Save American Workers Act of 2015

Floor Speech

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Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Save American workers. Make sure they don't lose purchasing power. Let's make sure that those at the bottom end of the employment spectrum are saved. That is the message.

I presume the minimum wage bill will be on the floor next week. Perhaps you are going to want to extend unemployment insurance next week. Perhaps you are going to really want to do something that will save the workers and give them the purchasing power they had in 1968.

The chairman said it well: We go from creating 29ers to 39ers. This bill will allow you to work 10 more hours without health care. Isn't that wonderful? I am sure every American worker is saying: Thank God the Republicans are going to have me work 10 more hours before I can get health insurance. Aren't you generous?

The American worker needs help, not to be misled by a rhetoric which pretends to do something for them but leaves them stuck, not just for 5 years, but for 10, 15, 20 years, as those at the top of the ring get better and better off--and we are among most of those 10 percent.

Mr. Speaker, we are now in the first days of the new Congress, with an opportunity to turn the page and write a new chapter of bipartisanship and cooperation. We are not doing it today.

It is unfortunate that the Republican majority has instead chosen to replay the highlight reel from the last Congress by bringing back to the floor a piece of partisan legislation that would undermine the Affordable Care Act and cause approximately 1 million Americans to lose their employer-sponsored insurance coverage. Not something that Mr. Young says may happen or is extrapolated to happen, but there is no doubt that this would happen--1 million people.

Well, so what? This bill is a solution without a problem.

The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentleman has expired.

Mr. LEVIN. I yield the gentleman an additional minute.

[Time: 14:30]
Mr. HOYER. As of this time, without being timed, I really miss my magic minute; I want to tell you that, Mr. Speaker.

Since the Affordable Care Act became law, 10.8 million new jobs have been created in the private sector, and it has not led to a shift to part-time work. That is what the statistics tell us.

You want to save the worker, but under your economic policies in the last decade, we had the worst loss of jobs in this country in my lifetime. In fact, part-time workers, as a share of all workers in our economy, have fallen--have fallen--have decreased, are less since the enactment of the health care reform bill.

Unfortunately, this bill's sponsors have chosen to ignore these facts because they don't support their argument. Their legislation would allow employers to deny health care reach to those working even as many, as I have said, as 39 hours.

That means the slightest reduction in hours could be used to deny employees the coverage they ought to be earning through their work, so the rest of us do not have to pay their bill.

The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentleman has again expired.

Mr. LEVIN. I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer).

Mr. HOYER. As a result, up to half a million Americans would become uninsured, and this bill would increase the deficit by $53 billion.

There is not enough time to really explain all the nuances of the adverse consequences of this bill. I ask my colleagues: let's have a decent and honest debate, let's have an honest debate and honest discussion so that, yes, Mr. Young, we can protect those workers that we all should be able to protect, and then I will expect that to be accompanied with a minimum wage bill and the unemployment insurance extension.

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