republican side is a mirage and i think a dangerous one. let me give you an example talking about their proposals on taxes. under their budget, the top rate is to be reduced from 39.6% to 25%. the a.m.t. will be repealed. the corporate tax rate will be cut from 35% to 25%. but you don't find one sill bell in the republican budget on how these tax cuts will be paid for. . they don't identify a single tax policy that will end. the republican budget would mean a huge tax cut for the very wealthy, several $100,000 a year and leave a nearly $6 trillion hole in the deficit that would lead to tax increases for

middle-income families. that isn't balance. that is total imbalance. at the same time, republicans propose cutting $3.3 trillion from programs for people with low and moderate incomes, including hundreds of billions of dollars for food nutrition and medicaid programs. so i want to end by asking the republicans when they come and talk about their tax proposals to name a specific that they would address. it's not in the republican budget. name one, name two, name three. otherwise, it's worse than empty. the chair: the time of the gentleman has expired. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: with that, mr. chairman, i yield three members to the gentleman from indiana, r. rokita.

mr. rokita: i thank chairman ryan in bringing this budget to the floor. i rise in high support of it. i also am very proud, one of the highest honors i have had in my short time here to serve on this committee. not because of chairman ryan only, but because of the members. by members, i mean republican and democrat members. i know that mr. levin is not a member of the budget committee. but there are great people who are. that's why and perhaps because of that pride that i'm disappointed to hear the ranking member characterize the accomplishment, because that's what it is, the accomplishment of balancing within 10 years as some sort of political goal. you know, families who are trying to put food on the table, associations, neighborhood associations, nonprofits, for-profit businesses, they have to make a budget balance every day, every month, every year. i think should be offended by

that characterization. it's not a political goal. you know what's political? never balancing. you know what's political? the immoral idea that we are going to put more on our plate now, add up deficit after deficit and create a bigger and bigger debt and then make people who don't even exist yet pay for it. why is that political? because, you know what, mr. chair? the people in the here and now can vote. generations in the future, our grandkids who don't exist can't vote. and that's what makes the other approaches we have heard about immoral, wrong political. we balance. we balance within 10 years. let's contrast that a bit. our responsible approach to what the senate democrats have done, for example. next year alone the senate democrat budget increases spending by $162 billion above what we are spending today. over 10 years, increases the

delebt by $7.3 trillion from today's levels despite a massive tax hike that they have. and it adds $1.5 trillion in new taxes. even after that, they still add to the debt, our kids' debt by $7.3 trillion. and again, mr. chair, it never balances. after four years and $6 trillion in debt since a budget was last even passed, the senate democrats' proposal leaves more debt and government that never stops growing. after four years, the democrats are unable to identify any real reforms, no tax reform and no entitlement reform and it's not a serious proposal. i stand again in support of the house budget because it's responsible, it's real, it balances in 10 years and it's the last thing from political. and i yield back. the chair: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from maryland. van vanch you know -- mr. van hollen: you know what's

wrong, mr. chairman? it's to pretend to the american people that you can have it all ways. what's wrong is to pretend that you have a budget that's imbalance in 10 years and pretend that you're getting rid all of the affordable care act, getting rid of obamacare. what's wrong is demagogging savings in medicare which we achieved by ending payments to private companies. by demagogging that and using it to balance your budget and say you know what? we didn't use it to balance our budget. that's what people don't like. people trying to have it all ways. now, we have taken an approach to steadily and rapidly reduce our deficits in a way that doesn't interfere and hurt economic and job growth right now. and we do it in a balanced way. and what i find astounding,

astounding is to hear our republican colleagues talk about the deficit and the debt in one breath and then talk about all those tax breaks and expenditures that disproportionately benefit very wealthy people in the other breath, and then say they won't close one single tax loophole for wealthy people for the purpose of reducing the deficit, not one dime in their budget for that purpose. and yet, they're willing to hit medicaid to the tune of $110 billion. they are willing to hit the food and nutrition program by over $1 00 billion. they are ready to cut transportation funding by over 15% in this budget window and yet they're not willing to close one of those more than $4 trillion in tax loopholes to reduce the deficit. i think that's wrong. mr. chairman, i now yield two

minutes to the gentlelady from pennsylvania, a member of the budget committee, ms. schwartz. the chair: the gentlelady from pennsylvania is recognized for two minutes. ms. schwartz: the federal budget is a statement of our priorities and values as a nation. the budget to be fiscally responsible and reduce the deficit. to make velft to grow our economy and to meet our obligation to our seniors, to our families and to our future and the republican budget fails all three. republican budget threatens our nation by undermining our economic growth and by shifting the financial burden for the deficit, and the deficit reduction, to our seniors and the middle class. republicans have made their choices clear, end medicare as we know it, adding costs to seniors today and ending the medicare guarantee tomorrow, slashing investments necessary for economic competitiveness and giving millionaires an average of $400,000 in tax breaks.

republican budget eliminates protection for millions of our sickest seniors who depend on nursing home and home health services and republican budget will increase taxes for average middle-class families by $3,000. their choices will cost two million jobs next year alone and decrease economic growth by 1.7%. in contrast, the democratic alternative present serves -- preserves the medicare guarantee and makes investments in education, innovation and infrastructure necessary to job creation and economic growth and protects the middle class from these large tax increases. the democratic alternative reduces the deficit in a fiscal and responsible way and a balanced way. without causing harm today and without threatening our economic competitiveness for the future and reduces the deficit while meeting our commitment to our seniors, our elderly and to our

children. i urge my colleagues to reject the republican budget that threatens our seniors, our middle class and our economic growth and to vote for the democratic alternative that builds on our great strength as a nation. innovative entrepreneurial business sector, skilled rs hard-working middle class, vote for the democratic alternative that will builds on hope, security and opportunity for all americans. the chair: the gentlelady's time has expired. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: the gentlelady from pennsylvania said that ending medicare as we know it. i got news for you, obamacare ends medicare as we know it. it takes the savings from medicare and makes sure it stays in medicare, that it doesn't go fund another program. stop the rate of medicare, make sure that those savings that the gentleman says are necessary and worth while, stay with medicare to make it more solvent and extend the life of the trust

fund and not double count it and raid it to fund obamacare. loophole, i enjoy this conversation, we hear close loopholes for the purpose of deficit reduction. what it means is take more money and spend it in washington. we are saying close loopholes and lower tax rates for everybody. the problem with our tax code, it's not fair. if you have access, if you have good clout, you can get a loophole in the code and pay lower taxes. in wisconsin, you are pay-going whatever tax rate. we are saying the person or business that has the same income pays the same tax rate. i would like tore yield to the gentleman from texas, mr. williams. the chair: the gentleman is recognized. mr. williams: ever person in america has to balance the budget. i'm a small business owner. i still own a business. i have owned and operated my business for 41 years and i balance my budget every month

and in many cases every day. the government should be no different. and until we balance the budget, we don't know the true fiscal condition of our country or of a company or of a family. it's like a business that is overleveraged or a family that has overborrowed. deficit spending can obscure the real pinth. but eventually the numbers come out. once they line up, you get a view of your fiscal condition. we have gone far too long without knowing our country's financial condition. in the last four years, we have had trillion dollars deficit. our nation's credit rating was downgraded and our publicly held debt is on track to exceed 76% of g.d.p. in 2013. yet we still spend more money that we don't have, pushing the country towards a department-driven crisis. if the government deposit have the ability to print money, we would be in a weak financial position. a budget is a blueprint. it's a road map, a plan.

our nation's budget doesn't need to have balance as its end goal, it needs to be our starting point. it's the only way to guarantee that the public debt will not outgrow the economy which would crowd out private investment, raise interest rates and increase inflation. i'm proud to stand in support of this bill. it's a responsible balanced budget that is right for america. this budget balances, cuts wasteful spending and fixes our broken tax code all without raising taxes. i applaud chairman ryan and my colleagues for their tremendous work in presenting the american people with what they want, a budget that works. with this plan we will apply the same principles that families and businesses use every day and i predict our country's best days will be ahead of us, because unlike our democratic friends, we balance, it means jobs and means prosperity and means opportunity. small business and the people of america are begging for this

budget. i yield back. the chair: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: i thank you, mr. chairman. i would just point out to my colleagues that the affordable care act with the reforms it made to medicare, we extended the life of the medicare trust fund as part of that effort going forward. i would be happy to yield. mr. ryan: does that mean there is no money going to fund obamacare and there is a hole in the funding of obamacare? mr. van hollen: in your budget we will help reduce the deficit by whatever amount it was. but what we do not do in our budget is fund tax breaks for folks at the very top by raising them on folks in the middle. listen, let me just one other thing here, mr. chairman. we have had four balanced budgets in the last 40 years. wasn't under president reagan or the first president bush or the

second president bush, but 1998, 1999, 2000 and 2001. under president clinton and then president bush came in and did a big tax cut in 2001. put us out of balance for a long period of time. and during the period of time when the budget was imbalance the last four times out of 40 years, the revenue was coming in, was higher than it is in any year in the republican budget that's before us now. and what that tells you is that their budget approach is trying o seek balance on the backs of everybody else. by really cutting into those important investments that have helped power our company, by violating important commitments to seniors. and in the end, by raising taxes on middle-income people. why else would they not have joined democrats in sending

policy statement to the ways and means committee that says when you go about eliminating tax preferences, don't hit middle-income taxpayers in the process. in fact, mr. chairman, if you look at the mortgage interest deduction, for example, mortgage interest deduction really helps middle-income people. homeowners. so in addition to saying, ways and means committee, when you do tax reform don't hit middle-income taxpayers, we specifically said, don't take away the mortgage interest deduction from middle-income taxpayers. again, all our republican colleagues voted against that. so they have been talking about tax reform for three years now. we have never seen a piece of paper from them as to how they would do it, which is why we wanted to make sure they don't do it that hurt middle-income people.

no. can't do that. so let's make sure that we address our deficit issues and do it in a way that calls for shared responsibility and not another round of tax breaks for the wealthy on the backs of everybody else. i now yield two minutes to the gentlelady from wisconsin, one of the distinguished members of the budget committee, ms. moore. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady is recognized for two minutes. . . mr. moore: this is an austerity plan and -- ms. moore: this is be a austerity plan and an inequality plan. this republican budget. and i want people to behold the plunder of suckling babes, the young, elderly, the infirm, omen, community of colors by $810 billion cuts in medicaid, $135 billion in snap. it is not humorous to me.

and i want you to beware of the claims that we're going to grow our economy by ending 750,000 jobs, by pillaging pill grants and cutting off educational opportunities to students. this is not a balanced budget, this is a budget blunder which plunders us into a double-difficult re-- double-dip recession. ben bernanke warns against these kinds of severe austerity cuts. if you don't believe him, take the word of playedow. he said, -- plato. he said, in a state which is desireous from being saved from the greatest of plagues, there should exist among the citizens neither extreme poverty nor again excessive wealth, for both of productive of great evil. so we plunge poor people into poverty and give $245,000 tax breaks to the wealthiest. i think that qualifies for not

only an austerity plan that can harm us but it is the greatest inequality plan that this body has seen. and i would yield back. the chair: the gentlelady yields back the balance of her time. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: mr. chairman, i think the reference to plato reveals a mindset that the country ought to be run by a handful of philosophers and kings rather than the people. i yield myself 10 seconds to simply say this budget, this plundering, evil cutting budget increases spending on average 3.4% a year instead of 5% a year. with that i'd like to yield three minutes to the distinguished member of the budget committee, the gentleman from california, mr. mcclintock. the chair: the gentleman from california is recognized for three minutes. mr. mcclintock: i thank the gentleman for yielding and for his leadership on this issue. mr. chairman, this debate over the budget reflects a great struggle between american

families and their government. over whether they or the government can best spend the money that they have earned. this budget benleds that struggle slowly back in favor of those families by returning to them a little of their freedom to spend more of their own money and make more of their own decisions once again. the prosperity of american families is directly affected by government spending. government cannot put a dollar into the economy that it first hasn't taken out of the economy. it's true we see the government job that's created when government puts that dollar back in. what we don't see as clearly is the job that's destroyed when government first pulls that dollar out. we see those laws -- lost jobs as chronic unemployment and a stagnating economy. every $1 billion spent in washington means taking $9 from an average family. oother in direct taxes -- either

in direct taxes or tax-driven price increases as businesses pass along their cost to consumers. that means that $1 trillion of new taxes that the senate has proposed means $9,000 per family. now we're told, don't worry, that's all paid by businesses. but businesses don't pay business taxes. they only collect them. they pass them on to us as consumers through higher prices, to us as employees through lower wages or to us as investors through lower earnings, usually on our 401-k's. $1 trillion of deficit as we ran up last year really means $9,000 of future taxes for every family , robbing our children of their futures. it's about time we started thinking in these numbers as families size to terms because ultimately these numbers have a very real impact on families who were struggling to balance their own budgets, to set their own priorities and to look after

their own needs. these days we pass more than 1/3 of the cost of government on to our children. we finance the remainder through a tax system in which politicians pick winners and losers through an appallingly unfair and distorted tax code. this budget calls for doing away with these tax distortions and rewards -- that rewards some and punishes others, distortions that ship capital away from economic expansion and into the service of political interests. and this budget calls for flattening and lowering tax rateses to assure that no american family pays more than 1/4 of its earnings to the federal government. those nations that have adopted similar reforms have been rewarded with explosive economic growth. that means fairness for every american taxpayer and an economy unshackled from the burdens and political favoritism of our current system. in short, freedom works and it's time that we put it back to work. i yield back. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from maryland.

mr. van hollen: thank you very much, mr. chairman. just to be very clear on what the senate democratic plan does and the house democratic plan does with respect to revenue. again, we heard from governor romney and others last year that there are about $4 trillion in these disers to -- distortions and preferences in the tax code that help very wealthy people. and what we say is we should get out some of that clutter, some of those preferences and use some of that to help reduce the deficit. and we say at the same time when u do tax reform, don't touch middle-income taxpayers and when we asked our republican colleagues to give us that assurance in the form of an amendment in the budget committee, they all voted no. so, yes, we think that you can eliminate some of the tax breaks and preferences that mr. mcclintock just talked about, but you can use some of them to

reduce the deficit. but the republican budget won't use one dime of those to help reduce the deficit. i now yield two minutes to the gentleman from washington state who is both on the budget committee and on the ways and means committee, mr. mcdermott. the chair: the gentleman from washington is recognized for two minutes. without objection, so ordered. mr. mcdermott: mr. chairman, i ask yourself what we're doing here today. we're fear mongering again. we spent last week, we spent the last campaign, we spent the last number of years really presenting to the americans that we're in imminent doom and gloom is coming to america. we're going to be the next spain, we're going to be the next italy, the next greece. and probably tomorrow the next cyprus. our debt is so bad we're told that we have to take food out of the mouths of children through the nutrition program and send

seniors out with vouchers to take care of their medicare. and then this weekend an epiphany occurred. speaker boehner came on television and told the american ople, and i quote, we do not -- we do not have an immediate debt crisis. and mr. ryan, the chairman, was asked and he agreed. they finally told the truth. this is not about debt. if the speaker and mr. ryan are right, why are they feeding us this austerity cool aid all the time? why are they sabotaging the economy by throwing hundreds of thousands of jobs away in the sequestration? why are they stunting our future by cutting the legs off our r&d programs and the national institutes of health? and why are they asking seniors and kids and the sick and the poor to go without health care and food security to pay for a fantasy crisis?

why? because they have needed an excuse to do what they've been attempting for generations to do and that is disable the safety net, to get rid of social security, to get rid of medicare, to get rid of unemployment, to get rid of everything that makes us -- makes the social safety net in a civil society. this charade is built on the fundamental deception that we are on the brink of an economic apocalypse. so the politicians can wipe out the programs that people need so that they can give tax breaks to the people at the top. the speaker knows it, mr. ryan knows it and it's about time the american people know it. you need not be afraid, folks. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. mr. mcdermott: vote no. the chair: the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: mr. chairman, i'll yield myself 0 seconds to say that is pretty good scare mongering if i've ever heard any. like i said, the whole purpose of balancing the budget is to

prevent a crisis from happening in the first place. what happened to europe? they kicked the can down the road. they spent more than they could take in. they borrowed until they couldn't borrow at affordable rates and then a crisis hit. we know that that's where we're headed. look. the federal budget is growing at about 5% a year. the family budget is growing at about 2.5% a year. we want to get the family budget on course with the federal budget or vice versa. with that i'd like to yield three minutes to the gentlelady from tennessee, a member of the budget committee and the ways and means committee, mrs. black. the chair: the gentlelady from tennessee is recognized for three minutes. black black -- mrs. black: thank you. mr. chairman, nearly 23 million americans are still struggling to find work. and millions more low- and middle-income americans are struggling with the reality of depressed wages, higher food and gas prices and rising health care costs. it is clear that the president's

tax and spend policies are putting the american dream further and further out of reach of more and more americans. it's hard to get ahead in america when you can barely get by. paying your rent, putting food on the table and getting to and from work. i believe the status quo is not working. and i believe that the american people deserve better than the chronically high unemployment, record levels of debt, unrealized dreams and a diminished future. here today, stand urge to my colleagues to support the house republicans' path to prosperity budget. the path to prosperity budget funds america's priorities. it protects important entitlement programs, it saves our social net, it repeals the president's budget-busting health care law and it reforms our broken code and balances within a decade. president obama and the congressional democrats say that

they want to get america back to work and support a balanced approach to our fiscal problems. but they also support record deficits and budgets that never, ever balance. instead of government living within its means, the democrats' budgets raise taxes to fuel more spending and in turn millions of americans remain out of work. the only place that these failed policies will lead is to higher unemployment, depressed wages and a crushing debt crisis. the majority of americans are not satisfied with the current state of our economy and they're not hopeful about the future. and who can plame them? i believe the american people -- blame them? i believe the american people deserve more than the status quo and i believe the american people deserve leaders here in washington who are honest with themselves and their constituents about the challenges facing our nation and what it's going to take to get our nation back on track. 30 seconds? mr. ryan: another 30 seconds.

the chair: the gentlelady is recognized for an additional 30 seconds. mrs. black: i urge the house to pass the path to prosperity budget and for the president to work with the congressional republicans to balance the budget so that we can start to create the conditions for economic growth, job creation and more opportunities for current and future generations of americans. thank you and i yield back. the chair: the gentlelady yields back the balance of her time. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: thank you, mr. chairman. we heard earlier about the united states becoming spain, others have compared it to greece. the reality is right now the danger is that we follow the european austerity measures that we've seen do damage to economies like that in the u.k. and that's what our republican colleagues are calling for in their budget. yes, we need to reduce our long-term deficits but we also need to make sure we keep the facts straight. and in the republican budget

pamphlet this year, they show ink ig tidal wave of red which i believe the chairman showed earlier today that's based on an outdated congressional budget office analysis, that doesn't take into account much of the deficit reduction we've done over the last couple of years, including the revenue in the fiscal cliff agreement. that's why factcheck.org said that the republican budget proposal exaggerates the debt in a chart contained in their newly released budget plan. we need to keep this in perspective and that's what we do in our budget. we focus on economic growth now and economic growth in the future. and yes, because of the reduction in the rate of increase in health care costs and using actually an assumption

that the discretionary parts of our budget, mandatory assumes grow faster, our budget comes into balance the same year the republican budget last year came into balance, but we do it without balancing it on the backs of other essential priorities that are important to the american people. with that, i yield two minutes to a terrific new member of the budget committee, the gentleman from wisconsin, mr. poe can the chair: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. pocan: i rise today to join my democratic colleagues to staunchly oppose the budget proposal we have considered last week in committee. mr. speaker, i was not in congress last year when the budget was considered in the house, but it sure seems like my republican colleagues wanted to make sure i didn't miss a thing since the proposal before us today represents little more than the unrealistic policies

that have been rejected by both the congress and the american people. this is a budget based on bad math and unrealistic assumptions. it keeps the savings and revenue from the affordable care act but repeals its benefits to the people. it cuts taxes for the wealthiest without identifying how they will pay for the trillions and takes almost $1 trillion in unspecified cuts that will likely target programs for the needy and disadvantaged. with all those unrealistic assumptions, i'm surprised there is not a provision that requires them to steal the pots of gold at the end of rainbows. that could have been $1 trillion and you would have a surplus now. mr. speaker, the math may be bogus, the budget will have serious effects on the people of wisconsin. it keeps the sequester in place, which costs the people of wisconsin, 36,000 jobs and

across america, two million jobs. will turn medicare into a voucher program forcing 850,000 wisconsin seniors out of medicare, people like my mother and raise taxes on middle-class families by $3,000 and giving the richest a tax break. we need to balance the budget by getting people back to work. that's the best way to reduce our deficit. we need to create jobs. the c.b.o. says we should do it. we need to get it done. i urge my colleagues to reject the backward-looking plan and embrace a forward-looking plan on job growth. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: i yield myself 30 seconds, i dispute my friend from wisconsin's interpretation. this is the chart the gentleman from maryland was talking about. we have gotten this from the congressional budget office and the most recent numbers. will they give us new numbers? yes. it is going to show a whole

bunch of red ink. we can't wish away this debt problem when you are spending $3 for every $2, we have a problem. we have to deal with that. we know we are giving the next generation an inferior standard of living. and give myself 30 seconds to say, if we keep going down this path, we will have a crisis. it is not a fear mongering. simpson-bowles and we will have a crisis. there are democrats who agree with the facts. it's not the democrats who are writing these budgets, though. that's our problem. mr. speaker, we are going to have to come together sooner or later to deal with this and i yield four minutes to the vice chair of the budget committee, a gentleman who has offered wisdom on this, the gentleman from georgia, dr. price.

the chair: the gentleman is recognized for four minutes. mr. price: i thank mr. ryan for his remarkable leadership. mr. chairman, it is no wonder that folks are confused out there. i tell you, there is so much misinformation that is coming from the other side. it is truly remarkable. let's try to set the record and the motives straight. republicans care about seniors staring at devastating reductions in medicare under current law. republicans care about workers and middle-class folks fighting to make ends meet with increased gas and food prices and on and on. republicans care about young people struggling to get started in careers and crushed by government rules and regulations. republicans care about students getting out of school and not being able to get a job in their field. because we care about seniors and workers and single moms and young people and students, because we care about all

americans, we present this responsible, balanced budget. now, budgets, mr. chairman, are about priorities and priorities that the american people overwhelmingly support including getting spending under control. getting our economy moving again so we can get folks back to work and getting our debt crisis under control so we may preserve the american dream for future generations. and these are precisely the priorities of our house republican budget, the path to prosperity. this path to prosperity is the way to responsibly balance our budgets. american families know that the federal government shouldn't spend more than we take in and we agree. let's look at a couple of specific items. our friends talk on the other side about loopholes. we are interested in closing loopholes, you bet. the gentleman from maryland said not one dime will go to close the deficit. he is just wrong. i have had this discussion with

him and he is simply wrong. it's sad that he perpetrates that misinformation. second, taxes. the gentlelady from pennsylvania said we were interested in raising taxes by some remarkable amount. i can't remember what it was. we don't. we balance the budget without raising taxes. mr. chairman, they can't have it both ways. they can't say that our plan is not specific enough on taxes and then say it is so specific that we increase taxes by a specific amount sm the fact of the matter is, mr. chairman, as you know and our friends on the other side of the aisle know it's the ways and means committee that develops the tax plan. and that's why the budget committee doesn't address it. as a physician, i can tell you, mr. chairman, that removing -- taking $716 billion from medicare and spending it on something else means that seniors are not going to have the kind of quality health care they need. and that's why we go get that $716 billion. we bring it right back to the medicare program. it's imperative to do that to

keep quality health care in this country. and they talk about slashing and spending cuts and severe cuts to spending. mr. chairman, our budget increases spending by 3.4% every single year on average and we do that because that's the number that you need in order to bend the curve down so we get into balance. mr. chairman, the path to prosperity ensures that we are honoring america's most important priorities. our budget saves and strengthens and secures medicare. we protect the national security. it cares for the poor and the sick by repairing america's safety net programs. and we expand economic opportunities for all. we believe in the ingenuity and the dreams of the american people. it's time we have a government that is worthy of the people that we represent. and i yield back. the chair: the time of the gentleman has expired. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: thank you, mr. chairman. let's start with taxes. what the republican budget does

is provide a windfall tax break for the folks at the very top. people listening can do the math. dropping the top tax rate from 39% to 25%, right off the bat. that's about a cut of one-third, top rate for millionaires. that's a huge loss of revenue. so how do they make up that revenue? well, if you are going to really make sure you don't increase the deficit, math tells you you are going to increase taxes on middle-income people to help pay for those tax breaks, which is exactly why we offered an amendment in committee saying, ok, ways and means committee, when you do tax reform don't raise taxes on middle-income folks, and they voted against that. there are lots of other provisions in the republican budget that provide guidance to other committees, but they

didn't want to provide them that dep guidance. so the point is that they provide tax breaks to the folks at the very top while leaving middle-income folks vulnerable. on net, they do not close one tax loophole out of those four trillions to reduce the deficit. you know how we know that, mr. chairman? because their revenue line is constant with the baseline. so, mr. price is just dead wrong when he says they closed tax loopholes to increase revenue for the purpose of reducing the deficit. it's not in there. it's just dead wrong. now, let's get the record straight about what the republican budget does to different groups that mr. price referenced. seniors, here's what the aarp, the largest organization

representing seniors says what the republican plan will do. it fails to address the high cost of health care and instead shifts costs on to seniors and future retirees. removing the medicare guarantee of affordable coverage, seniors contributed to through a lifetime of hard work is not the answer. $810 billion uts, in cuts. 2/3 of that goes to people with disbilities. nonpartisan n, congressional budget office has said, and i quote, it means that states, they block grant the program to states with a lot less money. states would need to increase their spending on these programs, make considerable cutbacks in them or both. cutbacks might reduce eligibility for medicaid and

chip and lower payments to providers or increased cost-sharing by beneficiaries. all of which would reduce access to care, unquote. so whether it's in medicare or medicaid, we violate commitments to seniors in this budget. talked about kids in education, their budget would allow the doubling of the student loan interest rate in july from 3.4% to 6.8%, making college less affordable. our budget makes sure there's not that doubling. and we had an earlier conversation with ms. moore about the impact of people in poverty. and i will give you one example. in the category of the budget that helps women, infants and children program, this is the program that helps pregnant women and women with very young children get nutrition

assistance, in that category of the budget, they double the sequester cut. and then they tell us it's not going to have any impact, not on that, not on doubling the sequester cut, on the national institutes of health and the research they do. somehow magicically all of that will be funded, even though you double the sequester cut, more than double it in that category of the budget. so their budget, while providing these tax breaks to the very folks at the top. their budget while slowing down economic growth in the economy right now, also means we undermine other important priorities in our country. and i would now like to yield two minutes to a new distinguished member of the budget committee from california, mr. huffman. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. huffman: i rise to oppose

the republican budget for a very fundamental reason. it would be devastating to the health and well-being of america's seniors. this budget raises seniors' costs for preventative services and reduces costs to nursing home care and opens the doughnut hole, which means for seniors with high prescription drug costs they could end up paying $13,000 moreover the next 10 years. the republican budget also tries once again to end the guarantee of affordable coverage under medicare by converting that program into a private-sector voucher that will not keep up with costs and that's going to leave seniors on fixed incomes holding the bag. the republican study group budget is even worse. it forces chained c.p.i. on social security and what that means is quite simply reduced benefits for seniors who paid into the system and earned those benefits, need them and are

counting on them. mr. speaker, i cannot vote for a budget that protects billions of dollars in special-interest tax breaks for the wealthy and most powerful corporate interests while reducing benefits for seniors and shredding the social safety net. my 83-year-old mom is like millions of seniors. she did her part working hard all her life, paying into the system and paying her taxes and when she retired, she couldn't odd a guarantee that her government would honor its end of the bargain. we can reduce the deficit without forcing extra costs on the middle class, seniors and the most vulnerable on our society and i'm supporting the democratic alternatives which do four essential things. they honor our commitment to seniors, two, they focus on jobs and economic growth, which is a far better way to balance our budget and three, they maintain our safety net. finally, fourth, they keep us on

the path of health care reform, which is going to bend the costs that are creating these problems. i yield back. the chair: the time of the gentleman has expired. the gentleman from wisconsin. . . mr. ryan: mr. chairman, another chart. the red line shows where spending is going. the congressional budget office numbers. the green line shows our historic revenues. the blue line shows president obama's numbers. but even if we got all the tax increases that the president and his allies in congress are calling for, it wouldn't even pay for 1/5 of all the deficit spending that's coming. this is where spending is going. we are spending ourself into a debt crisis. we will never, ever balance the budget if we keep spending growing at the pace it's growing right now. we have to do something about this. if we don't our families will receive a bankrupt country,

economic growth will slow and our kids will be guaranteed a diminished future. we owe it to our countrymen, to our economy, to our kids to get this under control. with that i'd like to yield three minutes to a member of the budget committee, also a member of the appropriations committee, the gentleman from mississippi, mr. nunnelee. the chair: the gentleman from mississippi is recognized for three minutes. mr. nunnelee: thank you, mr. chairman. i do want to thank mr. ryan for his leadership on this budget. week of talked a lot about the big picture. i want to make it personal. in the early 1990's i lost my job in a corporate merger. for about 48 hours i moped around feeling sorry for myself. but then one morning my wife and i got up, we made a pot of coffee and we got out a sheet of notebook paper and right down the middle of the page we drew a line. on one side we wrote down, this is what we have coming in. on other side we wrote, this is how we're going to spend it.

we shed some tears that morning as we made difficult decisions. and the reason i tell that very personal story is because there's no question in my mind that today there are americans sitting at their kitchen table with that same piece of pamer, shedding those same tears -- paper, shedding those same tears. before i got here i served in the state senate, i chaired the appropriations committee. and i worked with the democrat chairman in the state house as we made difficult decisions, balancing our state budget. families, state legislatures, small businesses around this nation are making those difficult decisions. they have every reason to expect their policymakers in washington to do the same thing. i support this budget proposal because it does make tough decisions and balances our budget. i support this proposal on behalf of my mom and dad who worked all of their life and

paid into a system and their government made them a promise. they said when you get age 65 we're going to provide you health care. yet the act wears for that system say -- actuaries for that system say that their government is in danger of not being able to honor its proposition. i support this budget on behalf of my parents because this budget says we repeal a system of unelected bureaucrats that will make health care decisions for them. i support this budget on behalf of my children and their peers who are entering the work force yet are facing job creators with an uncertainty of what's coming out of washington. i support this budget on behalf of my two grandchildren who i will not be part of passing on a debt that will jeopardize their future. we hear our friends on the other side of the aisle say, well, what we need to do is raise taxes so that we can spend more.

we're going to tax this current generation $1.5 trillion more, we're going to tax future generations so that we can spend more. that is not the right approach. that's why i support this budget. and i yield back. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: thank you, mr. chairman. just to be clear in terms of the democratic proposals, if you take our budget proposal here, together with the work that we've done over the last couple years, which reduces spending by over $1.5 trillion, $700 billion in revenue, take that all together, means $4 trillion in deficit reduction, over that amount, over the period of window. and we do it inal bad way -- do it in a balanced way. we don't do it the same time we're providing windfall tax breaks to folks at the very top. we don't do it on the backs of

other important priorities. we do it by growing the economy and asking for shared responsibility so we have shared prosperity in this country. yield a minute and a half to the gentleman from georgia, a member of the judiciary committee, mr. johnson. the chair: the gentleman from georgia is recognized for 1 1/2 minutes. mr. johnson: thank you, mr. ranking member. mr. speaker, i rise in opposition to the so-called ryan budget path to prosperity which really should be called the ryan budget mainline to misery for the middle class. budgets are a reflection of our nation's values and it's clear that the house republicans chose to favor the ultrawealthy over the weak, the sick, the poor and the elderly. mr. speaker, this is just more of the same old, same old. more tax breaks for the wealthy and into medicare as we know it,

they don't care anything about medicare. broken promises to our seniors and higher taxes on the middle class. for the middle class, this ryan budget is a road to ruin. for the middle class, this ryan budget is a shortcut to suffering. issuing vouchers for health care and gutting programs for low- and middle-income americans at the expense of budget-budgeting tax cuts for the wealthy is not the best way forward for our nation. i look forward to supporting the democratic budget which reduces the deficit in a balanced way while strengthening the economy, bolstering the middle class and investing in our future. thank you and i yield back. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: too many points to refute so i won't bother trying. i yield three minutes to the gentleman from wisconsin, a member of the budget committee, mr. ribble. the chair: the gentleman from wisconsin is recognized for

three minutes. without objection. mr. ribble: thank you, mr. chairman. thank you, chairman, for yielding. wow, it's been quite an afternoon already. slash, cut, tone deaf, burn, plunder, shred, eviscerate, end medicare as we know it, balance the budget on the backs of our seniors and my favorite, austerity cool-aid. there's been enough hyperbole in this room today, i should have brought my boots. let's talk about our austerity. we talk about a lot, about the leent fortunate among us. the concern for seniors and for veterans and the most needy. this is what the budget actually does. these are the real numbers. i've read the real budget. not somebody's report on the budget but the real budget. this is what we do for veterans. we increase from $145 million to $187 billion. that's a 20% increase. 20% increase over a decade. $1,675,,000,000,000 commitment to our seniors, i'm sorry, to our veterans. then i heard we're going to end medicare as we know it.

ll, $509 billion to $864 billion in medicare over a decade, if this is austerity cool-aid, i don't know how you can define $6,656,000,000,000 as austerity cool-aid. i've heard a lot of people say, i'm concerned about my mom. some of my colleagues have said it on both sides. i want you to know, moms, we've got your back. to the tune of $6,656,000,000,000. we're here for you. let's look at social security. we hear that social security's going to be in trouble. well, this budget goes from $854 .illion to $1,423,000,000,000 so what does that come out to? it's just a meager $11 ,150,000,000,000 over the next decade on social security alone.

so what does that do for these three programs? three programs, mr. chairman, this is our austerity cool-aid. $19,481,692,000,000 on three programs, nearly $3 billion more than the accumulative national debt in the last two centuries. if this is leaving our seniors behind, if this is leaving the most fortunate behind, i don't even know what we can do to make it right other than this. mr. chairman, mr. ryan, i'm proud of the budget you've put together and you've achieved balance, including meeting these demands for the most -- the least fortunate in our society. and with that i yield back. the chair: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: thank you, mr. chairman. i think mr. ribble made some very, very important points. for all of us in this debate. and that is that the reason you see spending rising in both

budgets is primarily because we have so many more baby boomers becoming eligible for medicare and social security. in fact, what this chart shows is that over the 10-year window, you're going to see about a 33% increase in the number of people eligible for medicare and about a 30% increase in the number of people who are eligible for social security. and so what we say in our budget is that if we're going to meet our commitments to these seniors , but also reduce our budget deficit, we got to do it in a balanced way because if we meet these commitments and at the same time are trying to reduce our deficit, one way to do it is the way the republican budget does. to more than double the

sequester cut in all the areas that are important to growing our economy, our infrastructure investment, our kids' education, science and research. they also cut medicaid which affects a lot of those seniors on medicare, about 20% of those seniors are also on medicaid. but it's at the end of that 10-year window that our republican colleagues then move to their voucher plan, premium support, i don't care what you call it. the only way you're going to achieve any savings compared to the baseline numbers, c.b.o. baseline that the chairman showed you, the only way you're going to do it is if you're capping the amount you're going to get so that seniors have to eat the costs and take the risks of rising health care. now, there's a better way to address that issue and that is

the way we approach it in our budget and that is to build on the kind of reforms that we made in the affordable care act, in obamacare, which have helped and contributed to reducing the rapid rise in per capita health care costs and which as i pointed out earlier our republican colleagues included in their own budget. so, yes, we have to deal with these drivers of costs, including health care. but the way we propose to do it is not by transferring or offloading these rising health care costs on the back of the seniors, but by moving medicare away from a strictly fee-for-service system toward one where we reward the value of care over the volume of care. and that has achieved significant savings and it has done so without any negative impact to medicare

beneficiaries. so, very different approaches to this issue. mr. ribble pointed out there's spending going up. that's to meet these commitments. if you don't take a balanced approach like we do, you can only address those issues by undermining other very important national priorities. priorities that have always had bipartisan support in the past. and i now yield a minute and a half to the gentleman from texas , financial services committee, mr. green. the chair: the gentleman from texas is recognized for 1 1/2 minutes. mr. green: thank you, mr. chairman. i thank the ranking member for the time. mr. chairman, the pending -- depending on your point of view, there is something in this budget for you to like and to love. if you like repealing the affordable care act and replacing it with nothing, then you love this budget.

if you like having senior citizens pay more for their pharmaceuticals in the dawn of life, the twilight of life, then you love this budget. if you like having 26-year-olds and under come off of the insurance policies that they're currently on with their parents, then you love this budget. if you like the notion that health care should be wealth care in the richest country in the world where one out of every 100 persons are millionaires, then you love this budget. if you like the concept of having voucher care as opposed to medicare, then you really love this budget. my dear friends, i neither love it nor like it.

i'm against it and i won't vote for it. i yield back. the chair: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: it was very entertaining. i yield myself a minute. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for a minute. mr. ryan: there are two ways to deal with medicare, essentially. and most people would agree that medicare has a big problem. it's going bankrupt. and the gentleman from maryland talked about demographics and health inflation. obamacare changed medicare as we know it. obamacare puts a board of 15 unelected bureaucrats in charge of medicare. these bureaucrats, by law, are given the assignment, required to cut medicare each and every year to hit the targets that will lead to denied care for current seniors. we disagree with that. we think patients and their doctors should be in charge of their health care. we believe choice in competition

so that seniors have guaranteed coverage options to make sure that they can have a plan that best meets their needs. is this some pie in the sky theory? to yield myself one more minute, let me show you a chart. by the way, you get a check, no one is proposing that. premium support is a bipartisan solution, the only bipartisan idea offered on how to save medicare. how the prescription drug law works today. when the prescription drug law was passed, it was expected to cost about $100 billion. when it began on an annual basis. what happened to the actual costs? it came down 41% below cost projections. the prescription drug law came in 41% below cost projections. name me a government program that comes in 41% below costs. why did this one do that? i'll tell you why. seniors got to choose the plan

that meets their needs. the drug-providing plans had to compete against each other for the seniors' business. they compete. they lowered their prices and improved their quality. customer satisfaction at an all-time high. and lo and be hold costs went down. give myself 30 more seconds to say, we believe inputting seniors in charge of their health care, not 15 bureaucrats. our budget does not change the medicare benefit for anybody in or near retirement. but to guarantee that that promise can continue to be made for my mom and the other moms we have been talking about, to guarantee it is there for the future generations, you have to reform the program. and that's why we want this bipartisan idea that is proven to work versus giving the control to 15 bureaucrats. with that, i would like to yield three minutes to the gentleman from arizona, mr. salmon.

the chair: the gentleman is recognized for three minutes. mr. salmon: balancing our budget goes beyond spending. t will ensure prosperity and according to two prominent stanford economists, the ryan budget would raise gross domestic product by one percentage point by 2014. just what does that mean? they explained it. equal to about $1,500 for every household in the united states. $1,500 for every household in the united states. by 2024, they estimated g.d.p. would increase by three percentage points to $4,000 per household. that growth, that kind of growth, can't be ignored. putting our budget, mover, our economy on a sustainable budget is a moral imperative and we owe it to the men and women retiring tomorrow as well as my newest

granddaughter who will be born in april. the ryan budget recognizes that our current tax structure is holding our nation's prosperity back. i applaud collapsing the tax code of 10% and 25%. we need pro-growth policies that will grow and create jobs. at the end of the day, we don't need more taxes, we need more taxpayers and new jobs will do just that. containing the size and scope of government has to be a priority here. the more money taken away from the economy to support government programs means less money in the economy to support investment, innovation, job creation and wealth for all americans. we have done this before and we can do it again. i listened with incredibility as i listened to the gentleman from maryland doing a little bit of revisionist history and talked about the late 1990's and gave

cried to the president for the budget well, i was here in the republican house of representatives in 40 years and i would like to take credit for that, too. i think the republican congress got the ball rolling. i don't care if the president takes the credit for that. in fact, after we passed welfare reform three times, finally the president came along kicking and screaming and signed welfare reform into law and 50% fewer families have to rely on that. they have jobs. i would like to see us balance the budget not just for my children, but for my grandchildren and if president obama is willing to do that with us like president clinton reached across the aisle, i will be the first in line to give him credit for that, because i believe all america will benefit. i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: thank you, mr. chairman. i want to respond to a few of

the comments from the chairman with respect to health care and medicare costs. as we indicated earlier, we have seen a dramatic slowing in the per capita increase in health care costs. that's a good thing. that's, in part, we believe as a result of changes in the affordable care act. and as a result of that, the so-called independent advisory board that our colleagues misleadingly refer to as a bunch of bureaucrats, won't even any job to do for at least 10 years, probably longer. now, if health care costs per capita start rising more quickly, then their tasks are to propose a way to reduce those health care costs and specifically instructed not to have a negative impact on beneficiaries. and by the way, it specifically

says, if congress has a better way to do it, go for it. that's what the law says. we think that that's a better approach than handing everything over to insurance companies and the republican plan to give seniors a voucher premium support, i don't care what you call it. it's bad news, because seniors will be getting this thing, but the value of that thing doesn't keep up with the rising health care costs. the chairman mentioned prescription drug part d. it came in under projected costs. one reason was, you had more generic drugs on the entire market, not just the medicare market. but the other major reason was, guess what? 25% fewer people enrolled in part d. you had fewer partnership panels and it cost less, 25%. now it is simply wrong to say

that the republican voucher plan for medicare is like part d prescription drug or like the federal employee health benefit plan, which we have referred to many times before, because the difference is, and it goes to the core of this issue, both those plans, part d and the federal employee health benefit plan have provisions that ensure that the premium that is provided by the government or medicare keeps up on a percentage basis with rising health care costs. that's why it's called premium support and that's why the republican plan is not premium support because it does not keep up with rising health care costs if they are going to claim the savings it makes. and here's a chart that illustrates this. this is current medicare, seniors are putting in a certain amount and guaranteed a certain percentage of support from medicare. here's the plan for federal employees and members of

congress, they put in about around 25% and the program picks up the other 75% and as costs go up, the federal government still picks up 75 frs. here's what happens with a voucher program where a value with what you get doesn't keep up. you, the beneficiary, the senior, pays more and more and that's the only way it can work if at the same time you are going to show that congressional budget office chart that shows all that spending out in the future. the only way you can bring that down under that plan is to cap the value of premiums and that's not premium support. that's a voucher. and that's the end of the medicare guarantee. i yield two minutes to a great new member of the budget committee, the gentleman from rhode island, mr. cicilline.

the chair: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. cicilline: i thank the gentleman for yielding. budgets should reflect our priorities and our values and should protect american families by investing in education, infrastructure, science and research, clean energy and housing. budgets should be designed to grow our economy and get people back to work. this republican budget does not reflect the values of our great nation. it will hurt our economy and it will hurt the american people. it says as yogi beara said, deja vu all over again. more tax breaks for the richest americans, big subsidies for big oil, tax subsidies to companies that ship jobs overseas at the expense of the middle class and working poor. our federal budget should honor the commitments we have made to our seniors, but this republican proposal would end the medicare guarantee as we know it, shifting rising health care costs to seniors. we should be educating our next leaders to enter the workplace successfully and making

meaningful investments in rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure, bridges, rods and schools and put people back to work in jobs that help support families. but this budget makes deep cuts in rebuilding america and in education. according to the center for american progress, the republican budget proposal on the floor today would cut $1.2 trillions from investment in education, science and infrastructure, hurting our economy and some have projected would result in the loss of two million jobs. the budget before us does not reflect our values as a nation. i urge my colleagues to vote against it and support the democratic alternative. it's a budget that really speaks to the highest ideals of america, the kind of america that will provide the best education for our kids and discover new cures for disease and develop new clean energy resources and rebuild our crumbling bridges, roads and ports and honor our promise to

our seniors and veterans. i urge my colleagues to support the democratic alternative and vote against the republican ryan budget. the chair: time of the gentleman has expired. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: i enjoy the back and forth on medicare. under our proposal, there is no cap on medicare growth for current seniors. we don't have the cap like obamacare does. obamacare caps medicare and then has this board of 15 bureaucrats decide how to affect current seniors to make it live within its price control. we don't do that. we say leave medicare alone. people like my mom organized their lives around this program and relied on it. don't change a thing. don't put bureaucrats controlling it. the cap we are talking about, that's future seniors. if you are poor, sick, middle income, you get a lot more subsidy, total coverage for poor people than the wealthy. what we say, the wealthy should

pay for more their own premiums than everybody else and helps us save medicare for the next generation. these are ideas that have bipartisan support. the only bipartisan idea on how to save medicare versus the rationonning from the ipab board. i yield three minutes to the the gentlewoman from tennessee, mrs. blackburn. the chair: the gentlelady from tennessee is recognized. mrs. blackburn: i thank the gentleman from wisconsin for the outstanding work that he has done and all of my colleagues on the house budget committee have diligently brought forward a budget that is responsible and is a credit to our citizens and to the american people. you know, i think it is quite amazing when you listen to some of this rhetoric. mr. chairman, it is so evident from listening to this debate that we have friends across the

aisle that just really believe that government can never get enough of the taxpayers' money. i don't think they could tell us how much is enough. because they are always willing to find ways and reasons and new programs and new ventures or investments that they like to call it, things to spend that money on. and every time we talk about accountability and responsibility of the house to manage the people's money in an accountable and responsible way, they start to talk like that money is theirs. it is theirs. and we're talking about taking that money away from them. but you know what? it's the people's money. and what the american people have said is they want to see this government on a spending plan that is going to be accountable, that is going to be responsible and they want a

budget that is going to balance and want us to get this deficit spending and our national debt under control. now the document we are bringing forward is something that is going to do that. and it's going to do it in the appropriate way. because we meet our obligations. we honor the commitments and the promises that have been made. i heard someone talk about shredding the social safety net. mr. chairman, quite frankly, when our friends across the aisle brought forward obamacare, they're the ones that took a whack into that social safety net by making those spending cuts in medicare and pushing that money over to stand up the new program. . what we will do is preserve medicare for today's seniors. give younger workers an option

that is going to honor the work that they are doing now and paying into that system. i think it's important that we look at how this is going to affect our children and our grandchildren. i have two grandsons, jack and chase. they're here this week. i'm delighted they're here in budget week. because the decisions that we make this week are going to be decisions that they're going to bear the burden of. money we spend is money they will pay back. it's imperative that we be responsible to our children, to our grandchildren, to future generations and meet the obligations we have today. i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentlelady yields back the balance of her time. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: thank you very much, mr. chairman. it's extraordinary how many times we have to point out that the republican budget before us today contains the medicare

savings that were first demagogued last fall during the presidential campaign. we hear them attacked here on the floor of the house by republicans and yet they're in the republican budget. and in fact if they weren't -- no, mr. chairman, they're in this republican budget. and what's more, their budget wouldn't balance without them, which is why they cannot have it both ways and claim their budget's in balance and they're getting rid of obamacare. now, while they're keeping the savings, they are getting rid of all the important benefits in the affordable care act that will provide more affordable health care, which will make sure people can't be denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions. it will make sure that kids can stay on their parents' insurance policy until they're age 26. you know, for three years in a

row we've had a bill from our republican colleagues called repeal and replace. repeal obamacare, but you know what? we're going to replace it with something else that provides affordable care. three years. we've never seen replaceed. there is no replace -- replaced. there is no replaced. you can look in the republican budget. there is no replace. just like for three years they've told us they have a tax reform plan that's going to magically provide these big tax cuts for people and not hit misdemeanorle-income taxpayers. not one piece of paper out of the ways and means committee in three years. so, mr. chairman, i get a little -- it's a little tiresome to continue to hear people criticize savings that we achieve without touching beneficiaries which our colleagues, including -- our colleagues include in their budget and which extend the life of the medicare trust fund by more than eight years. i now yield a minute and half to somebody who knows a lot about the importance of medicare and social security, the gentlelady from illinois, a member of the

energy and commerce committee, ms. schakowsky. the chair: the gentlelady from illinois is recognized for 1 1/2 minutes. ms. schakowsky: thank you, mr. chairman. the ryan republican budget reflects everything that the american people rejected in the last election. asking nothing from the wealthiest americans and rich corporations that ship our jobs overseas while turning medicare into a voucher program and slashing investments that create real jobs. inequality is at its highest point since the great depression and yet this budget would make it worse. here's the top 1%. since 1979, look at how their income has gone up. 277.5%. this is the bottom 99%. you see a little bit of increase but you see where the money has gone. well, households making more

than $3.3 million would get an average tax cut of $1.2 million. those who make less than $22,000 would get $40 and 1/3 of them would get no tax cut at all. meanwhile critical support programs for seniors and the poor would be cut, including drastic cuts to medicaid and the food stamp program. i urge my colleagues to oppose the ryan republican budget. it is pure march madness and not in a good way. the chair: the gentlelady yields back the balance of her time. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: i yield myself a minute to -- the gentleman is correct in saying that the savings that are in the affordable care act for medicare we apply back to medicare. that's correct. we think that money should stay in medicare to expend its solvency and not be raided to spend on obamacare. he says we keep the savings but

we don't keep any of the benefits. president obama said that premiums would go down by $2,500 if we passed obamacare. they've gone up by $3,000 on average. i don't call that a benefit. the cost of the bill have gone from $938 billion to $1.88 trillion. it's a budget buster. it doesn't pay for itself. i don't think that's a benefit. next year young people are expected to see their premiums go up by 145% to 189%. i don't think that's a benefit either. so, yes, we don't want these benefits. we don't think turning medicare over to a board of 15 unelected bureaucrats to cut it in ways that will surely lead to denied care for current seniors is a benefit. that's why i want to yield two minutes -- let's -- that's not why, but i want to yield two minutes to the gentlelady from indiana, a former member of the budget committee, mr. stutzman. the chair: notwithstanding, the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. stutzman: thank you, mr. speaker. and i rise in strong support today of the balanced budget put

forward by my friend and chairman paul ryan. and the reasonable and practical approach that this budget committee has taken while they budget hardworking taxpayer dollars. mr. speaker, this budget debate goes deeper than spread sheets and focuses on the longevity of the american dream. today we are considering a republican budget that actually balances in 10 years. calls for pro growth, pro job tax reform -- pro-growth, pro-job tax reform and strengthens medicare for our seniors and future generations. while in the senate harry reid and patty murray are considering a budget that never balances. it increases taxes by $1 trillion and let's medicare and social security race towards bankruptcy. and it turns medicare into a program that rations benefits to seniors. make no mistake, washington is approaching $17 trillion of debt and more than 12 million americans are unable to find

work. the decisions we make will either sink us deeper into debt or put us on a path that encourages job creation and restores the belief that if we work hard and make tough choices, our kids will inherit a stronger country. mr. speaker, the choice is clear. if hoosier families balanced their budgets, washington doesn't have an excuse. it's time the president and the senate offer real solutions for hardworking hoosier families. i commend chairman ryan and the house budget committee for their hard work and i urge my colleagues to support the resolution. i yield back. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: thank you, mr. chairman. i now yield two minutes to another terrific new member of the budget committee, the gentlelady from new mexico, mrs. grich am, lujan grich am. the chair: the gentlelady from new mexico is recognized for two minutes. mr. lujan: mr. speaker, i rise in opposition to the -- mr. lujan: lew mr. speaker, i rise in opposition to this plan.

this plan abandons the economic recovery, it is a path to greater disparity and it protects the affluent while further squeezing the middle class. grishgrish this will cost us -- grich grich this will cost us $2 million jobs in 2014. this is on top of the 750,000 jobs we will lose this year due to sequestration. the republican budget attacks the various industries where the largest job growth should be occurring. ms. lujan grisham: we need to invest in critical infrastructure like the health care system as a key way to create jobs here at home and protect our most vulnerable. according to a 2012 bureau of labor statistics study, the health sector is going to be the leader in job growth throughout the rest of this decade. unfortunately the path once again chosen by republicans in this congress will put job growth in jeopardy. the center on budget and policy priorities estimates that the

budget plan under consideration cuts $2.5 trillion from health care by 2023. how? it turns medicare into a voucher program and it block grants medicaid to states. now this will force health care providers to cut jobs and to reduce services to their patients. with an aging population that will require greater care, we should be investing in critical infrastructure like health care and other programs like disease and care management which have an will continue to reduce spending -- and will continue to reduce spending in medicare. let's be clear. this budget wreaks havoc on health care systems in this country, it hurts patients and it devastates future job growth in the health sector. lastly, this plan also chooses to arbitrarily balance the budget in 10 years, which is harmful to the fragile economy and middle class families. the notion that 10 years is the magic number to balance the budget is ludicrous. it is similar to telling mortgage holders who are responsibly paying their mortgage that instead of having 30 years to pay it off, now they

have 10. would they be able to? many of them would end up losing the house and that is exactly what the ryan budget does and why to the nation's budget and to our economy it puts us underwater. instead i would encourage all of my colleagues to support the van hollen substitute which is a balance approach that leads to job creation and is the right way forward. i yield back. the chair: the gentlelady's time has expired. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: i yield four minutes to the gentleman from california, a member of the budget committee and also some other committee, the appropriations committee, mr. calvert from california. the chair: the gentleman from california is recognized for four minutes. mr. calvert: thank you, mr. speaker, and thank you, mr. ryan. this is what principal visionary, responsible leadership looks like. i commend chairman ryan and the entire team for this budget and for assisting on regular order. i also congratulate this body for finally forcing the senate to do something. and produce a budget. we owe it to our fellow americans to be honest about the

complex fiscal challenges and options before us. that's why today's debate is one of the most important we'll have this year. nearly every day i hear from my hardworking constituents from the southwestern river side county, struggling tremendously. they continue to make ends meet by making tough fiscal decisions. whether it's for themselves or their families or for their businesses. most americans don't understand why our elected official it's can't do the same. instead they see us jumping from one crisis to the next, putting their lives and their well-being on a constant roller coaster. frankly i don't understand it either. you can't hide from the statistics. you don't have to be on the budget committee to understand our fiscal situation. a balanced budget is not a radical idea. it's a responsible one that the citizens of riverside county and those around this country practice themselves. economists across the spectrum agree, that our current path is leading us to a debt crisis

should we fail to act. make no mistake, we're on the warning track and we should reverse course before we slam into the wall. all americans should have real concern about what this means for the future prosperity of their own families and of our own nation. under the obama administration, u.s. public debt is a percent -- as a percentage of g.d.p. is over 70% and growing. we've seen european nations, there appears to be a tipping point on the debt to g.d.p. ratio. and our current rate, we're nearing dangerous territory. the reverse currency status of the dollar and our rank among world economies will only carry us for so long. so what affect does this level of debt have on the economy and its citizens when things go south? all you have to do is look around like -- at countries like cyprus, spain, greece. in the case of greece you'll see a depressed environment where the unemployment rate is over 26%, severe austerity cuts and

overhauls of gutted worker benefits, safety net programs, harming seniors and the country's poorest populous, taxes on families an businesses have increased at a sharp rate and violent social unrest has become common place. most recently we've seen a proposal to bail out cyprus banks that could raid the savings account of its own population. these are the realities of debt-ridden countries. these are the realities of liberal policies that tax too much, spend too much, borrow too much and produce far too few jobs. we cannot afford the path that we're on. thankfully we have time to change. america's course and the house republican budget provides a so-year plan. it puts brakes on our spending levels, laying out a thoughtful program, reforms to ensure successful government services are solvent for generations to come, prioritizes a comprehensive restructuring of or tax code to simplify the system and improbables our fiscal system in a way -- improves our fiscal system in

way that would allow our economy to grow, providing opportunities that work -- for those who work hard, no matter what station in life they start at. the senate is joining the house in this conversation after a four-year absence. i don't think a plan that never balances, with a failed stimulus and additional tax hikes. i suspect the president's budget will be similar. however we welcome the proposals because we'll have clear options laid before the american people and have a comprehensive and honest discussion about future choices. the vice president famously said, show us your budget and i'll show what you you value. with the budgets submitted we're all forced to conclude that the ite house values delay and objectscation. i know that this process will allow us to find common ground. addressing issues on this magnitude is never easy or

pretty but it is a process worth taking. house republicans continue to stand ready to work with the president and our democratic colleagues in the congress to meet the complex challenges before us so we can get our nation back to a path of prosperity. thankfully the house republican budget does exactly that and with that i urge a yes vote on houses remain 25. i yield back. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: thank you, mr. chairman. i yield a minute and a half to the gentleman from vermont who has been very focused on these budget issues, mr. welch. the chair: the gentleman from vermont is recognized for 1 1/2 minutes. well well the focus and goal of this budget is to eliminate the debt. we all share it. but this budget lacks ambition for other challenges. what about stag narnt wages --

stagnant wages, lack of jobs? these are all fundamental issues. the middle class is shrinking. wages now are what they were as they were in 1966, just a week ago when we voted for the sequester, it was a day when american profits were at a record, higher than they have been since the 1960's, but american wages were back at 1966 levels. there is an assertion that we lack credibility and we are taxers and spenders. i reject that. but let me remind the folks, the war in iraq, on the credit card, the war in afghanistan, on the credit card. tax cuts for the wealthy, never paid for. medicare part d, on the credit card. then we had the collapse of the economy. those were not our policies but

the policies of a previous president but erased the record surplus -- may have additional 30 seconds. the chair: if you want to give him 30 seconds. mr. van hollen: i yield 30 seconds. mr. welch: there is a credibility question but an economic policy question. there are two assumptions. one is that austerity will lead to prosperity. getting the debt down will get us to the promised land. it's the pot of the gold at the end of the tea party rainbow. no evidence for that whatsoever. the second is a faith-based conviction that if you give tax cuts to wealthy people, that will trickle down to the rest of us. no experience in showing that that can be successful. we should be cleaning up the tax code. we should be fighting waste, fraud and abuse, whether in the pentagon or health care system. we should be doing that together. this budget does not give us

that chance. i yield back. the chair: the time of the gentleman has expired. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: i yield myself 30 seconds to say that austerity is what we are trying to prevent from happening. that's the irony of this debate. austerity is what happens after the debt crisis hits. austerity is what is happening in europe. austerity is cranking up taxes, slowing down your economy. cutting benefits on senior citizens after they have retired, that's what austerity is. that's what they call it. we are preventing that. we are preempting that. the goal of this budget, it's a reasonable plan to balance the budget, to grow the economy, to create more take-home pay so families can prosper. i yield three minutes to a new member of the budget committee, the gentleman from south carolina. the speaker pro tempore: charkt

-- the gentleman from south carolina is recognized. mr. rice: there is one thing for sure, we can't keep going the way we are. if you look around the world, look at countries like spain, portugal, greece, and you see the consequence of unrestrained spending, the republican plan balances in 10 years. the plan offered by the senate never balances. and when we say balance, we mean matching revenue to spending, not spending more than you take in. when our colleagues across the aisle talk about balance, they use it as a code word for a tax increase. the republican plan offers protections across the spectrum of american life. it offers our seniors the protection of making our promises good in social security and medicare.

no one will deny, o.m.b. will tell you, the c.b.o. will tell you, the medicare trust fund is going broke. it will expire in 11 short years. and the longer we wait to deal with that, the worse the problem becomes. it protects our middle class through tax reform and through repealing the obamacare law with its regulations and taxes. it will structure our system for economic growth. we will stop hemorrhaging jobs overseas and bring american jobs back to these shores. it's one thing if we lose jobs because of low wages overseas. we don't ever want to compete in that arena. it's another if we lose jobs because our government is inefficient, bloated and expensive. and finally, it protects our

most vulnerable. it protects our young people. you know, i agree with then senator obama when he said it was immoral to continue to incur these massive debts. of course, when he said it, since he said it, our debt is multiples of what he was decrying at that time. we are piling mountains and mountains of debt on our children and our grandchildren to fuel our addiction to spending and it's got to stop and it's got to stop now. i'm proud to stand for this republican budget and i urge its passage. i give back the rest of my time. the chair: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: thank you, mr. chairman, under our budget proposal, the deficit is dropping rapidly, but we also

address the jobs deficit so that we make sure more people get back to work. and with respect to the medicare trust fund, i would point out that obamacare extended the life of the hospital trust fund by eight years. and if republicans did what they said they wanted to do, which is repeal it, they would shorten the life of the trust fund to 2016. but even though they want to tell us they have kept that in. i now want to yield 1 1/2 minutes to the gentleman from connecticut, who has worked so hard to make sure that colleges are affordable to students in this country, mr. courtney. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for 1 1/2 minutes. mr. courtney: as we talk about the issue of young people in debt, one thing that is very clear for 7 1/2 million young americans who receive subsidized stafford loans. the interest rates is going to

double from 3.4% to 6.8%. we have before us now two budgets and one budget, the democratic budget brought up by mr. van hollen protects the other rate. the other budget by the majority party allows that rate to double to 6.8%. the federal reserve bank of new york came out with a study that showed the student loan debt has tripled over the last eight years. we have one budget which protects pell grants, which reduces the need to borrow money to pay for college and we have the other budget from the majority party, which freezes pell grants at $5,65 dollars a year. any parent like myself who has kids in college, any student who believes that over the next 10 years that television is going to -- tuition is going to stay flat, has no understanding what the trends are over the last 20

years in terms of state withdrawal from higher education, support, and what is happening out there in the real world. we have one budget which speaks to the monumental challenge that young people who are trying to improve themselves to get ready for the workplace, we have another budget which is blind to those challenges and will reduce college to a system of "v"s and have nots. e must invest in young people. the subsidized student loan program understands that. the majority budget which allows those rates to skyrocket, which freezes pell grants so that young families from poor backgrounds will not be able to afford the cost of college, again leaves this country behind in the competition for high-valued jobs, jobs that require skills whether in science, technology, engineering and math or other areas of curriculum. the fact of the matter is, for

young people, there is only one budget which speaks to them and addresses their needs. that's the democratic budget that is brought up by mr. van hollen and i yield back. the chair: the time of the gentleman has expired. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: the interest rate was put in law by the democrats. if we bring legislation to the floor that is paid for like we did last year, i would assume we have every reason to believe we would pass it. i yield three minutes to the gentleman from wisconsin, a new member of the budget committee, mr. duffy. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for three minutes. mr. duffy: i'm happy to hear my friends across the aisle talking about investing in our future and our economy. when they talk about that, we have to declare that is code for borrowing and spending more money. and we should truly talk about the cost of this debt. we all know today that we owe $17 trillion in debt. and if the federal reserve

stopped printing money, the actual cost to service this debt, to pay the interest payments, would be about half a trillion dollars, $500 billion. you go out 10 years. and our debt is going to be $25 trillion and minimally to service that interest payment 10 years from now is going to cost $7.5 billion a year or trillion. so you talk about the cost of interest payments every year to service the debt, that's $750 billion that isn't going into education. it's not going into health care. it's not going into roads or schools or helping our poor. it's $750 billion that goes to interest payments. so when you talk about investing in our future, we're not doing that. we are mortgaging our children's future. let's be clear, there is someone

who is investing in our future. it's the chinese. they are investing and buying american debt. so when my little two-year-old girl and four-year-old, when they get to be our age, they are going to have this weight and debt around their neck and going to pay those payments back to those chinese pre-schoolers. this is not responsible and to hear my colleagues across the aisle stand up and talk about a balanced approach that continues this course of red and say this is what we want to give to them? listen, if you asked moms around america, is this what you want for your children and want them to inherit? is this how you want them to invest their tax dollars, they would stand up and say, heck know no. be responsible. pay off the debt. we don't want them to have their massive tax dollars go to

interest payments. my friends across the aisle, they talk again about borrowing and spending and investing in our economy. and when they use that language, it sounds familiar to the same language they used four years ago. this is the same argument that was used to borrow a trillion dollars to help us grow our economy, create massive new jobs. the bottom line is that trillion dollar stimulus failed. we want a responsible approach. balance the budget, grow our economy, part our the house will be in order.-working middle-class families back to work. the republican budget does that. and i ask my colleagues to support the republican budget. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from maryland. . . mr. van hollen: mr. chairman, when president obama was sworn, in fact, before he even put his hand on the bible a little more

than four years ago, we were losing over 700,000 jobs every month. the economy was actually spiraling downward at a faster rate than it was at the time of the great depression. and thanks to the resiliency of the american people and the emergency actions taken by the president and others we stopped the freefall, we turned the corner and there have been 36 consecutive months of private sector job growth, more than 6.4 million jobs created. we didn't get any help from our republican colleagues. when we had to make difficult decisions to prevent the total collapse of the economy. now we've seen some momentum in the job market and we have a republican budget that's going to put the brakes on that growth. that according to the congressional budget office and by the way their budget includes the assumption of those

continued sequestration levels into the next year. so, let's talk about china for a minute. i got a letter the other day from the c.e.o. of a major biotech company. here's what he said. he said, other the last couple of years, because of -- over the last couple of years, because of the reduction in our national investment in science and research, he laid off 1,000 people. 1,000 people. and because of the continuing sequester they've imposed a hiring freeze right now. those are jobs that now will not be created, that would otherwise if we hadn't had the republican approach to the sequester. and you know the real kicker? i hear mr. duffy talking about china. they're hiring people in china. not because of lower chinese wages, but because china has decided to make a robust science and health care funding a national priority. in other words, the chinese are

copying the secrets to our success, things that help our economy grow, things that are slashed in the republican budget and i say slashed, yeah, because they cut that portion of the budget by more than two times the sequester. that's a fact. so, we're talking about competing with the chinese or the indians or the europeans or anybody else who's out there, one of our global competitors, let's not allow them to borrow the secrets of our success while we're ignoring them here at home. and now i yield two minutes to a terrific new member of the budget committee, someone who's been focused in leading a lot of our anti-poverty efforts, ms. lee of california. the chair: the gentlelady from california is recognized for two minutes. ms. lee: thank you, mr. chairman. let me thank our ranking member for your tremendous leadership and for yielding. and also to chairman ryan for a

very spirited markup. i rise in strong opposition to the budget, to the ryan budget. and let me just say, as a new member of the budget committee, i've had the opportunity now to really get into the weeds of the budget which really is full of choices. but those choices would undermine our nation's future for the continued benefit of special interests and the wealthy. bottom line that's what this budget does. it would dismantle government, it would increase inequality and leave the most vulnerable people on their own. we should reject this warped vision of america. and we should call this budget for what it is. republicans call it a path to prosperity but it really is a path to poverty. for the middle class, for working families, for children and for our seniors. the fact of the matter is you cannot pretend to fight poverty while you make brutal cuts to the very programs that lift millions of americans out of poverty. the republican budget would make

devastating cuts that will increase child hunger, cut off millions of seniors from access to health care and throw struggling families off of tanf during the middle of a job crisis. the republican budget proposes yet another $6 trillion tax cut for the 1%, the top 1% in our country. while focusing the 66% of their cuts on shredding our nation's critical safety net for our children, our seniors, our disabled and the poor. this budget would also cost two million jobs and slash nutrition and food assistance programs for eight million to nine million people. mr. chairman, block granting medicaid, turning medicare into a voucher program and gutting food assistance to our children and our seniors will not reduce poverty, it will make it much, much worse. our democratic budget will close special interest tax loopholes to rates the critical revenue

that we need to invest in the american people. may i have another 30 seconds? mr. van hollen: i yield the gentlelady another 30 seconds. the chair: the gentlelady is recognized for 30 seconds. ms. lee: thank you very much. let me just conclude by saying, fully supporting our safety net programs like medicare, medicaid, snap and social security will reduce poverty, grow the middle class and renew economic prosperity for all americans. unlike republicans, democrats simply do not believe that gutting the very programs that support poor and low income families would reduce poverty. programs such as the child tax credit, the earned income tax credit, the van hollen democratic alternative budget creates 1.2 million jobs this year, it reduces the deficit by $2.4% and makes huge -- 2.4% and makes huge key investments in our future. the chair: the gentlelady's time has expired. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: mr. chairman, let me yield myself a minute. look, i very much appreciate the gentlelady from california, where she comes from on this issue. i believe her heart's in the

right place. we too want to make sure that we get rid of poverty. we too want to make sure that people get on with their life, get that letter of -- ladder of life so they can get onto good lives. that's our aim here. now, here's what we see. we have spent trillions of dollars on this war on poverty. we're spending $1 trillion a year on all levels of government to fight poverty. and what have we gotten for this? we have 46 million people in poverty. poverty rates in america are at a generational high. so rather than measure our poverty-fighting efforts by how much money we throw at programs, by inputs, why don't we start thinking about measuring it by outputs, by people -- how many people we're helping get out of poverty, by any measurement this isn't working. i yield myself another minute to say that we need to rethink our

premise here. are we simply perpetuating poverty by treating its symptoms? or shouldn't be we -- shouldn't we look at what has worked in the past, what communities are doing to make a difference and get behind those ideas? let's fight poverty by attacking the root causes of poverty to break the cycle of poverty, to get people out of poverty. those are the ideas that we're talking about here. this is not a numbers thing. this is not a budget-cutting exersiles. this is taking those ideas -- exercise. this is taking those ideas that were so successful in reducing child poverty and the welfare reform and applying them to the prom -- to the programs that have not been reformed. giving states flexibility, having work training requirements and job training requirements and block grants and time limits. what does that do? all the predictions of doom and gloom were there but we lowered child poverty. we helped get single moms back to job-training programs, to get back to work.

this is why we reform job training programs, this is why recall for reforming our safety net. because our goal like her goal is to get people on with their lives, to reach their potential. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. mr. ryan: with that i'd like to yield three minutes to the gentleman from utah, mr. stewart. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for three minutes. mr. stewart: mr. speaker, i am honored and thrilled to speak on this subject. it is the primary reason that i ran for congress. and i think it is the defining issue and the most critical argument of our day. we are at a crossroads in our history. i believe that this time is that important. what we do at this moment will determine the future of our nation. it will determine the future of our children. it will determine the future or the death of the american dream. one of the great innovators and business leaders of our generation and man who happens

to be from my home state of utah popularized a time management concept called the urban important matrix and the point of this was to help us focus on those things that are both urgent and important. and to let the other things go. and frankly as a congress, we do a terrible job at that. we often legislate based on the crisis of the moment. lurching from one manmade crisis to another. and the budget is a great example of that. for years we have treated this as if it is neither urgent nor important. as if it could go on forever. but we know that that's not true. but we also know now what this president believes. he doesn't think it's important to balance our books. he doesn't think it's important to cut our debt. he has no intention of cutting any spending. and not only does he not intend to balance our budget, but he derides and dismisses those of

us who think that it's important to our future. but americans understand this. and it's not that hard. and please listen to me on this because this is so important. a nation that is bankrupt cannot provide for the security of its citizens. a nation that is bankrupt cannot provide for the poor and the needy among them. and i speak now primarily to my colleagues on the other side of the aisle. if you care about the poor, and i know that you do, and by the way, i do as well, then care enough to help them in the long run, not just for the next few years. there's nothing compassionate about letting medicaid or medicare go into bankruptcy. there's nothing compassionate about letting social security fail. but that's what's going to happen if we don't have the courage to fix this thing.

and we have to fix it now. this is both important and urgent. many of us had hoped that the president would lead on this matter but he has chosen not to. it's not in his nature, he's much more comfortable leading from behind. but since he won't lead, those of us in congress will. i admire chairman ryan, i thank him for his courage in tackling a challenge that has terrified congress for years. reforming entitlements in a way to save them for our children. we have a window where we can make a difference, we can save america, we can save the american dream. please, let us have the courage to do that. and that is why i support chairman ryan's budget and urge my colleagues to do as well. thank you, mr. speaker, i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: thank you, mr. chairman. the president has been crystal

clear. his top priority is to grow the economy, to put more americans back to work, to strengthen the middle class, have rising middle class wages and upward mobility in this country. because by attacking the jobs deficit we can also bring down the budget deficit because we know from the nonpartisan congressional budget office that more than half of our deficit this year is due to the fact that you still have a lot of people out of work who are looking for work. which is why it's so counterproductive to adopt the approach that our republican colleagues do, by not replacing the sequester, the congressional budget office tells us we will lose hundreds of thousands of jobs just by the end of this calendar year. and those jobs are the most important thing to be available to help strengthen the middle

class and help lift people out of poverty. but to lift people out of poverty it's also important to provide a little bit of support that they can stand on as they climb that ladder of opportunity. and unfortunately this budget cuts into a lot of those legs on that stool. of support. and nobody understands this issue better than our colleague, ms. lee, so i'm going to yield 30 seconds to ms. lee to respond on that issue. the chair: the gentlelady is recognized for 30 seconds. ms. lee: thank you very much, mr. chairman. first let me say i appreciate the chairman, mr. ryan, saying that he knows that my heart is in the right place. but i also want him to know that the facts speak for themselves. we have this chart right here. and it just demonstrates very clearly that 18 more million people, 18 million people more, ok, would be living in poverty had it not been for those initiatives in this budget that you completely cut out. snap, the refundable tax credits anded broad selection of other

programs. 18 million more people would be in poverty. also let me just say that a budget's a moral document. they reflect values of who we are as americans. and why in the world as an american -- mr. van hollen: i yield the gentlelady another 15 seconds. the chair: the gentlelady is recognized for 15 seconds. ms. lee: thank you. why would we want to impose 66% of the cuts in your budget on low-income individuals and the poor? that does not make any sense, that is just morally wrong. finally i just have to say that the ranks of the poor began to grow under the bush administration. in 2005 -- mr. van hollen: i yield the gentlelady another 15 seconds. the chair: the gentlelady is recognized for 15 seconds. ms. lee: in 2005 i formed the out of poverty caucus because i saw the bush economic policies of what in fact they were beginning to do. we had probably 42, 43 members who joined that caucus. and so i just have to say to you, mr. chairman, that this didn't just begin. this -- the ranks of the poor

began to grow as a direct result of the economic policies that this budget wants to return to. thank you. the chair: the gentlelady's time has expired. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: mr. chairman, federal spending rises each and every year by 3.4% under this budget instead of 5%. and with that i'd like to yield three minutes to a member of the budget committee, the gentlelady from, mrs. hartzler. the chair: the gentlelady from missouri is recognized for three minutes. mrs. hartzler: when i'm home in missouri, i hear people say things like, i have to balance my budget, how come washington doesn't? and it's time for the government to liven within its means. and they say, we are tightening our belts, washington should, too. i have good news, i agree. and this budget reflects those concerns and those priorities. as a member of the budget committee, i'm proud to support a responsible budget that

supports economic growth while reducing wasteful spending. the federal government borrows 36 cents out of every dollar it spends and that is $16 trillion and that creates anxiety when unemployment is high and we must end the government's reckless tax, borrow and spend policies. our budget balances in 10 years. and we do it without ever increasing taxes. senate democrats released a budget that actually increases taxes by $1 trillion and never ever balances. this is worst than the status quo. washington must stop spending money it doesn't have. we must target the real problem this country faces from this uncontrollable spending. stead of continuously taxing americans, we must create jobs

and proactive steps to preserve and protect medicare and medicaid for the future. colleagues across the aisle claim this is a voucher system, when this is false. the path to prosperity reforms medicare for future beneficiaries by offering them the same kind of health care as other current federal workers and members of congress. future seniors are provided guaranteed shoed health coverage where no one will be denied coverage based on health status or pre-existing conditions. they will be able to choose from a wide range of options, one of which will include traditional medicare. the government will pay all or part of their premiums. our plan would give substantial help to the poor, who would qualify for greater relief, greater premiums. this will save the program from bankruptcy while fulfilling our commitment to health care security for seniors.

the democrat plan is to kick the can down the road and jeopardize this important program for our seniors. our plan is right for senior citizens and right for our future. additionally, we take steps to preserve medicaid and send it back to the states in the form of a block grant to allow local control and state control over this very important program that provides flexibility to help low-income individuals rather than forcing states to fit in one size fits all program. it's important that we get people back to work. and our budget does that as well, by consolidating and enhancing job training programs and pro-growth. one of the best parts, it gets our priorities right. and it provides for the common defense. there is only a few things we should be doing here, but it provides that. it replaces and repeals the president's sequester and makes sure our men and women in

uniform have what they need. i encourage my colleagues to support this bill that gets our economy growing and has our priorities right and protects and preserves those programs for our seniors and provides for the common defense. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady's time has expired. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: let's be very clear. if you give states one-third of the amount of money they are currently getting from medicaid and ask them to do the same job, which is what this budget would do just 10 years from now, you will, as the nonpartisan independent congressional budget office, say, quote, reduce access to care. that's the bottom line. with respect to the voucher program, premium support again, i don't really care what label you attach to it. the impact is the same. if you want to achieve the out-years budget savings our

colleagues claim to achieve, you have to put a cap on that amount, which is what their plan would do and which makes it entirely different than the plan we have for members of congress and federal employees and the plan that most people in the private sector have as well. as this red line shows, the amount of support you would get would drop dramatically relative to rising health care costs and we don't call it premium support. it doesn't provide support. i yield to the gentlelady of texas, a member of the judiciary committee, ms. jackson lee. the chair: the gentlelady is recognized for 1 1/2 minutes. ms. jackson lee: thank the gentleman for his leadership. and i certainly thank the budget committee for the work they have done. and i make the argument that in rly, we have a dilemma

focus and commitment and direction. i call the other budget, the budget that has a sense of lacking of what people truly need. democratic budget is a budget that speaks to what people need and it cares about people. it also cares about family economic security. the budget that mr. ryan is offering, the republican budget, three million texas seniors will see medicare end as they know it. 50 million seniors across america. but frankly, this is the real key on how the g.o.p. budget really works. $500 billion and so-called balancing is taken from the affordable care act and fiscal cliff deal. that's how they say they reach budget and will undermine americans who will not have health care. that's the budget that does not concern itself with family

economic security. then if we want to look again at the idea of safety net programs, rather than giving americans the opportunity to stand on their own feet, the republican budget literally cuts the programs that help reduce poverty. so it is not one that cares about economic security for our families. then, mr. chairman, if you want to really see what works, it really works when we talk to the top 2% -- may i have 30 seconds? mr. van hollen: i yield 30 seconds. ms. jackson lee: when you look at the tax rate under president clinton, 39.6%, we created 20.8 million jobs. the republican budget is a jobs killer. where we had a 35% tax rate and lost 580,000 jobs under george bush. here's the democratic budget, van hollen budget.

we focus on creating jobs, replace the sequester and reduce 2 deficit by $45,000 and 1. million jobs. i ask my colleagues to vote for the democratic budget. i yield back. the chair: the gentlelady's time has expired. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: i yield to the gentleman from virginia, mr. cantor. the chair: the gentleman is recognized. mr. cantor: i thank the gentleman from wisconsin for his continued leadership on the issue of the fiscal outlook for our country on the issue of the moral obligation that we have to our children and next to address the growing mountain of debt that unfortunately they're facing. and mr. chairman, i would say that this debate we're having is a debate of contrast. you look at the two budgets here

in this chamber, you look at the budget that is under way across the capitol. ours is a budget that balances, just as people at home around their kitchen table at the end of the month have to do with their checkbook every month. we believe the same is true. we balance this budget within 10 years. the other side calls for more taxes. the other budget that is being discussed in the other body, in fact, creates a trillion dollars of new taxes. and the question for the american people really is which budget do you think grows the economy? which budget do you think helps folks gain some certainty, helps folks get back to work, helps folks on are relying on some of the programs that this body knows because its budget office is telling us are going to go

away unless we act? it is clear. the choice is clear, and the contrast couldn't be more clear. i would like to respond, mr. chairman, by some of the suggestions by members on the other side of the aisle that somehow our budget doesn't address the needs of those who are most in need. in fact, the opposite is the truth. our budget protects the social safety net programs. the other budget on the other side of the aisle does nothing to respond to the alarms that have been issued by our budget counters and c.b.o. and others year in and year out. social security, medicare, medicaid, all are on life support if we don't act. our budget and the chairman of our budget committee has been a champion to say let's be responsible, let's help those who are in need.

let's provide the social safety net, the programs that make america who she is. it is our budget that helps those in need, mr. chairman, not the other side of the aisle. let's look at the question of tax reform. the people of this country have spoken out on this issue. they want a fairer and simpler code. what chairman ryan has done in this budget is provided a prescription for doing just that. a broadening of the base, a lowering of the rates, and yes, mr. chairman, an insurance in our budget that we're going to get rid of the special interest loopholes that have put washington in the business of choosing favorites. and i think all of our constituents know that is not what they elect us to do. they want to see an even playing field for all. they want everyone, everyone in this country to have a fair

shot. you compare tax reform and the position we take in our budget to that which the other side is proposing in this body and the one across the capitol, i think it's very clear. higher taxes without the reforms necessary, versus what we are trying to do, which is even the playing field, giving everybody a fair shot to go and earn success. the choice is very clear, mr. chairman. that our budget provides certainty for the future, for the moms and dads out there, who are desperate to know that we are doing our job in washington on their behalf. that we are going to address this fiscal situation so that they can get on about their lives and can see their kids have a better education, so they can have access to health care that they have come to know and for those who don't have the health care, can actually have a system that will lower costs and

provide real prospects for quality health care, not the kind of health care designed by this affordable care act that we are going to see come into law or come into effect. again, i want to thank the chairman ryan of the budget committee, the gentleman from wisconsin, for his dogged attention to this very, very alarming question of how we're going to grow our economy and doing it in a way that is thoughtful, that is well put and has the specifics to go and do the job. mr. chairman, that's something that we have not seen from the other side. we have certainly not seen from the white house. they haven't even presented the budget yet. and that is unacceptable. i urge my colleagues to support the budget coming out of our budget committee under the leadership of chairman ryan. and i yield back. the chair: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from maryland.

mr. van hollen: let me just say a word about the health care provided in the affordable care act. that means you can stay on your parents' policy until you are 26 or if you have a terrible accident, the family is not bankrupted. if you have pre-existing conditions, you are not denied coverage by the insurance companies. we keep hearing repeal all those benefits and someday we will get aaround for replacing them. nothing in this budget about replacing them. the majority leader asked the right question, which budget rose to the economy. and i would like to read what the majority leader said on the floor last year about the sequester and here's what he said, under the sequester, unemployment would soar up to 9% setting back any progress the economy has made. d cites a study showing that residents of virginia, jobs are on the line.

well, guess what? the republican plan leaves in place the deep sequester cuts. and that's why by the end of this year, we will see 750,000 fewer jobs, including a lot fewer jobs in virginia, as mr. cantor acknowledged. why in the world we would want why we would bapt to do that when we need jobs, i don't know. in the democrat budget we replaced that and invest in jobs going forward. on the tax issue, here's a headline from the other day in "the washington post." a nonpartisan group did a study, headline, g.o.p. tax cuts would benefit the very wealthy. that's bottom line. tax breakers in folks at the very top, all those loopholes we talked about closing, not one loophole closure to help reduce the deficit in a balanced way.

so i would like now to yield a minute and a half to the gentleman from tennessee, who has been working on these issues and working -- for working families, mr. cohen. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for one and a half minutes. mr. cohen: thank you, mr. van hollen, i appreciate the time. the thing that disturbing me most about the budget is its inability to understand what our priorities should be. the republican budget keeps the defense budget at $550 billion. no question we need a defense department but i don't think the other side understands what the real enemy is. the enemy to my constituents and each of us is not lurking overseas. it's disease. and to each american who will suffer from or has family members suffering from alzheimer's, aids, cancer, or heart disease, diabetes, parkinson's, post polio or

whatever, they want cures and treatments. the national institutes of health is cut in this budget by at least $1.6 billion. it's a $30 billion budget, the defense department's $550 billion. i submit to you, mr. speaker, our enemy is disease. and the department of defense for the human being and the human body is the national institutes of health. at some place, the two parties should be able to come together and agree we need to fund research which creates jobs and find cures and treatments. the other side talks about what this will do to children and grandchildren. i've heard people talk about their children and grirn and what their mothers would want. their mothers want their children to live long lifes and not suffer from cancer and get cures and get dreams. and the cures and treatments -- if i could have 30 seconds additional. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for 30 seconds. mr. cohen: the cures will benefit the next generation and the generation after that more

than this generation that place where spending dollars creates job, saves lives and benefits future generations. most research done in this country that's come up -- to come up with cures and treatments have been funded by the government or at least helped by the government and that continues to this day. people say we should be different than cyprus and greece. and spain. and portugal. and we are. because we funded those researches and we've come up with the cures and treatments and that's why this is the greatest country on the face of the earth. we need to see that the national institutes of health are funded at a greater level, not children ined. i yield back the plans of my time. the chair: the chair would remind the committee that the gentleman from wisconsin has 11 minutes remain, the gentleman from maryland has 1/2 minutes remaining. the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: i would note for the record funding on discretionary levels are set by the appropriations committee. i would like to yield three

minutes to the gentleman from pennsylvania, mr. perry. the chair: the gentleman is recognized. mr. perry: thank you, mr. speaker, thank you, mr. chairman. i deeply care about my mother who is on social security and medicare and my two little girl whors counting on their daddy to make sure those programs are available when the time comes. and of course for the constituents who are counting on me to make sure the programs are available to them. i commend chairman ryan on his leaership in drafting a budget that responsibly addresses the national debt and ensures that my own children and all the residents of the fourth district in pennsylvania are not burdened with washington's spending problem any longer. this legislation balances our budget in 10 years. i mean, i know some folks are saying why 10 years? and i say, why not ever in your budgets? why not ever? it reduces spending and make responseable reforms to mandatory spending programs. for the past few weeks i have heard from hundreds of

constituents, including my own mother, about how this budget will change social security. for current beneficiaries. i want to make clear the ryan budget does not do that. it does not cut social security. but i remind everybody that the social security disability insurance fund will be insolvent by 2016. 2016. that's three years from now. so if you're 21 years old, when you're 24, it's insolvent. if you're 45 years old, when you're 48, it's insolvent. now the part a, the medicare part a trust fund will be exhausted by 2024. this is not a long time away. for young people or old people. i had to remind my mom if these programs were not reformed, there would be nothing left for her grandchildren. there'd be nothing left for her son and very likely there'll be nothing left for her. this legislation makes those reforms responsible by allowing

medicare recipients the opportunity to choose options specific to their needs and it repeals the president's plan to have a group of unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats to slash medicare benefits for seniors, including my mom. it also repeals the president's health care law which has placed an undue burden on our job creators. a company in the district i represent told me obamacare health care costs, the affordable health care law, will cost their employees a inimum of $68 a week more. $68. that a -- that's a meal with your family, an extra tank of gas in your car. this budget ensures our service men and women are protected providing must be for defense spending, an amount consistent with america's military goals and strategies this budget is responsible. the senate budget, the democrat budget, each one starts at no

less than $1 trillion in new spending. i urge everybody to support the ryan budget. thank you, mr. speaker. i yield back. the chair: the time of the gentleman has expire. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: i yield two minutes to a terrific new member of the budget committee, mr. jeffries of new york. the chair: the gentleman is reck nighed for two minutes. mr. jeffries: i thank the gentleman for his leadership. we are at a fork in the road. there are two stark choices, the democratic plan promotes progress for the many. the republican plan promotes prosperity for the few. the democratic plan will put americans back to work, the republican plan will put americans out of work. the democratic plan takes a balanced approach to deficit reduction. the republican plan will balance the budget on the backs of children and working families and seniors and the sick and the afflicted. now whenever we make that observation, our friends on the other side say we are trying to scare the american people by

communicating misinformation. it's a very cute observation but it has no factual basis. let's just check the record. the republican plan cuts higher education spending by $168 billion. that's not a scare tactic. the republican plan embraces $85 billion in random sequestration cuts that will cost the economy 750,000 jobs. that's not a scare tactic, that's reality. the republican plan will cut spending on medicaid by $810 billion. a program, by the way that disproportionately benefits poor children, senior, and the disabled. that's not a scare tact ig. that's reality. the republican plan will turn medicare into a voucher program. but because that voucher will not keep up with the cost of health care inflation, it will

deny beneficiaries what they are receiving today, that's not a scare tactic. that's reality and that is why the republican plan is designed to plans the budget on the backs of the most vulnerable in our society. i urge a no vote and yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the time of the gentleman has expired, the gentleman from wisconsin. mr. ryan: i would like to yield two minutes to the gentlelady from north carolina, mrs. ellmers. the chair: the gentlelady is recognized for two minutes. mrs. ellmers: thank you, mr. speaker. i thank the chairman and the hard work the house budget committee has done on this incredible effort for a new plan to balance the budget in 10 years. this proposal invites our friends across the aisle, president obama and the senate, to commit to the same commonsense goal. the 2014 house republican budget sets a responsible

precedent by ensuring our government lived within its means. just like millions of americans across this country, just like my constituents back in north carolina. i hear from them every day and they ask me why can't the federal budget be balanced. why can't washington get its spending under control. this proposal sets real, practical goals that will stop spending money we don't have, fix a broken tax code, protects and strengthens important priorities like medicare and national security, reforms welfare programs like medicaid, so it can deliver on the promises to deliver to those who are in most need. it also does repeal the president's health care plan. and it puts in place and allows aos put in place real sensible patient-centered reforl for health care. the house republican budget reduces the deficit by $4.6

trillion over the next 10 years. this budget offers a plan to expand opportunity and create jobs. while not sufficient by themselves, policy reforms at the federal level can help foster an environment that promotes economic growth. this budget seeks to equip americans with the 21st century economy and glow that economy. mr. speaker, i support this bill and i believe the american people are looking for this leadership here in washington because they know that bureaucrats here in washington do not know what they know back home. so thank you, mr. speaker, i yield back the remainder of my time. the chair: the time of the gentlelady has expire. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: thank you, mr. chairman. i yield two minutes to a new member of congress, new member who is on the veterans' committee, mr. takano of california. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes.

mr. takano: thank you, mr. speaker. thank you, mr. van hollen. i rise to address the so-called path to prosperity this bdy is now debating. i'm struck by the beltway media bubble that call this is plan bold and its cree kator, representative ryan, a serious policymakers who isn't afraid to make the tough decision. my republican colleagues call this proposal brave and necessary but i couldn't disagree more. i don't think it's brave to break the promises we made to seniors, i think it's dangerous. i don't believe it's necessary to cut funding for police, firefighters and programs for low income citizens. i think that's foolish. and i don't believe that it's wise to provide tax credits for private jets and luxury yauts. my colleague mr. ryan seems to be living in an alternate reality and thinks we can fund the federal government at 19% of g.d.p. with an aging population whose health care costs are at 18% of g.d.p.

even conservative idol president reagan funded the government at 22% of g.d.p. when there was no retiring baby boom generation and health care costs only amounted to 11% of g.d.p. would mr. ryan accuse president reagan's administration of wild government spending? i don't think soful the g.o.p. budget boils down to three steps. phase one, cut spending. -- phase three, prosperity. there's a gaping hole in mr. ryan's logic. his thinking is incomplete. how is cutting funding for infrastructure, education, and health care a path to prosperity? mr. speaker, a century of evidence shows that austerity will not lead to prosper by. -- prosperity. democrats offer alternative proposals that deal with the real crisis in america. the jobs crisis.

a plan to reach full employment is the true path to prosperity. i urge a no vote on the ryan budget, thank you, and i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the time of the gentleman has expire the entleman from ribe mr. ryan: i yield two minutes to mr. yoder. mr. yoder: i rise in support of this budget proposal. before i came to washington, d.c., i was the appropriations committee legislature where we were required to balance our state's budget. we were like a lot of kansas families, we couldn't spend more money than we bring in. quite a novel concept. as a member of congress, i stood in disbelief at the wanton disregard for balancing the federal budget. it is astonishing in the last 50 years, we only balanced the ug budget six times.

not only does it balance, but pays off the national debt down to zero. i require congress to do its jobs. opponents of that amendment say we don't need the constitution to require us to do our work, to balance the budget. we have all the tools to balance the budget now. great. this is our opportunity to prove it. let's come together and do our jobs. americans are sick and tired of the standard, lame washington excuses of why we couldn't do our jobs and balance the budget. how can you keep going home and blaming others for the fiscal state of the nation? the factsr mr. speaker, besides the r.s.c. budget, this is the only budget that pays the debt down to zero. we are hearing speeches that criticizes that balanced budget without offering a balanced alternative. each day, hard-working americans get up to do their jobs and work

long, hard hours, put food on the table, pay their taxes. is it too much for us to balance our books and spend our tax dollars wisely? let's rebuild our economy and honor the commitment of the american taxpayers and let's stand together for a balanced budget. i yield back. the chair: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: may i inquire how much time remains on each side? the chair: the gentleman from maryland has 3 1/2 minutes remaining and the gentleman from wifbling has four minutes remaining. mr. van hollen: gentleman have any remaining speakers? mr. van hollen: we are prepared to close. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for 3 1/2 minutes. mr. van hollen: we have had a good and healthy debate today. and i want to go back to the question that was posed by the republican leader, mr. cantor, which of these budgets does more

to help the economy? which budget helps put more people back to work? well, we know that the austerity approach taken in the republican budget will result in 750,000 fewer americans working by the end of this year and two million fewer americans working next year compared to the alternative that the democrats are proposing, which would replace the sequester to achieve the same amount of deficit reduction, but you don't do it in a way that results in slowing down economic growth in this country, this year, next year or the year beyond. we tackle the budget deficit by dealing with the jobs deficit right now and taking a balanced approach into the future. let's talk about taxes. the republican budget will give another windfall tax break to the very wealthiest people in

this country. and in order to make up the revenue lost, they will inevitably have to increase the tax burden on middle-income taxpayers unless they are going to put their budget out of balance. now just to safeguard against that, we offered an amendment that said when you do tax reform, don't raise taxes on middle-income families. every republican on the budget committee voted against that. we can address our priorities and reduce the deficit in a smart, consistent way without violating our commitments to seniors, without reopening the prescription drug doughnut hole so people with high drug costs will have to shell out more thousands over the period of this budget. we can do it without making the interest rate on students doubled and cutting our transportation by 15% when we have all these unmet needs and unemployment in the construction industry.

we know we can do those things and reduce the deficit because we do it in the house democratic budget, which dramatically drops the deficit so it's growing much slower than the economy, stabilizes the debt at g.d.p. and balances the budget as the republican budget last year. what a conversion to hit this political target this year after all the talk last year. and the reason and the fundamental difference here is that by trying to drive to that political target, they end up balancing the budget on the backs of everybody else. commitments to seniors and investments in our economy and future. and at the end of the day and we showed the numbers earlier, mr. chairman, they can't have it both ways. they can't say their budget balances in 10 years and at the same time, they repeal obamacare.

because the $750 million in savings from obamacare is embedded right in their budget. and the trillion dollars in revenue from that, they say they are going to pull out of the air. but if we repealed obamacare today, it would be out of balance by over $500 billion. so let's focus on the task at hand. put people back to work. let's have a tax code that makes sense for the middle class, and let's keep our commitment to seniors and grow this economy. mr. chairman, i ask the people ject the lopsided republican plan and adopt the balanced approach presented by the democratic caucus. the chair: time of the gentleman has expired. the gentleman from wisconsin is recognized for four minutes. mr. ryan: i thank my friend from maryland for a lively debate. we could probably finish each

other's sentences. washington is arrogant. there is an arrogance here in the federal government. it's an arrogance that says, we know how to run things better in washington. we should run everything here. we reject that. we believe in the principle of federalism, which is contained in our constitution. we think that people who are closer to the problems can probably do a better job fixing problems. i have a letter from the governor of utah and lieutenant governor of iowa, this budget will replace the one size fits all federal programs and offers the states the flexibility they need to make these programs work for the people they serve. this budget gives states maximum flexibility in medicaid and tanf for states to determine the needs of their unique populations. we want to empower people to solve problems, because you know what? we aren't fixing these problems.

the other measure of arrogance in washington is only in washington is reducing the increase of spending a huge cut. only in washington is growing spending for the federal government at 3.4% a year to 5% a year a massive cut. you know what? government's growing just fine. the senate democrat budget says let's grow instead of 5%. that's supposed to be progress. the family budget is growing at less than 2.5% in the next 10 years. if the family budget is growing 2.5% and the federal government is growing at 5%, this is arrogance. we should ask our federal government to do just what our families do and balance the budget. that's the responsible thing to do. now, let's look at what our friends on the other side of the aisle are doing. the one consistent theme of all

of these budgets that are being offered by mr. van hollen, by the other democrats, by the senate democrats is, tax more and spend more. the senate democrat budget, that comes in the cheapest one of them all, increase net spending. we have a trillion dollar deficit. what do they say? let's net increase spending above where we are and let's raise taxes $923 billion. the house democratic budget, let's have a net spending $476 billion and raise taxes $1.2 trillion. the congressional black caucus budget, let's raise spending $1.99 trillion and have a tax or thee of $2.9 trillion progressive caucus budget, that one really takes the cake, let's have a $4.65 trillion spending

increase only to be outdone by $5.683 trillion tax increase. this is what they're saying. ignore the deficit. ignore the economy. all the answers lie in washington, take more from hard-working small businesses. take more from families. spend it in washington. and oh, by the way. we don't have a crisis. that is scare mongering. you know what? try telling that to our children and grandchildren who are guaranteed to get a lower standard of living. try telling that to the struggling workers, the families and people in poverty who aren't cutting it in this economy. balancing the budget. helps us promote a healthy economy to create jobs and get people back on their feet again and that's exactly why we are proposing and passing this budget. i yield back the balance of my time.

the chair: all time has expired.

the chair: the gentleman from texas, mr. brady and the gentlewoman from new york, mrs. maloney, will each control 30 minutes on the subject of economic goals and policy. the chair recognizes the gentleman from texas. mr. brady: thank you, mr. speaker, during the annual debate -- i yield myself such time as i may consume. during the annual debate on the budget resolution the house assigns one hour to assess the

current economic condition and evaluate how the budget resolution, if implemented, would improve the outlook for america's economy. as chairman of the joint economic committee during the 113th session of congress, i'm pleased to lead this discussion. for more than two years, the joint economic committee has demonstrated that the current recovery we're in is the weakest of all recoveries lasting at least a year since world war ii in terms of economic growth, in terms of jobs and personal incomes for families. let's examine the following three charts. in each, the red line depicts the current referry. the navy blue line depicts the average of all the recoveries since world war ii in that the navy blue line depicts average of these recoveries. since recession ended 3 1/2 years ago, our real economy, the real g.d.p. has grown by a mere

7.5%. that's this one. but during the comparable period, real economic growth averaged more than double than that, 17.5% in other post-war recovery. it is a huge gap of where we are today as a nation and just the nation. see student, middle of the road recovery in the past, we are lagging far behind. there is a serious growth gap. president obama often boasts that his recovery is generated 6.4 million jobs in the private sector since we hit a low in february of 2010. but if you look at previous post-war recoveries, apples to apples, how the average increase in private jobs over the comparable time would have generated an equivalent of 10.4 million jobs. this is the comparison. these are the jobs in the

current recovery. this is just the average. blue-shaded area is the range between the very worst and the very best, which is a lot more jobs. in fact, today, this recovery, compared to the average, we're missing four million jobs in america. we're missing more than $1 trillion out of our economy because of the current recovery in this growth gap. in fact, if this recovery had been nearly average, middle of the road, instead of having fewer jobs along main street and when the recession began, which is where we are right now, fewer jobs on main street, private payroll employment would have been at an all-time high if this just would have been an average recovery. sluggish economic growth and slowed personal income growth, the money you earn as a family. in recovery since 1960,

disposable income, real disposable income, apples to apples per person grew by $3,500 over 43 months. during the same period, this is where the average income for families has grown. but look where we are under the current recovery. in the same period in the current recovery, personal income growth per family, it $416. -- $3,000 500 but this current recovery is taking a real toll on families and real toll on our economy and on jobs. to have it oal is be able to create jobs in the future. the congress cohn gregsal

budget office lowered its estimate for our long-term growth as a nation, the potential g.d.p., from its ample since 1950 of 3.3%, they lowered it. in our future. to 2.3%. one percentage point may not sound like much but it has a huge effect on our economy, on our jobs, and on the ability of the federal government to pay its bills. think about it like this. america's traditional 3.3% frothe rate of the past, our real economy dubbles every 22 years. but at this new normal, the new slower rate of 2.3%, it takes almost 32 years to double in size. that's a decade longer, that's a decade slower. a permanent growth gap translates into one third slower growth. people seeking to find their

first job, for families trying to reach the american dream. a permanent growth gap of 1% mean ours economy will be $20 trillion smaller in 2052. that's actually a growth gap for one year larger than the entire american economy today. it also means it will be harder to balance the federal budget. a perm nept growth gap of 1% means a los of a whopping $93 trillion from our federal coffers again. think about $93 trillion. today the unfunded loiblet for social security, medicare and our federal pensions in today's dollars is only $87 billion system of the prospect of a new normal for america's economy in which our future growth permanently slows by one third should be a red flag for all americans. we are told in school growing

up that in spake spear's play, the soothe sayer told julius caesar, beware the ides of march, the 15th. ironically this year, president obama released his economic report of the president on that ominous date. buried in this report are some strarting admissions and dire warnings for the american people. like caesar this congress should take heed. first, the president's report acknowledged the current recovery is indeed the weakest since world war ii. republicans on the joint economic committee have been saying that for two years. the growth gap is real and widened. our economy's ability to grow in the future, the growth rate f potential g.d.p. has decreased. the president admits that. and the president seeks to blame this new normal on

anything put his economic leadership. he attributes toyota demographic factors, specifically a slower rate of immigration, and attributes the remaining one third to crust about everything that's over curred in the last five years. demographic factors account for ome of the new normal, but our economy for the future, it's a function of how many hours that are worked in america and the growth of the workers, how productive they are. in turn, what drives that productivity of the american worker is if businesses invest in new business, new equipment, new buildings, new software that drives jobs along main street. it's really the policies of the obama white house. to r taxes, the inability propose real solutions to save social security and medicare for future generations.

the prospect of higher costs and regulations due to the president's new obamacare law. how we regulate our local banks. nd global warming regulations. the production of -- production on federal lands, on america's lands and waters, have generated so much uncertainty. it's squelched new business in america. unlike real personal consumption nonresidential investment from the business community remain best low what it was before the recession began. mr. speaker this new normal for america, the growth gap we're in today, the prospect for america will go slower in the future is unacceptable. republican members of this house are working to accelerate growth. in a big step we can take forward tonight is to pass a

house budget. it is a responsible, balanced budget. by estimations, it will raise our economic growth by 1% in the next year. that's significant. and adds $1,500 in new purchasing power per household. if you look over the long-term over the next 10 years, the house budget could well add up to 3% to our economic growth and $4,000, per household. real income, real gains that people don't have today. the truth of the matter is roadblocks to america's future are still in place. the prospect of higher taxes, the failure to reform and save our entitlements, obamacare with all the new taxes and new regulations and higher costs per family. and the fact that we are not pursuing tax reform at least from this white house with the ways and means committee and

house republicans in this budget. move forward a fairer, simpler tax code that closes tax loopholes. does it not to fuel spend bug rather fuel lower rates for families and small piss and make us competitive again as a nation. this budget resolution, this responsibility balanced budget developed by the budget committee chaired by paul ryan is a first step toward a brighter economic future for our children and grandchildren. i reserve the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman from texas reserves. the gentlelady from new york. mrs. maloney: i thank you for yielding, i'm pleased to represent the democratic point of view in this budget. we now have before this congress the choice of two profoundly different tasks -- paths forward for the american economy. one based on severe austerity

for the many and deep cuts in programmers in vulnerable is offered by chairman ryan. and our friends from across the aisle. no new revenues are included in mr. ryan's plan. the other proposal offered by house democratic committee ranking member chris van hollen and the democrats, is based on a balanced of targeted spending cuts, the closing of loopholes, and the elimination of costly tax expenditures that benefit the very few. it uses a balance of spending cuts and new revenue. this is perhaps the most important choice that congress will make this year. it will determine what kind of country we're going to be, what kind of economy our children will inherit and what kind of place we will make for ourselves and the world. but before we examine our differences, let's look at the things we can all agree on. the long-term structural

deficit needs to be addressed on that there is no question, there is agreement. spurring economic growth is vital, without it, there's no hope. more jobs and opportunities need to be created, the recovery is leaving too many people behind, and wasteful spending needs to be eliminated and costs need to be controlled. on these things we can all agree. all these things need doing. this is not our argument. our disagreement is over how to do it and how long it should take. it's also help to feel remember how we got here and how far we've come under progress under the obama administration. as you can see from this chart, and i call it the v chart, you want to put it over here on the side. i call it the v chart.

from december, 2007 through december, 2009, the economy lost a staggering 8.7 million jobs that red section represents what was going on at the end of the bush administration. the blue section shows what happened when president obama took office. you can see there was quite a turn around. instead of going down, we started going up. and gaining jobs. in fact there have been 36 months of private jobs gained in 36 months. during this last three-year period here, the private sector has added nearly 6.4 million jobs. just last month, the private sector added 246,000 jobs. we have been moving in the right direction, from the deep

red valley into the hope of moving forward and that is where we are now. the unemployment rate is down almost 2.5 percentage points from its peak in october of 2009. our economy came very close to falling into the abyss but since the depths of the great recession, as you can see from this short, we are making progress. as you can see from the next chart, the economy has recorded 14 consecutive quarters of g.d.p. growth. again, moving in the right direction. key sectors such as manufacturing and construction have rebounded. in 2012, the hiller national home price index rosely bi7.3%. a recovery is clearly under way, but where do we go from here and how do we speed things up. let's look first at the

proposal from representative ryan and the republicans. from what i see there are only three things wrong with it. its priorities, its math, and its vision for america. the ryan budget is based solely on massive cuts to domestic investments, cuts to programs that service that benefit the work millions and help the most vulnerable. and cuts in tax rates that benefit the fortunate few. for many who are struggling now, the ryan plan would lead to a slow economic death. death from a thousand cuts. it is absolutely impossible to cut your way to prosperity. the ryan plan would make a deep and painful cut to vital domestic programs. it would change the food stamp program, a program that helps millions and cuts funding by

$135 billion. medicare as we know it would come to an end. the ryan plan includes a voucher system that would increase out of pocket health care costs by over $5,000 per senior. ere's what the aarp had to say about the ryan budget, and i quote, from the aarp. chairman pall ryan's proposed budget fails to address the high cost of health care and shift costs into seniors and future retirees, removing the medicare guarantee of affordable health care coverage seniors have contributed to from a lifetime of hard work is not the answer, end quote, from the aarp. cuts to medicaid could affect as many as 60 million people annually. half of these e