Budget
Getting our fiscal house in order using the federal budget process is essential to restoring long-term economic growth in our nation. This will require some tough choices, but I'm confident that our renewed determination to restore fiscal responsibility to the budget will enable us to focus on such key priorities as enriching our nation's classrooms, making health care coverage more accessible and affordable to all Americans, and investing and developing clean energy initiatives across the country.
Today, our nation and the President have been left to bear the cost of two wars, disproportionate tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, and the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.
Deficits Matter — Deficits matter for everyone, and it's clear that deficits of this magnitude are not sustainable. The record surpluses of eight years ago have been squandered, resulting in a swollen national debt that has nearly doubled in the past eight years. If we fail to take action, the national debt will grow ever higher, and we risk leaving a legacy of debt for our children and grandchildren.
When I attended a recent bipartisan Fiscal Responsibility Summit at the White House, I had the opportunity to hear directly from President Obama regarding his views on the fiscal road ahead.
The President said, "This will not be easy. It will require us to make difficult decisions and face challenges we have long neglected. But I refuse to leave our children with a debt they cannot repay, and that means taking responsibility right now, in this Administration, for getting our spending under control."
The President is correct. I believe the time is now for Congress and the Obama Administration to chart a course of fiscal responsibility throughout the budget process. Fixing this mess will not be easy and we must make the tough decisions necessary to get it done. Here are just a few examples of what I'm doing this Congress to help make a dent in the deficit:
- I plan to introduce legislation that will direct federal agencies to focus more time and resources on eliminating improper payments and becoming more aggressive in the use of recovery auditing. This will help the federal government recoup or reduce the more than $72 billion in improper payments made in FY2008, most of these are government overpayments.
- I plan to introduce legislation to help close the "tax gap" by focusing on improving taxpayer compliance. That is, making sure all Americans pay the taxes they owe. The net tax gap was upwards of $290 billion the last time it was measured, in 2001. Today, it probably approaches $400 billion.
- I have introduced the bipartisan Budget Enforcement Legislative Tool Act, or BELT Act, to allow the President to help control spending by cutting wasteful programs - including earmarks - from appropriation bills, and doing so without vetoing the entire federal spending bill.