care of our last veteran--do you recall much discussion about how that war was going to be paid for? In fact, do you remember one word of how that war was going to be paid for? I don't remember that. I was in the middle of that debate. Mr. President, $3 trillion, and no one said: Oh, we cannot afford it.
When the crooks on Wall Street, through their illegal behavior, their reckless behavior, drove this country into the recession we are in right now and they came begging to the Congress for their welfare check of some $800 billion, do you recall too many of the people who voted for that saying: Gee, we cannot afford to do it. It is going to drive up the deficit. How are we going to provide Wall Street with an $800 billion bailout? I don't recall that discussion.
When I was in the House a number of years ago, Congress passed an initiative from President Bush for a Medicare Part D prescription drug program. I believe seniors must have prescription drugs, but that legislation, which was written by the insurance companies and the drug companies, was not paid for.
When our Republican friends fought vigorously for tax breaks for billionaires, which would result in significantly less money coming into the Treasury, driving up the deficit, do you recall much discussion about how we were going to pay for that?
I don't recall that discussion.
I find it ironic that when we give tax breaks to billionaires, no worry about the deficit. When we bail out Wall Street, no worry about the deficit. But suddenly when we provide childcare to low-income children who are in desperate need of help in the midst of a recession, suddenly everybody is concerned about the deficit. Frankly, I call that absolute hypocrisy. It is hypocrisy to say we can give tax breaks to billionaires and not worry about the deficit, but we have to cut back on the needs of working families, the middle class, the sick, the poor, and the elderly.
This country, at this particular moment, has to make some very basic decisions. The decision we must make is whether, in the midst of this horrendous recession, when the middle class is hurting, when poverty is increasing, do we go after, as our Republican friends in the House want us to, programs that are virtually life and death for millions and millions of working-class and lower income people.
I don't know about West Virginia, but I can tell my colleagues that in Vermont it is very hard for working families to get adequate, affordable, and good-quality childcare, early education for their children. It is a major problem all over the country. Yet our Republican friends say we should balance the budget by cutting Head Start $1.1 billion, a 20-percent cut from 2010, and throwing over 200,000 kids off Head Start. If you are a working mom who sends her kids to Head Start now, it feels pretty good that your kid is getting a good quality, early childhood education, getting nourishment. They watch these kids for health care problems. We are going to throw over 200,000 kids off Head Start.
I worked very hard to expand the community health center program, which I know is so important in West Virginia and Vermont. The Presiding Officer and I argue about which State has the greater coverage. It is enormously important. A few years ago, about 20 million people accessed the community health center program. We are now working so that in 5 years 40 million Americans will be able to walk in the door, regardless of their income, get health care, dental care, low-cost prescription drugs, and mental health counseling. It is working. President Obama has been very strong on this issue. Secretary of HHS Kathleen Sebelius has been very strong on this issue. It is working.
Here is the irony. When we give people good quality primary health care, they don't have to go to the emergency room. The emergency room costs 10 times more than treatment at a community health center. When we open the doors for primary health care, people do not get very sick. They don't end up in the hospital. Study after study shows that when we invest in community health centers, we save the taxpayers money. We save Medicaid money and Medicare money because people have access to medical care when they need it. The Republican House wants to cut community health centers by $1.3 billion, denying 11 million Americans the opportunity to receive the health care they need.
In my State--and I am sure all over the country--people who are applying for disability help, for Social Security are upset about how long the process takes. Our Republican friends want to make major cuts in the Social Security Administration, which means that half a million people are going to find delays in getting their claims processed.
Everybody in America knows that one of the great problems we face is the expense of college. We know hundreds of thousands of bright young people can't even afford to go to college. We know that many people are graduating deeply in debt. One of the accomplishments we have managed to bring about in the last few years is to significantly expand the Pell grant program so low- and moderate-income families will find it easier to send their children to college. Our Republican friends in the House have decided, in their wisdom, that what they want to do is reduce by 17 percent Pell grants, which means that 9.4 million lower income college student would lose some or all of their Pell grants. Here we are, trying to compete with the rest of the world. We are falling, in many cases, further and further behind in terms of the percentage of our young people graduating college. The costs of college are soaring. The Republican solution is to cut the major program which makes it easier for working families to send their kids to college.
The Community Services Block Grant Program is the infrastructure by which we get emergency services, food, help to pay for emergency services for lower income people, housing needs, making sure people keep the electricity on. That would be decimated by the Republicans.
In the midst of a recession, what they want to do is to cut $2 billion from the Workforce Investment Act and other job training programs when we desperately need that job training to make sure our people can get the jobs that are out there and available. Often they don't have the skills to do that.
My point is a pretty simple one. As a nation, we have to make some choices. The top 1 percent today are doing phenomenally well. That is a fact. Our friends on Wall Street whom we bailed out are now making more money than they did before they caused this recession. The top 1 percent now earns about 23 percent of all income in America, more than the bottom 50 percent. The top 1 percent, the richest people in terms of their effective tax rate, what they pay is now lower than at any time in memory. So we have the wealthy doing phenomenally well, tax rates going down. We have showered huge tax breaks on them. Then we say, to balance the budget, we have to cut nutrition programs for our kids, Social Security Administration, Pell grants, Head Start, and many other programs which millions of people depend upon.
The question we as Americans have to decide is, When the rich get richer, do we give them more tax breaks while the poor get poorer and we cut programs for them? I don't think, frankly, that is what the American people want.
There was a poll that came out yesterday or today. It was an NBC News and Wall Street Journal poll. The questions dealt with the deficit and how the American people think we should go forward in dealing with the deficit. Here are some interesting results. When asked what do Americans want the Federal Government to do to reduce the deficit, the highest percentage said it is totally acceptable or mostly acceptable to impose a surtax on millionaires to reduce the deficit. Eighty-one percent of the people said that for obvious reasons. The rich are getting richer. Given the choice of asking people who are already doing well to pay a little more in taxes or to cut programs that working families need, the choice is not terribly hard.
Seventy-four percent of the American people believe it is totally acceptable or mostly acceptable to eliminate tax credits for the oil and gas industry. Sixty-eight percent of the public believe it is totally acceptable or mostly acceptable to phase out the Bush tax cuts for families earning over $250,000 a year.
What the American people are saying in this poll, and I believe all over the country, is obvious. Given the choice of decimating programs that working families depend upon or asking the wealthiest people who have been receiving huge amounts of tax breaks to start paying their fair share, it "ain't" a tough answer. The answer the American people are saying is: We cannot move toward a balanced budget just by cutting, cutting, and cutting. A budget has two parts. Everybody in America understands that. It is the money we spend; it is the money that comes in. In the case of the U.S. Government, we have to address our budget deficit in both ways. We have to raise revenue. We do that primarily by asking the wealthiest to pay a little bit more in taxes. Yes, we do have to cut some programs. There is waste out there. There are programs that can and should be cut. That is what we do. We don't just cut, cut, cut and then give tax breaks to the very wealthiest people.
The Senate has, along with our friends in the House, the responsibility, the constitutional responsibility of coming up with a budget. I certainly hope the President intends to play an active role. I hope the President is prepared to do the right thing and to understand that revenue, asking the wealthiest to start paying their fair share of taxes, is one important component of how we move forward toward a balanced budget. But if the President chooses not to participate or if the President chooses not to take that avenue, that does not mean to say that we in the Senate should not go forward. I intend to work as hard as I can to come up with a deficit reduction program which is fair but responsible. Being responsible means it includes revenue and not only cuts. There are a whole lot of ways to bring in revenue in a fair and progressive way. It is not only asking the wealthiest to pay their fair share of taxes, it is ending abusive and illegal offshore tax shelters. According to a number of studies, we will lose $100 billion this year because corporations and wealthy individuals are stashing their money in tax havens in the Cayman Islands and in Bermuda. Before we cut nutrition programs for pregnant women, maybe we do away with those tax havens.
We have to begin the process of ending tax breaks for big oil and gas companies. ExxonMobil, the most profitable corporation in the history of the world, not only paid nothing in Federal income taxes in 2009, but they received a $156 million tax refund from the IRS, according to their own shareholders report. Maybe before we start cutting the Social Security Administration or Pell grants for college students, we might want to ask the most profitable corporation in America to start paying some Federal income tax.
On and on it goes. My point is, now is the moment when we have to do the right thing for working families. There is a lot of pain out there. A lot of people are hurting. This recession has taken a heavy toll. In the middle of these tough times, we don't stick a knife into the people and make it even worse. We have to move toward deficit reduction. I believe that. But I believe we don't do it on the backs of the sick, the elderly, the poor, and the most vulnerable. I think we need shared sacrifice. Some of the wealthiest people are going to have to play their part in deficit reduction as well.
Mr. President, on behalf of the majority leader, there will be no further rollcall votes today. The next rollcall vote is expected on Monday at 5:30 p.m.
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