Bernie Sanders

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I just want to reiterate what I think is the key point in this entire debate, and that point is whether we develop a budget that works for the vast majority of our families-- working families, middle-class families who, in many instances, are working longer hours for lower wages--whether it works for our children at a time when we are experiencing the highest rate of childhood poverty of any major country; whether it works for our elderly citizens who often have to make the choice about whether to heat their homes, buy the medicines they need or buy the food they need--and there are millions of people in that position--or do we have a budget that works for the top 1 percent of people who are doing phenomenally well or maybe even the top one-tenth of 1 percent. I want to get back to this chart, which I think is real interesting. I want everybody to take a deep breath and think about this. At a time when the top one-tenth of 1 percent owns almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent, when the people on top, the very wealthiest Americans, are doing well almost beyond imagination, do we really want to cut food stamps and nutrition programs for hungry kids? Do we really want to make college education less affordable for working families? Do we really want to ask seniors to pay more for prescription drugs--those people trying to live on $13,000, $14,000 a year. So here is the chart. This comes from Forbes magazine, not notably a leftwing publication. They simply give us the facts, and here are the facts. The top 14 wealthiest people in this country have seen their net worth increase by $157 billion over the last 2 years--14 people. Do my Republican colleagues go to these people and say: You know what, you are Americans. We have a lot of problems here. Our middle class is disappearing. We have an infrastructure which is crumbling. We have millions of families who can't afford to send their kids to college. You, the top one-tenth of 1 percent, are doing phenomenally well. Is it so hard for my Republican colleagues to say to these people: Maybe you will have to pay a little more in taxes. Let me list them. Bill Gates, in that 2-year period from 2013 to 2015, saw his wealth increase by $12 billion; Warren Buffet, $19 billion; Larry Ellison, $11 billion; Charles Koch, almost $9 billion; David Koch, almost $9 billion; Christy Walton, over $13 billion; Jim Walton, almost $14 billion; S. Robson Walton, $13 billion; Michael Bloomberg, $8.5 billion; Jeff Bezos, $9.6 billion; Mark Zuckerberg, $20 billion; Sheldon Adelson, $4.9 billion; Larry Page, $6.7 billion; and Sergey Brin, over $6 billion. That is just the increase in their net worth in a 2-year period. Who can deny the very richest people in this country are doing phenomenally well? How do you ignore that reality? How do you not say to those people: You are going to have to help us with our infrastructure, with education, with our deficit. But my Republican colleagues have a different approach. Their approach is to say to working families: Well, we are going to make it harder for your kids to get into Head Start. We are going to make it harder for you to get the nutrition programs you need to keep your family from going hungry. We are going to make it harder for seniors to get the prescription drugs they need. So I think, with this budget, the choices are pretty clear. It is laid right out there. Republicans want to balance the budget on the backs of the elderly, the children, the sick and the poor, and protect all of these guys--not ask them to pay one nickel more in taxes. I think that is wrong from a moral perspective, from an economic perspective, and I think this is a budget that should be defeated. With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SANDERS. I thank Senator Kaine for his outstanding work on the committee and for his very cogent remarks. In the Republican budget, we don't have to talk about protecting absurd loopholes for large corporations and for the wealthiest people in this country. We don't have to talk about significant cuts in Head Start, making it harder for working families to send their kids to that very important program. We don't have to talk about cuts in the Pell grant program, some $90 billion in mandatory funding, making it harder for working families to send their kids to college. We don't have to talk about raising taxes on working families by allowing the earned- income tax credit and the children's tax credit to expire. We don't even have to talk about that. All we have to do is to hear what Senator Kaine just said. Does anybody in America think it makes sense to tell 16 million men, women, and children--who today have health insurance, some for the first time in their lives--that they are going to lose that health insurance, but, by the way, we will continue to collect the taxes from the Affordable Care Act? Does anyone take that proposal seriously--throwing 16 million people off of health insurance, the equivalent of, what was it, the 15 smallest States in America--and having no plan with what to do with these people? On the surface, I think the Republican budget makes no sense at all and has a very warped sense of priorities in terms of protecting the wealthiest people in this country--the largest corporations--but sticking it to the middle-class and working families. Senator Kaine mentioned that one of the areas that we, in fact, are going to focus on is the need to create jobs. I think all of us who are not particularly partisan are aware of the fact that the economy today is a lot better than it was when President Bush left office and we were hemorrhaging 800,000 jobs a month. Is the economy where we would like it to be today? I don't think anyone believes that. But have we made some significant progress in the last 6, 6\1/2\ years? Yes, I think we have. But having said that, let's be clear. If you look at the unemployment rates, unemployment in this country is not 5\1/2\ percent. Real unemployment is close to 11 percent. Youth unemployment, which we never talk about at all, is somewhere around 17 percent, and African-American youth unemployment is off the charts. In addition to that, we have another major problem. That is, our infrastructure is crumbling. So what many of us think we should be doing is that at a time when our roads, bridges, rail systems, water plants, wastewater plants, dams, levees, and airports need a huge amount of work, and at a time when real unemployment is much higher than it should be--well, what about a commonsense approach which says: Let's start rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure and let us put Americans back to work? Do you know what, that is what the American people want. On every poll I have seen, the top priority of the American people--Democrats, Republicans, Independents--is the economy, create jobs, raise wages, and that is what we should be doing. In about 1 hour or so I will officially offer an amendment which will, in fact, rebuild our crumbling infrastructure and create many millions of decent-paying jobs. In terms of infrastructure, which is a fancy word for roads, bridges, water systems, rail, and so forth, I don't think you have to be a Ph.D. in infrastructure to know our infrastructure is really in quite bad shape. Every day somebody gets into a car--whether it is in Vermont or Washington, DC--and you see that pothole that takes away half of your axle, that is what infrastructure is about. When you are in a traffic jam because the road is inadequate to deal with traffic, that is called infrastructure. When your water pipes in your town are bursting and flooding downtown, that is called infrastructure. The truth is that for too many years Congress has dramatically underfunded the maintenance and improvement of the physical infrastructure our economy depends upon. That has to change, and that is why I will be introducing an amendment to invest $478 billion over 6 years to modernize our infrastructure. How will we pay for that? Will we pay for it by throwing children off of Head Start? Will we pay for it by throwing people off of the Affordable Care Act? No. We are going to pay for it in the right way, and that is to close tax loopholes that allow corporations and billionaires to shift their profits to the Cayman Islands, Bermuda, and other tax havens. So instead of having these corporations putting their money in tax havens--paying zero in Federal income tax--and at a time when we are losing about $100 billion a year without reason, we are going to ask these corporations to start paying their fair share of taxes, and then we are going to use that money to repair our crumbling infrastructure and put millions of people back to work. This amendment--by the way, I will tell you personally I have introduced legislation that is more expansive than this, but because I want all of the Members of the Senate to be supporting this, I have tailored it down a little bit, and we are talking about $478 billion over 6 years. This amendment will support more than 9 million good- paying jobs over 6 years, more than 1.5 million jobs a year. This is money that not only creates jobs and rebuilds our infrastructure, it makes the country more productive, more efficient, and safer. Right now, Larry Summers, the former Treasury Secretary, makes the point that if we take into account the impact of depreciation, our net investment in infrastructure is actually closer to zero of GDP, zero percent. In other words, what we are spending our money on is not rebuilding new infrastructure but replacing and patching old infrastructure. The sad truth is that as a nation we are falling further and further behind. Throughout China, multibillion-dollar projects are underway to build new bridges, airports, tunnels, an $80 billion water project, and high-speed rail lines--in China, not in the United States. This past November, China approved nearly $115 billion for 21 additional major infrastructure projects. While we are debating, while we refuse to invest in our crumbling infrastructure, China is doing just that--in spades. It is no surprise that the World Economic Forum's Global Competitiveness Report now ranks our overall infrastructure at 12th in the world--12th in the world. That is down from seventh place a decade ago. There was once a time when the United States had an infrastructure that was the envy of the world. Now we are in 12th place. Let's take a look at some of the problems we face and why we need to invest in infrastructure. One out of every nine bridges in this country is structurally deficient, and nearly one-quarter are functionally obsolete. We need to rebuild crumbling bridges. Almost one-third of our roads are in poor or mediocre condition, and nearly 42 percent of all urban highways are congested. We need to rebuild crumbling roads. Transit systems across the country are struggling to address deferred maintenance, even as ridership steadily increases. People want to take advantage of transit, to get to work on transit, and yet the transit authorities are deferring maintenance because of limited funds. Meanwhile, nearly 45 percent of American households lack any meaningful access to transit, which is a huge problem in rural areas across the country, including the State of Vermont. In Vermont, in most cases you have one way to get to work and only one way: That is in your automobile. The amendment I would be offering also creates a national infrastructure bank. This idea, championed in the past by Senators on both sides of the aisle, will leverage private capital to finance more than $250 billion in transportation, energy, environmental, and telecommunications projects. My amendment will also greatly expand credit assistance to projects of national and regional significance through the TIFIA Program, long championed by my good friend from California, Senator Barbara Boxer. It will boost funding for the highly competitive TIGER Program that funds locally sponsored transportation projects across the country that increase economic competitiveness and promote economic innovations. But we all know our infrastructure problems are not just limited to roads, bridges, and transit. Much of our Nation's rail system is obsolete, even though our energy-efficient railroads move more freight than ever and Amtrak's ridership has never been higher. While we debate the merits of high-speed rail in Congress, countries across Europe and Asia have gone ahead and built vast high-speed networks. Guess what. They work. High-speed rail trains relieve congestion on roads, airports, and whisk people around quickly and efficiently. China has already 12,000 miles of track with trains that run at least 125 miles per hour and several thousand miles with trains that can travel at 200 miles per hour. Meanwhile, the Acela, Amtrak's fastest train, travels at an average speed of just 65 miles per hour. This amendment will invest $12 billion to make much-needed investments to upgrade our passenger and freight rail lines, and to move people and goods more quickly and efficiently. It is time for America to catch up with the rest of the world. There was once a time when we were No. 1 in infrastructure. Today we are No. 12. I hear my friends on the other side talking about the debt we are going to be leaving our kids and our grandchildren, while we are going to be leaving them a crumbling infrastructure which at some point somebody is going to have to pay for unless we get our act together now. America's airports are bursting at the seams as the number of passengers and cargo grows. The Airports Council International--North America says America needs $76 billion over the next 5 years to accommodate growth in passengers and cargo activity and to rehabilitate existing facilities. Moreover, and rather incredibly, our airports still rely on antiquated 1960s radar technology because Congress chronically underfunds deployment of a new satellite-based air traffic control system. This amendment will invest $6 billion to improve airports across the country. It will invest another $6 billion to bring our air traffic control system into the 21st century by accelerating deployment of NextGen technology that will make our skies safer and our airports more efficient. Anyone, as many of us do, who travels, who flies a lot, knows our airports need to be more efficient than they are. Bottlenecks at our marine seaports, which handle 95 percent of all overseas imports and exports, cause delays that prevent goods from getting to their destinations on time. The same is true--perhaps even more so--for our inland waterways, which carry the equivalent of 50 million truck trips of goods each year. My amendment will invest an additional $1 billion a year to clear the backlog of projects needed to improve inland waterways, coastal harbors, and shipping channels. Our businesses simply can't compete in the global economy if they can't move their goods and supplies to, from, and within our country more efficiently. Right now, more than 4,000 of the Nation's 84,000 dams are considered deficient--not in need of a few repairs, but deficient--serious problems. Even worse, one of every 11 levees has been rated as likely to fail during a major flood. I will talk a little more about this issue in a few minutes as this is something that could concern everyone in the Senate. My amendment will invest $5 billion a year to repair and improve the high hazard dams that provide flood control, drinking water, irrigation, hydropower, and recreation across the country, and the flood levees that protect our cities and our farms. Much of our drinking water infrastructure is nearing the end of its useful life. I like to tell the story of Rutland, VT. A few years ago that city--one of the largest in Vermont--had water pipes that were built before the Civil War--before the Civil War--and I think that is not all that uncommon. Cities and towns all over this country, in many instances, have pipes that go way, way, way back and are constantly breaking and causing serious leaks. Each year, there are nearly one-quarter million water main breaks with the loss of 7 billion gallons of freshwater. Let me repeat that: Each year, there are nearly one-quarter million water main breaks with the loss of 7 billion gallons of freshwater. But that is nothing compared to the amount of water we lose through leaky pipes and faulty meters. In all, the American Water Works Association estimates that we lose 2.1 trillion gallons of treated drinking water every year--2.1 trillion gallons. Clearly, this is an issue that cannot continue to be delayed. We have to address that. Our wastewater treatment plants aren't in much better shape than our freshwater pipes are. Almost 10 billion gallons of raw sewage is dumped into our Nation's waterways every year when plants fail or pipes burst, often during heavy rains. My amendment would invest $2 billion a year so States can improve the drinking water systems that provide Americans with clean, safe water. The amendment would similarly invest $2 billion a year to improve the wastewater and storm water infrastructure that protects water quality in our Nation's rivers and lakes. America's aging electrical grid consists of a patchwork system of interconnected power generation transmission and distribution facilities, some of which date back to the early 1900s. Not surprisingly, the grid suffers from hundreds of major power failures every year, many of which are avoidable. Our grid is simply not up to the 21st century challenges it faces, including resiliency to cyber attacks. It is no wonder the World Economic Forum ranks our electric grid at just 24th in the world, in terms of reliability, just behind Barbados. My amendment will invest $3 billion a year for power transmission and distribution modernization projects to improve the reliability and resiliency of our ever more complex electric power grid. This investment will also position our grid to accept new sources of locally generated renewable energy and will address critical vulnerabilities to cyber attacks, an issue of great concern to many of us. Another area where we are falling behind is Internet access and speed, and this is especially important to rural States such as Vermont. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the OECD, ranks the United States 16th in the world in terms of broadband access--16th in the world in terms of broadband success--not something we should be terribly proud of. We are only marginally better in terms of average broadband speed--12th in the world, according to Akamai's 2014 annual report. How can it be that businesses, schools and families in Bucharest, Romania, have access to much faster Internet than most of the United States of America? My amendment will invest $2 billion a year to expand high-speed broadband networks in underserved and unserved areas and to boost speeds and capacity all across this country. Let us be clear: Internet access is no longer a luxury, it is essential for 21st century commerce, for education, for telemedicine, and for public safety. We cannot continue to lag behind many of our global competitors in terms of broadband quality and access. That is a brief summary of what my amendment does. It addresses a chronic funding shortfall. It addresses the need to start the kinds of investments we need to bring our physical infrastructure into the 21st century. If $478 billion over 6 years sounds like a lot of money, please consider this: The American Society of Civil Engineers--the people who actually know the most about the state of America's infrastructure--says we need to invest $3.6 trillion by 2020 just to get our Nation's infrastructure to a state of good repairs. So this amendment is a good start, but that is all it is. It is a good start. Much more has to be done. Let me conclude by asking my fellow Americans to imagine an America where millions of people in our 50 States are hard at work earning good wages rebuilding our crumbling bridges, making our roads much better, dealing with wastewater plants, dealing with water systems, and dealing with our rail system. Think about what America looks like when we create an infrastructure that is 21st century. Our job right now is to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure. As a former mayor, I can absolutely assure you infrastructure does not get better all by itself. You can't turn around and ignore it and think it gets better. Quite the contrary, it gets worse. If you have a bridge right now which is in serious disrepair, it does not get better by ignoring it. It only gets worse, and in fact it ends up costing more money to rebuild it as it deteriorates. So we have an opportunity right now. We have an opportunity to make our country more efficient, more productive, and safer by creating a 21st century infrastructure, and at the same time we have an opportunity to create millions of decent-paying jobs. In many respects, this is a no-brainer. This amendment is paid for by ending outrageous corporate loopholes that allow large profitable corporations from paying any Federal income tax. So I hope we will have wide bipartisan support for this amendment, which, as I understand it, will be voted on tomorrow, and I will officially bring it up in about half an hour. With that, Madam President, I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I was in the House of Representatives for 16 years, and I have been in the Senate now for 8 years. During all of that time, this country faced and still faces a major health care crisis. As the Presiding Officer knows, the United States is the only major country on Earth that does not guarantee health care to all of our people. Today, despite the modest gains of the Affordable Care Act, which I will discuss in a moment, we still have about 40 million Americans without any health insurance. By the way, despite so many uninsured and so many underinsured, we end up paying, by far, per capita the highest costs of any country. How does it happen? Millions of people are uninsured, millions more are underinsured, and we end up paying per capita almost double what any other Nation faces. Now, I was in the Congress during the years of the Bush administration, and I waited eagerly to hear what my Republican colleagues had to say about tens of millions of people without any health insurance and about the cost of health care being so expensive. I waited and I waited, and my Republican colleagues had nothing to say. Apparently, the private insurance companies were doing just great under that system. Drug companies were charging our people the highest prices in the world under that system. What is there to complain about? What is there to worry about? So 40 million, 50 million people have no health insurance and people can't afford health care, but it is no problem for my Republican colleagues. Five years ago, the Congress, with no Republican support, passed the Affordable Care Act. Let me be very clear. I voted for the Affordable Care Act. I will be the first to say that the Affordable Care Act has many problems and, in fact, in many ways, it did not go anywhere near as far as it should have gone. By far, it is not a perfect piece of legislation. Yet I still wait to hear what my Republican colleagues have to say about how we address the health care crisis, other than doing what they are doing in this budget, which is to repeal the Affordable Care Act completely. Let's take a look at what the Affordable Care Act--ObamaCare--has accomplished, which they want to end completely. After 5 years of the Affordable Care Act, more than 16 million Americans have gained health coverage. Many of those people never had health insurance in their entire lives. Many of those people were getting their health care through the emergency room at outrageously high costs. Since 2013, we have seen the largest decline in the uninsured rate in decades, and the Nation's uninsured rate is now at the lowest level ever recorded. Just since October 2013, the uninsured rate for nonelderly adults has fallen by 35 percent, and 16 million more Americans have health insurance. Republican response: Get rid of the ACA; throw 16 million Americans off of health insurance. Since the Affordable Care Act was enacted, health care prices have risen at the slowest rate in nearly 50 years. All of us can remember 7, 8, 10 years ago health care insurance rates with increases of 20, 30 percent. Since the Affordable Care Act was enacted, health prices have risen at the slowest rate in nearly 50 years. Are they going up? Yes, they are, but at the slowest rate in nearly 50 years. Thanks to exceptionally slow growth in per-person costs throughout our health care system, national health care expenditures grew at the slowest rate on record--on record--from 2010 through 2013. Are we making progress in controlling the growth in health care costs? Yes, we are. Republican response: Throw it out. Ten million low-income Americans are now able to get health insurance through Medicaid. And if one is a low-income American struggling to make ends meet and not able to afford health care, in many instances, this is health insurance that saves one's life. It saves one's life because they now have the opportunity--maybe for the first time in years--to be able to go into a doctor's office because they have Medicaid. Republican response: Throw it out; 10 million low-income Americans no longer have health insurance. All of us remember not so many years ago, before the ACA. You have health insurance for your family, and when your child reaches the age of 21, that child is now off of your health insurance plan. So we have huge uninsured numbers for young people in this country who are no longer able to be on their parents' health insurance plan. Under the Affordable Care Act, some 5.7 million young adults have been able to stay on their parents' policies. The uninsured rate for young adults has dropped by 40 percent. I would like to see it drop even more than that, but 40 percent is nothing to sneeze at. The Republican response: Let's make sure all of these young people from 21 to 26 rejoin the ranks of the uninsured. One of the great scandals that existed in this country before we had the Affordable Care Act--when we think back on it, people find it hard to believe--somebody was diagnosed with diabetes, with cancer, with heart disease, with AIDS, or whatever it may be, and that person walked into an insurance company and said: I need some insurance. They filled out forms. The insurance company said: Oh, you had breast cancer 3 years ago; we are not going to insure you. You had diabetes; you are not going to get insurance. So the people who needed insurance the most were the people least likely to be able to get insurance. Can we imagine that--for people who had a history of heart disease, a history of cancer, scared to death it may reoccur, in absolute need of insurance, insurance companies said: No. We can discriminate against you. You are sick, you may get sick again, and we will have to pay out money. We don't want your business. Well, the ACA did something about that. It should have never been allowed to happen in the first place. It provides protections for people with preexisting conditions. Republicans want to end the ACA. That is in this budget. They want to get rid of it. So for those people who have serious illnesses, understand that if the Republicans succeed, people may not be able to get health insurance, because we will go back to a time when companies could discriminate against people with serious illnesses. Before the ACA, many individuals couldn't gain access to health insurance for a variety of ``illnesses,'' including pregnancy. I guess pregnancy is an illness for which a person doesn't deserve insurance. It doesn't make a lot of sense to most Americans, but that is what will reoccur if the Republicans are successful. Millions of seniors in this country are struggling in terms of how to pay for their medicines. The cost of medicine in America is very high-- the highest of any country on Earth. The Affordable Care Act moves to close the doughnut hole, which means money that has to come out of seniors' own pockets. If the Republican budget gets passed and if that gets implemented into law, seniors will now be paying significantly more for their prescription drugs. The Affordable Care Act includes important health care for seniors in the doughnut hole, including 45- percent discounts on the cost of their drugs, but allowing the full price of the drug to be counted toward the amount they need to spend to get out of the hole. The Affordable Care Act gives people access to free preventive care that keeps them healthy and out of the hospital. The Affordable Care Act ends discrimination against women by health insurance companies so that they don't have to pay more for health insurance simply because they are a woman. Are we going to go back to the days when because a patient was a woman, she had to pay more for health insurance than a man? I certainly hope not. But that is what happens if we end the Affordable Care Act. The Affordable Care Act protects against a practice by insurance companies of including lifetime limits in their policies. Prior to the ACA, many insurance plans included lifetime limits--a limit on the amount of coverage that plan would provide an individual or a family in their lifetime. So, in other words, if somebody was racking up large claims because they were seriously ill, the insurance company said: Sorry, that is it. We are not going to pay any more. Are those the days we want to go back to? I think we can all agree the Affordable Care Act is far from perfect. In my own view, we should provide health care to every person in this country as a right, and I would do it through a Medicare-for-all program. Other people have different ideas. But it is hard for me to imagine anyone thinking that the solution to America's health care problems today is simply to eliminate the Affordable Care Act. Let me change topics and take a broader look at the Republican budget going beyond the Affordable Care Act, which they want to abolish. The question we have to ask ourselves is whether we are such a poor country that we should move toward a Republican budget which forces more and more people to have no health insurance; which makes it harder for working families to send their kids to college; which makes it harder for low-income families to send their kids to Head Start; which cuts back on nutrition programs, whether it is the Food Stamp Program, the Meals on Wheels program, the WIC Program; which helps people who are struggling, literally, to try to come up with the income to adequately feed themselves. We have many people in this country who are actually hungry, and the Republican budget cuts those programs. Are we such a poor country that those are the choices that stand before us? I think not. I think the facts are quite the opposite. I think the facts tell us that the United States of America is, in fact, the wealthiest country on this planet. In fact, we have never been a more wealthy country. We are not a poor country. We are an extremely wealthy country. The problem we face is that we have a grotesque level of income and wealth inequality such that tens of millions of families are struggling economically and many are hungry, while at the other side, people on top are doing phenomenally well. But when you add it all together, it turns out that we are a very wealthy country. And the idea that people would come forward and say: We are going to make it harder for low- income families to feed their kids, we are going to make it harder for working-class families to send their kids to college, and we are going to make it harder for working families to get their kids into childcare is a totally absurd argument. We are not a poor country. Let me demonstrate how we are not a poor country. When some of us talk about the rich getting richer, that is a general statement. Let me be more specific. From the year 2013 to the year 2015, the wealthiest 14 Americans--14 people--increased their net wealth by more than $157 billion over the last 2 years. The wealthiest 14 billionaires in America saw their net wealth increase by more than $157 billion from 2013 to 2015. Let me be even more specific, and tell me whether this is a poor nation that cuts kids off of health insurance, a poor nation that denies nutrition to families who need it, a poor nation that cuts back on Meals on Wheels for elderly, low-income seniors. Here is what is going on in this ``poor nation.'' From March of 2013 to March of 2015, Bill Gates, the wealthiest person in America, saw his wealth increase by $12.2 billion, going from $67 billion to $79 billion in 2015. During that period, Warren Buffett saw his wealth increase by $19 billion--one guy in 2 years. Larry Ellison saw his wealth increase by $11 billion. The Koch brothers saw their wealth increase by almost $18 billion in a 2-year period. The Waltons saw huge increases in their wealth--they are the wealthiest family in America--Christy Walton by $13.5 billion, Jim Walton by $13.9 billion, and S. Robson Walton by $13 billion. Michael Bloomberg saw his wealth increase by $8.5 billion. Jeff Bezos's wealth went up by $9.6 billion. Mark Zuckerberg's wealth went up by $20 billion, Sheldon Adelson's by $9.5 billion, Larry Page's by $7.6 billion, and Sergey Brin's by $6.4 billion. These are just the top 14. Added together, their wealth increased by $157 billion. This is a reality my Republican friends don't want to deal with. They do not want to ask the wealthiest people in this country--many of whom are paying an effective tax rate lower than that paid by truckdrivers and nurses--to start paying their fair share of taxes. Their solution to the deficit problem is to cut programs for working families, the elderly, the children, the sick, and the poor. Despite the fact that the billionaires of this country are doing phenomenally well, their view is, oh no, we can't go to those guys. They may be potential campaign contributors. We are going to go after the elderly--they don't contribute a whole lot. Elderly people on the Meals on Wheels program, elderly people making $14,000 a year--they have no political power here in Washington. They have no lobbyists out there. We will just go after the working families, the poor, the elderly, the children, the sick. They are easy. They are not actively involved. Many of them don't even vote. We can go after them, but we have to protect the interests of the wealthy and the powerful. At a time when the richest 400 Americans paid a tax rate of just 16.7 percent in 2012--the second lowest on record--the Republican budget does nothing to ask the wealthiest Americans to pay their fair share of taxes to create jobs or reduce the deficit. They are immune. The rich get richer, but leave them alone. No problem. Working families pay a higher effective tax rate than billionaires--not a problem because we are going to cut the deficit by going after the most vulnerable people in this country, the people who don't have a lot of political power. While the effective tax rate of large, profitable corporations was just 12.6 percent in 2010 and corporate profits are at an alltime high, the Republican budget does nothing to end the outrageous loopholes that allow major corporations to avoid $100 billion a year in taxes by shifting their profits to the Cayman Islands and other offshore tax havens. Now, why would you ask large, profitable corporations that in some cases pay zero in Federal income taxes to start paying their fair share of taxes? These are powerful people. These are people who have lobbyists all over Capitol Hill. These are people who make campaign contributions. Why would we ask them to start paying their fair share of taxes? At a time when billionaire hedge fund managers on Wall Street pay a lower effective tax rate than a truckdriver or a nurse, the Republican budget does not eliminate the carried interest loophole that will cost the Federal Government $16 billion in lost revenue over the next 10 years. The Republican budget protects over $40 billion in unnecessary and expensive tax breaks and subsidies for oil and gas companies even as the five largest oil companies alone made more than $1 trillion in profits over the last decade. Ask large, profitable oil companies to pay more in taxes? Don't be ridiculous--not when you can cut programs for hungry kids or cut Head Start or cut Pell grants for working-class young people. Let me tell you what this budget does do. At a time when millions of Americans are working longer hours for lower wages, the Republican budget paves the way for a tax hike averaging over $900 per person for 13 million families--$900 apiece for more than 13 million families with 25 million children--by allowing the expansions of the earned-income tax credit and the child tax credit to expire. So we can't ask billionaires who are doing phenomenally well to pay more in taxes. That we don't do. We can't ask corporations that stash their money in tax havens in the Cayman Islands to start paying their fair share of taxes. We can't do that. But what we can do is impact the lives of millions of working families by allowing the earned-income tax credit and the child tax credit to expire. In other words, we raise taxes for low-income Americans and working-class Americans and the middle class, but we do not ask the wealthy and large corporations to pay a nickel more in taxes. Further, the Republican budget paves the way for a tax hike of about $1,100 for 12 million families and students paying for college by allowing the American opportunity tax credit to expire. So if you are a family trying to send your kid to college, you are going to have to pay more because our Republican colleagues are allowing the American opportunity tax credit to expire. The Republican Senate budget would balance the budget on the backs of the elderly, the children, the sick, and the most vulnerable people in our society. It would slash investments in education, health care, nutrition, and affordable housing, while paving the way for another unpaid war by significantly increasing defense spending. It also would not ask millionaires, billionaires, and profitable corporations to contribute one penny for deficit reduction. No, it is only working families, the middle class, and low-income people who have to help us with deficit reduction, not billionaires or large corporations. As we all know, the budget we are debating today is not an appropriations bill; it is a budget bill, which, by the way, is filled with magic asterisks--those little asterisks which tell us nothing about how Republicans are going to be moving toward a balanced budget. But by making over $5 trillion in budget cuts over the next decade--$5 trillion--reasonable estimates have been made about the harm those cuts would do to the American people. At a time when the cost of college education is becoming out of reach for millions of Americans, the Republican budget would eliminate mandatory Pell grants, cutting this program by nearly $90 billion over 10 years, which would increase the cost of a college education to more than 8 million Americans. Take a deep breath and think about this. Young people all over this country--and I know this because at a lot of Vermont high schools, when you talk to kids, they are wondering how they are going to be able to afford to go to college. They are worried about the high cost of college. The Republican solution is to cut--eliminate mandatory Pell grants, cutting this program by over $90 billion during a 10-year period. So what they are doing is making a very difficult situation even more difficult in terms of enabling the middle-class and working families in this country to be able to send their kids to college. I think everybody who has children or grandchildren understands that we have a major preschool and childcare crisis in this country, and in Vermont and all over this Nation, it is very difficult for middle- income Americans to find decent, quality, affordable childcare or preschool education for their kids. Within that context of a crisis in childcare, the Republican solution is to give us a budget that would mean that 110,000 fewer young people, young children, would be able to enroll in Head Start over the next 10 years. So we have a crisis in terms of higher education, and what they do is cut back on Pell grants, making it harder for families to send their kids to college. We have a crisis in childcare, and what the Republicans do is cut back on Head Start, meaning that 110,000 fewer young children would be able to get into the Head Start Program. Under the Republican budget, 1.9 million fewer students would receive the academic help they need to succeed in school because of some $12 billion in cuts to the title I education program. The Individuals With Disabilities Education Act would be cut by $10 billion over the next decade, which would shift the cost to States and local school districts and could lead to increased property taxes for millions of Americans. At a time when there are more than 20 million hungry Americans, people who in the course of the week are not quite sure how they are going to get the food they need to survive, when many working families are running to emergency food shelters in order to get the help they need to feed their families, the Republican budget would take some 1.2 million women, infants, and young people from the WIC Program, or the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, which goes to pregnant women and new mothers. They would cut that by $10 billion over a 10-year period, impacting some 1.2 million women, infants, and young children. Once again, we do not ask billionaires to start paying their fair share of taxes, but we tell the pregnant mother or the mother of a young child that the nutrition programs she has been receiving to make sure her kids are eating well are going to be cut by $10 billion over a 10-year period. I come from a cold-weather State, and we have had a very rough February. Only yesterday, the weather in my hometown was about 10 degrees. Under the Republican budget, up to 900,000 families would be denied the help they need to stay warm in the winter and cool in the summer by cuts to the LIHEAP program, or the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program--a $5 billion cut over the next decade impacting some 900,000 families. Many of the people on LIHEAP are seniors--a good percentage of them. These are elderly people without a lot of money in cold- weather States trying to keep warm in the wintertime. We are going to see a $5 billion cut in that program over the next decade. In Vermont, and I think in many parts of this country, we have a real housing problem for low-income people. The cost of rent in many cases is much more than people can afford. People are spending 40, 50 percent of their limited incomes on rent. To address that problem, the Republican budget would kick nearly half a million families off the section 8 affordable housing program and out of their homes by cutting section 8 by $46 billion over a 10-year period. So you have low-income people all over this country--and I see it every day in Vermont--paying 40, 50, 60 percent of their income for rents, and what the Republican budget does is it cuts $46 billion over 10 years from section 8 housing, again, making a bad situation worse. At a time when real unemployment is 11 percent, the Republican budget cuts job training and employment services for more than 2 million Americans. So what we have is a budget which in many ways is a Robin Hood budget in reverse. At a time when the rich are getting richer and the middle class is getting poorer, the Republicans take from the middle class and working families to give more to the rich and large corporations. The Republican budget has a set of priorities that are way, way, way out of touch with where the American people are. During the next week, there are going to be a number of amendments being offered by Members on our side which will create jobs for the unemployed, raise wages for low-income workers, address the overtime crisis facing millions of Americans who are not getting time and a half when they should, provide pay equity for women workers, address this issue of tax breaks for the rich and large corporations, which are unconscionable and unsustainable. That is what we will be doing. I look forward to that debate and those amendments. I note that Senator Markey is on the floor and has asked for 10 minutes. I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS. The Senator may have 2 more minutes.

Mr. SANDERS. I thank Senator Stabenow not only for her remarks this evening but for the great work she has done on the Budget Committee, and I certainly concur with the thrust of what she is saying. Our middle class is struggling, and the wealthiest people are doing phenomenally well. Corporations are enjoying recordbreaking profits. CEOs make 270 times more than their average worker. We don't need a budget that protects the top one-tenth of 1 percent and the CEOs of major corporations. We need a budget that protects working families and the middle class. I know that is something Senator Stabenow has been fighting for throughout this entire process, and I thank the Senator very much for that. Amendment No. 323 (Purpose: To create millions of middle class jobs by investing in our nation's infrastructure paid for by raising revenue through closing loopholes in the corporate and international tax system)

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 323, which is at the desk.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. SANDERS. The point I was making is if we are serious about reducing the deficit, it is inconceivable that one does not look at the fact that corporation after corporation is paying zero in Federal income taxes. It is inconceivable that we do not recognize that in 1952 corporations contributed about 32 percent of all Federal tax revenue. Today, they contribute about 11 percent. It is inconceivable that we do not understand that according to the CRS, each and every year profitable corporations are avoiding $100 billion in taxes. How can we not look at that issue? How could your only approach be to make it harder for kids to go to college or for little children to be in the Head Start Program? I look forward to the debate we will be having over the next several days. I suspect there will be a lot of amendments being offered. I think it is fair to say, on this side of the aisle, what the amendments will be saying is that we need to create millions of jobs. We need to raise wages in America. We need a tax system that is fair and does not contain loopholes that allow the wealthy and large corporations to avoid paying their fair share of taxes. We need a budget that says women workers should earn the same as male workers. We need a budget that says we have to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure. I think there will be a lot of very serious debates. I think the differences between the two sides will become very apparent, and I hope the American people pay strong attention to this discussion. I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I wish to speak today in remembrance of William David Roth, who passed away on March 17, 2015. William ``Bill'' David Roth, 71, of Albany, NY, lived an extraordinary life and made major contributions to U.S. public policy. He was the son of Dr. Oscar Roth and Dr. Stefanie Zeimer Roth, refugees from Vienna who arrived in the United States just prior to the onset of World War II. Bill graduated magna cum laude from Yale University in 1964 after majoring in mathematics, economics, and politics. This is all the more remarkable given the fact that a neuromuscular disorder from the age of 8 left him unable to write. He performed complex mathematical equations and logical formulae in his head. He was also a formidable presence at Yale and later at the University of California, Berkley, where he received his Ph.D. in 1970. He was that rare person who was both a man of thought and action and who inspired others by overcoming great odds and obstacles. From 1971 to 1972 he taught political science at the University of Vermont. He very well may have averted a Kent State tragedy in 1972 by permitting himself to be arrested at the Federal building in downtown Burlington during a nonviolent student protest against the Vietnam war. While Roth was offered immediate release because of his disability, he chose instead to remain until all the students had been released from the Burlington city jail. In this way he showed one of the virtues of civil disobedience, conducted with dignity and without violence, thus serving as an example and inspiration to others. Subsequently, he went to work on the Carnegie Council on Children in Connecticut. He coauthored a landmark book that dealt searchingly with children with disabilities. His first major work was called ``The Unexpected Minority: Handicapped Children in America.'' He also coauthored ``The Grand Illusion: Stigma, Role-expectations, and Communication.'' These are widely acknowledged as providing the analytical basis for the disability rights movement as well as fostering a new academic discipline, disability studies. Bill's work emphasized the disability movement's core vision: the most socially incapacitating aspects of disability are not the inescapable consequence of biology but the result of countless social decisions that do not acknowledge the needs of people with different bodies and, indeed, discriminate against people whose bodies are different. Bill went on to pioneer the use of computer technology for people with disabilities and in 1984 founded the Center for Computing and Disability at SUNY, Albany, one of the first such centers in the Nation. Bill was widely acknowledged through his scholarly research, technological imagination, and progressive politics, as one of the founders of America's disability rights movement. He helped establish the framework for the Federal Disabilities Act and his work over the years addressed the architectural, transportation, and technological barriers to living with a disability in the United States. As a longtime professor at the University at SUNY School of Social Welfare he taught courses in social policy and disability studies. In recent years, Bill's research and writing focused on illuminating the damage done in the aggressive pursuit of dismantling of the U.S. welfare state. His book, ``The Assault on Social Policy,'' Columbia UP, is now in its second edition. It is recommended reading for all of my colleagues. Bill Roth fought not only with issues in disability but with his own neuromuscular disorder. He was a little like the phoenix-- the bird that kept coming back. He was one of the most courageous people I have ever known. He was brilliant, imaginative, inventive, and utterly fearless. Bill inspired those of us who had the good fortune to know him. As Senator Joe Lieberman noted upon hearing of Bill Roth's death: Bill was an extraordinary person--gifted, strong, funny, inspiring. We were blessed to know him. As lawmakers, we have benefited from his many contributions to public policy and discourse. We remember and honor him for these accomplishments. Bill Roth overcame serious illnesses as well as disabilities. He served as a courageous example to his family, friends, colleagues, and students.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, as the ranking member of the Budget Committee, I wish to take a few minutes to discuss the budget situation. My understanding is that Senator Enzi, the chairman of the committee, intends to have a Budget Committee markup on Wednesday, March 18, and Thursday, March 19. My understanding is the resolution will come to the floor the following week of March 23. Unless I am mistaken, we will engage in what is called within the Beltway a vote-arama, where there will be a very significant number of amendments that will be allowed to be offered. Before we discuss a budget, whether it is at the Federal level, the State level, or one's family, I think it is imperative to understand the conditions that exist as one prepares a budget. A budget reflects what our country is about. It reflects our national priorities. It reflects how we attempt to address the problems we face. It attempts to address how we go forward as a people into the future. So the first issue at hand when we discuss a budget is to, in fact, determine what is going on in America today. What are our problems? What should we be doing and what should we not be doing? I start off with the premise that I think is shared by the vast majority of the American people, which is that the middle class of this country over the last 40 years has been disappearing; that people today, by the millions, in Vermont and throughout this Nation, are working longer hours for low wages, despite a huge increase in productivity. That is the reality that faces most people in this country. But there is another reality, and that is that the people on top and the largest corporations are doing phenomenally well. Today, real median family income is almost $5,000 less than it was in 1999 in inflation accounted-for dollars. Why is that? How does that happen? The typical male worker--that man right in the middle of the American economy--made $783 less last year than he did 42 years ago, after adjusting for inflation. How does that happen? We have an explosion of technology, a huge increase in productivity; we have the so-called great global economy, $3 trillion all over the world; and the typical male worker--the guy in the middle of the economy--makes $783 less last year than he did 42 years ago. The typical female worker is making $1,337 less than she did in 2007. Today, despite the modest gains of the Affordable Care Act--legislation I supported--40 million Americans continue to have no health insurance and we remain the only major country on Earth that does not guarantee health care to all people as a right. Then we have today, because many people were driven from the middle class into poverty, more people today living in poverty than almost any time in the modern history of America. How does that happen? Despite a very significant improvement in the economy since President Bush left office, real unemployment is not 5.5 percent, it is 11 percent. Youth unemployment, which we never talk about, is 17 percent, and African-American youth unemployment is much higher than that. Throughout this country, a significant number of young people have given up on the dream of college. Here we are in a competitive global economy and we have bright young people from working-class families and they are looking at the cost of college and they are saying, Sorry, ain't for me. I am not going to come out of school $50,000, $60,000 in debt. What sense does that make when we are engaged in enormous economic competition with countries all over the world? Then we have another group of young people graduating college or graduate school in debt to the tune of $50,000, $100,000. I talked to a young doctor in Burlington, VT, some months ago. She graduated medical school $300,000 in debt for the crime of wanting to be a primary care physician. Does that make any sense? While the middle class continues to disappear, the people on top and the largest corporations have never had it so good. That is the other reality of America today. The middle class shrinks--a whole lot of people living in poverty, people have no health insurance, kids can't afford to go to college--but people on top are doing phenomenally well. Today, the top 1 percent earns more income than the bottom 50 percent. And since the Wall Street crash of 2008, over 99 percent of all new income goes to the top 1 percent. Over 99 percent of all new income goes to the top 1 percent. Corporate profits are soaring. The stock market is up. CEOs now earn 270 times what their average employee makes. Today, the top one-tenth of 1 percent owns almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent. The top one-tenth of 1 percent owns almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent. And the wealthiest family in this country alone--one family-- owns more wealth than the bottom 42 percent of the American family. Does that sound like the America we want to see, that we believe in, where so few have so much and so many have so little? It is an extraordinary fact that between 1985 and 2013, the bottom 90 percent of our people lost $10.7 trillion in wealth that it otherwise would have had if the distribution of wealth had remained at the same level as it was in 1985. If we had the same distribution of wealth, the bottom 90 percent would have had close to $11 trillion more wealth. Meanwhile, the top one-tenth of 1 percent experienced an $8 trillion increase in wealth as the distribution of wealth became increasingly unequal. What a phenomenon, this huge transfer of wealth from working people to the millionaires and billionaires. Now let me get to the budget, because when we deal with a budget, we can't ignore that reality. If the rich get much richer and the middle class declines, it makes no sense at all to say we are going to give more tax breaks to the rich and we are going to cut programs for the middle class and working families. This is the Robin Hood principle in reverse. It is taking from the middle class and working families and giving to the very rich. I worry very much that this is exactly what will be in the Republican budget that we debate next week in committee. I expect--and I may be mistaken and I hope I am but I don't think I am--I expect the Republican budget in the Senate this year will be very close to what the so-called Ryan budget did last year which was passed by the Republican House. There may be nuances of differences, I don't know, but I think it will be very close. Let me tell my colleagues what the Republican budget will be about. The Republican budget will oppose ending tax loopholes for the wealthy and large corporations--loopholes that allow billionaire hedge fund managers to pay a lower tax rate than electricians and schoolteachers. I expect that the Republican budget will continue to allow major profitable corporations such as General Electric, Verizon, and many others to go through a given year paying absolutely nothing in Federal income tax. I expect that the Republican budget will attempt to voucherize Medicare--end it as we know it to be--and I expect there will be massive cuts in Medicaid, education, nutrition programs, Pell grants, and the kinds of programs that working families absolutely depend upon. We need a very different budget than what I believe the Republicans are going to propose. We need a budget that stands for the working families of this country and not just the millionaires and billionaires. Let me tell my colleagues what that budget should include, although I don't think the Republican budget will include these ideas. When real unemployment is 11 percent, we need a budget that creates millions of decent-paying jobs. In my view, and in the view of many economists, the fastest way to create those jobs and address a real national crisis is to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure--our roads, our bridges, water systems, wastewater plants, airports, dams, levees, and expand broadband to rural America. According to the American Society of Civil Engineers, we need to invest over $3 trillion to rebuild our infrastructure. We are not going to do that, but we need to make a major investment. When we do that, we make America more productive and safer, and we also create millions of jobs. A serious budget needs to make our Tax Code fairer and to bring substantial new revenue into Federal coffers. We need a budget that ends unfair tax loopholes and asks the wealthiest people and largest corporations to pay their fair share of taxes. Today at the hearing we had in the Committee on the Budget, a Republican witness testified that he thought that corporate taxes should be zero--zero. Well, that does not make a lot of sense to me. We need a budget that understands when the Federal minimum wage is a starvation wage of $7.25 an hour, we need to substantially raise the minimum wage. We need to deal with the overtime scandal we currently see. We need to raise wages for low- and moderate-income families. At a time when large numbers of our young people have given up on the dream of higher education and college is increasingly unaffordable, we need a budget that says to every kid in America that if you have the ability and you have the desire, you are going to get a higher education regardless of the income of your family. At a time when corporations have shipped millions of decent-paying jobs to China and other low-wage countries, we need a budget that rewards companies for investing in America and for creating jobs here, not abroad. At a time when millions of people still lack health insurance, we need a budget that ensures quality, affordable health care for all Americans by supporting the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, strengthening Medicare and Medicaid, and extending funding for the Children's Health Insurance Program, community health centers, and the National Health Service Corporation. Let me conclude by making this simple and obvious point: A budget is about priorities. A budget is about choices. And what we have to determine is whether our budget coming out of the Senate is a budget that represents the needs of the rich and large corporations and their wealthy campaign donors, or whether we produce a budget which represents the needs of working families and the middle class and the millions and millions of families who are struggling economically to keep their heads above water. I hope we make the right choice. I hope we stand with the working families of this country. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, let me congratulate and applaud Senator Brown of Ohio for organizing this colloquy on trade. In my view, if we look at why the middle class of this country has been in decline for the last 40 years, why millions of Americans are working longer hours with lower wages, why we have seen a huge shift in the economy from a manufacturing economy where people earn good wages to a Walmart economy where people are working for very low wages and minimal benefits, one-- not the only one, but one of the significant factors has been our disastrous trade policies for a number of decades. If people are watching this discussion, there may be some people who will say, Trans-Pacific Partnership, what is that? What is that trade agreement? What are they talking about? One of the reasons they may ask that question is that a study came out recently which looked at how the major networks are covering the TPP--the Trans-Pacific Partnership. It turns out the major television networks are not covering the TPP. Incredible as it may sound, this trade agreement--the largest trade agreement in the history of the United States of America--has received virtually no coverage--no coverage--on the major networks. That, to me, is very amazing. I think it was Albert Einstein who made the point that doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results is sometimes called insanity. If we think a new trade agreement, based on the same principles of the old trade agreements, is going to bring different results, I think we are very wrong. I remember, because I have been in Congress for many of the major debates on trade, that way back when we had a discussion about unfettered free trade with China and the argument was, well, look at the huge market in China, look at all the jobs we will create in America selling to China. In fact, we were told that permanent normal trade relations with China would create hundreds of thousands of American jobs. Well, not quite. It turns out, as everybody who goes into a department store knows, most of the products we buy are made in China, and it turns out the permanent normal trade relations trade agreement with China has led to the loss of more than 3 million good- paying American jobs. The reason for that is obvious. Why is a major corporation going to pay an American worker $15, $20 an hour, provide decent benefits, and obey environmental laws when that corporation can shut down here, go to China, pay people very low wages, and bring their products back to America? That is why, when we go shopping, most of what we buy is made in China. We were told that the North American Free Trade Agreement--NAFTA-- would create at least 200,000 American jobs in just a few years. Well, not quite. It turns out that NAFTA has led to the loss of about 1 million American jobs. We were told that the Korean Free Trade Agreement would increase American jobs. Well, it turns out that it has led to the loss of over 60,000 American jobs. Since we signed NAFTA, the United States has a cumulative trade deficit of $8.8 trillion--$8.8 trillion. That is wealth that has left the United States and gone overseas. While the full text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership has not been made public, there have been some leaks of what is included in it, and what these leaks tell us is in fact very disturbing. I think it is obvious to anyone who has taken a look at this issue that the TPP is just a new, easy way for corporations to shut down in America and to send jobs abroad. It is estimated the United States would lose more than 130,000 jobs to Vietnam and Japan alone if the Trans-Pacific Partnership goes into effect. The reason for that is, when we are dealing with a country such as Vietnam, my understanding is the minimum wage there is 56 cents an hour--56 cents an hour. Maybe I am old-fashioned, but I don't think American workers should be forced to compete against people who are working for 56 cents an hour. At a time when corporations have already outsourced over 3 million service sector jobs in the United States, the Trans-Pacific Partnership includes rules that will make it easier for corporate America to outsource call centers, computer programming, engineering, accounting, and medical diagnostic drugs. Under the TPP, Vietnamese companies will be able to compete with American companies for Federal contracts funded by U.S. taxpayers, undermining ``Buy American'' laws. If the United States is to remain a major industrial power, producing real products and creating good-paying jobs, we must develop a new set of trade policies which work for the ordinary American worker and not for large corporations and big campaign donors. Let me be very frank as an Independent. This is not just the Republicans who have been supporting these unfettered free-trade agreements; there have been Democratic Presidents as well. Corporate America has said we want these trade policies, and the leaders of both political parties have said, yes, that is what we will do. But I think it is time to stand up and say enough is enough. This country now is in a major race to the bottom. Workers are working longer hours for lower wages. No American worker should be forced to compete against desperate people around the world who are making pennies an hour. Corporate America, every night on television in every ad we see, tells us buy this product, buy that product. Well, you know what. If they want us to buy these products, maybe it is high time they started manufacturing those products in the United States of America. I am opposed to the TPP, Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement. That is my view, but I would hope every Member is opposed to the fast- track process which gives the authority to negotiate these agreements in the final terms. That is because nobody has had the opportunity to even see what is in the proposed agreement right now. Transparency has been minimal, absolutely minimal. I think if we are serious about creating decent-paying jobs in this country, if we are serious about raising wages, if we are serious about dealing with the other issues that have surfaced in terms of sovereignty, the idea we would make it easier for tobacco companies to sell their deadly products to children around the world and make it harder for governments to protect the health of their citizens is an absolute outrage. It is an outrage. I again thank Senator Brown for helping to organize this event. I hope the American people stand and tell the Congress enough is enough. We need to create decent-paying jobs in this country for a change and not just in other countries around the world. I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I do not agree with Speaker of the House John Boehner on very much, but I do agree that it is an excellent idea for there to be a joint session of Congress in the fall to hear from Pope Francis. To my mind, in the last few years the Pope has played an extraordinary role in speaking out on issues of enormous consequence that impact every man, woman, and child, not just in our country but on the planet. He has shown great courage in raising issues that we very rarely discuss here in the Congress or in parliaments around the country. What I want to do briefly this afternoon is quote and discuss some of the statements that the Pope has made that I think we need to listen to. I think it is a wonderful idea that Speaker Boehner has invited the Pope, but I think it is important we also listen to what he has said. This is from Pope Francis. We have created new idols. The worship of the golden calf of old has found a new and heartless image in the cult of money and the dictatorship of an economy which is faceless and lacking any truly humane goal. On another occasion what he says is: ``Man is not in charge today, money is in charge, money rules.'' Then he says in another quote: Today everything comes under the laws of competition and the survival of the fittest, where the powerful feed upon the powerless. As a consequence, masses of people find themselves excluded and marginalized: without work, without possibilities, without any means of escape. Then he says this on an issue that is, I think, very relevant to this body: In this context, some people continue to defend trickle- down theories which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world. This opinion, which has never been confirmed by the facts, expresses a crude and naive trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power and in the sacralized workings of the prevailing economic system. Then he says: . . . these things become the norm: that some homeless people die of cold on the streets is not news. In contrast, a ten point drop on the stock markets of some cities, is a tragedy. In other words, when people die because they are poor and hungry and cold, that is not news. But a 10-point drop in the stock market becomes a tragedy. Then he says: We must say ``we want a just system! A system that enables everyone to get on''. We must say: ``we don't want this globalized economic system which does us so much harm!'' Here we have the leader of the Catholic Church raising profound issues about the state of the economy--certainly not just to the United States but all over the world. I don't want to paraphrase him, but my interpretation of what he is saying is that money cannot be an end in itself. The function of an economic system is not just to let the marketplace reign and end up in a situation where a small number of people have incredible wealth while so many people have virtually nothing. That is true not just of the United States, but it is even more true around the world. We have a situation right now--incredible as it may sound--where the wealthiest 85 people in the world own more wealth than the bottom half of the world's population. So 85 phenomenally wealthy billionaires are here, and half of the world's population are over here--over 3 billion people. Does anybody in the wildest stretch of their imagination think this is anything close to a just world economic system? Oxfam recently told us that within the global economy within a year or two, the top 1 percent of the world's wealthiest people will own more wealth than the bottom 99 percent. What religion condones this type of economic disparity? What political party should condone this type of economic disparity? What the Pope is essentially saying is we need to pay attention to those people who are hurting--not just the homeless, not just the hungry, but those people who are working longer hours for low wages and at exactly the same time when in this country we have seen a proliferation of millionaires and billionaires. Is that what our economy is supposed to be about? Let me just amplify what the Pope was saying by giving you some cold statistics in terms of what is going on in the United States of America. I am not talking about the global economy. I am not talking about Greece, where unemployment is 25 percent and where their economy has contracted by a quarter in the last 6 years. I am talking about the American economy. Since 1999 the median middle-class family--that family right in the middle of the American economy--has seen its income go down by almost $5,000 after adjusting for inflation. Incredibly, that family earned less income last year than it did 26 years ago, back in 1989. Do you want to know why people in America are angry? Whether they are in the Occupy Wall Street movement and consider themselves progressive, whether they are in the tea party movement and consider themselves conservative, the median male worker--that man right in the middle of the American economy--earned $783 less last year than he did 42 years ago. In other words, you have seen an explosion of technological productivity, but the male worker in the middle of the economy-- inflation adjusted for dollars--made $783 less last year than he did 42 years ago, while the median female worker--the woman in the middle of the American economy--earned $1,300 less last year than she did in 2007. All over this country we are seeing men and women working longer hours for lower wages. We are seeing people working not one job but two jobs or three jobs in order to cobble together the income they need and maybe some health care as well. But while the middle class continues to disappear on a 40-year trajectory, the wealthiest people and the largest corporations are doing phenomenally well. The gap between the very, very rich and everybody else is growing wider. This is what the Pope means, I think, when he says this: While the income of a minority is increasing exponentially, that of the majority is crumbling. This imbalance results from ideologies which uphold the absolute autonomy of markets and financial speculation, and thus deny the right of control to States, which are themselves charged with providing for the common good. This is from Pope Francis. So what does he mean when he talks about the income of a minority increasing exponentially while the majority is crumbling? Let me give you some examples. I talked about male wages, female wages, and median family income. Let me talk about what is going on in the top 1 percent. Today the top 1 percent in America now own about 41 percent of the entire wealth of our country while the bottom 60 percent own less than 2 percent. Let me repeat that. The top 1 percent own over 40 percent of the wealth. The bottom 60 percent own less than 2 percent. Today, incredibly, the top one-tenth of 1 percent now own almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent--one-tenth of 1 percent. So 16,000 families own almost as much wealth as the bottom 300 million people in our country. Today the Walton family--the owners of Walmart and the wealthiest family in America--is now worth $153 billion. That is more wealth in one family than the bottom 40 percent of Americans. Over the past decade, the net worth of the top 400 billionaires in this country has doubled, up to an astronomical $1 trillion in just 10 years. In terms of income as opposed to wealth, almost all of the new income generated in recent years, since the Wall Street crash, has gone to the top 1 percent. In fact, the last information that we have indicates that over 99 percent of all new income generated in this country goes to the top 1 percent. The top 25 hedge fund managers on Wall Street made more than $24 billion in 2013, equivalent to the full salaries of more than 425,000 public school teachers. What we are seeing in this country is growing income and wealth inequality. What we are seeing around the world is the same. What troubles me very much is that in the midst of a disappearing middle class, at a time when we have more people living in poverty today than at almost any time in recent history, I believe my Republican colleagues on the Budget Committee will bring forth a budget in the next few years which will move us in exactly the wrong direction. When the rich get richer, their proposal will be let's give more tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires. When large corporations are enjoying huge profits, and major corporation after major corporation is paying nothing in Federal income tax, their proposal will be let's give more tax breaks to large multinational corporations. Then after giving tax breaks to the rich and large corporations, they say: Well, we want a balanced budget, and the way we are going to balance the budget is on the backs of a disappearing middle class, on the backs of millions of working families, and on the backs of the poorest and most vulnerable people in this country. This is the Robin Hood principle in reverse. This is taking from the poor and working people and giving it to the millionaires and billionaires. I would hope the American people say: Enough is enough. We don't need more tax breaks for the rich and large corporations. We don't need to cut Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, education, nutrition programs for hungry people, and Pell grants so the kids can go to college. That is not what we should be doing. In fact, we should be moving in exactly the other direction. From 1983 to a few years ago, what we have seen in this country is an incredible transfer of wealth from the bottom 90 percent to the top 1 percent. We are talking about trillions of dollars in wealth going from the bottom 90 percent to the top 1 percent. Most Americans are saying: Enough is enough. We don't need more austerity for the middle class. We don't need to cut Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. Maybe it is time for some austerity for the top 1 percent. I hope when we come together to discuss the budget, Members of the Senate will listen to what Pope Francis has been talking about and give us a budget which works for the most vulnerable people in this country, which works for tens of millions of working families, and does not simply work for large campaign donors. With that, I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for up to 20 minutes.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, yesterday the Budget Committee, of which I am the ranking member, held a very important hearing on the Social Security Disability Insurance Program, which is a life-and-death program for nearly 11 million Americans, including more than 1 million veterans and almost 2 million children who rely on this program to get the nutrition they need, to heat their homes, and to pay for their medicine. This is a program that impacts some of the most vulnerable people in this country. Let me be very clear in describing this program. This is a program American workers have paid into. It is an insurance program. This is not charity. When Americans pay 6.2 percent of their income in payroll tax, almost 1 percent of that amount goes into the disability insurance program. The average disability insurance benefit is less than $1,200 a month, and for 30 percent of beneficiaries this is all of the income they have--$1,200 a month, 30 percent of the beneficiaries of SSDI. For them this is all of their income. Nobody is getting rich off of disability benefits. Sadly, on the very first day of the new Congress, House Republicans passed a rule that would lay the groundwork for a 19-percent cut in Social Security disability insurance benefits. Specifically, this rule would prohibit the reallocation of payroll taxes from the Social Security retirement fund to the disability insurance fund, a routine accounting practice that has been done 11 times in the past in a very noncontroversial, nonpartisan way. But Republicans in the House said they will not allow this to happen unless it is accompanied by a cut in Social Security benefits or an increase in taxes. In other words, what the House Republicans are saying is that either there will be cuts to the disability program or, if that fund is to be replenished, the money will have to come from cuts to the Social Security Retirement Program. In my view, that is very wrong. If the Social Security disability program was cut by 19 percent, it would mean the average benefit of approximately $13,980 a year for a disabled person--which is already where the poverty level is--would be cut by 19 percent to $11,324. That is what a 19-percent cut to the average Social Security disability insurance benefit would mean. Do any of my colleagues believe a person with a severe disability-- maybe that person is facing a terminal illness, maybe that person is paralyzed, maybe that person is an amputee. Does anybody believe a disabled person in America in the year 2015 should be forced to live on $11,324 a year? Unfortunately, that is what the House Republicans are laying the groundwork for. That is what a 19-percent cut in disability benefits would mean, and we must not allow that to happen. In my view, the debate we are having is nothing more than a manufactured crisis which is part of the long-term agenda of a number of Republicans who in fact are trying to cut Social Security. In my view, cutting Social Security is a very bad idea. Let us be very clear because there is a lot of misinformation about Social Security that is getting out there. The fact is Social Security has a $2.8 trillion surplus and can pay out every benefit owed to every eligible American for the next 18 years. Let me repeat that. Social Security has a $2.8 trillion surplus and can pay out every benefit owed to every eligible American for the next 18 years. That is not the opinion of Senator Bernie Sanders. That comes from report of the Social Security trustees. There are a lot of folks out there who are talking in one way or another about cutting Social Security. Some of them are saying let's raise the retirement age. Let's have struggling workers work another 1 or 2 years or more before they can get Social Security benefits. Other people are saying these COLA benefits are just too generous. In recent years, Social Security beneficiaries know we have had several years where people have gotten a zero cost-of-living increase and other cost- of-living increases in recent years has been minuscule. Yet some are saying let's move to a so-called chained CPI and lower the cost-of- living adjustments. Other people are talking in one form or another about a means test, which would mean significant reduction in benefits for many seniors. Others who are bolder--including some of our Republican colleagues--are talking about the privatization of Social Security. As many will remember, under President Bush that proposal in fact was brought forward and pushed very hard by Republicans. Because of an aging population, because more women are in the workforce today, and because of an increase in the retirement age, it is true there has been an increase in the number of Americans who are receiving disability benefits, but this is not a surprise. This is a demographic reality that the Social Security Administration predicted would happen back in 1994. The fact that the Social Security Disability Insurance Program is facing a funding shortfall next year is a surprise to absolutely no one. It was predicted 20 years ago. Furthermore, shortfalls in the Social Security Disability Insurance Program or the Social Security Retirement Program is nothing new. It has happened 11 times in the past and has always been resolved in a simple, noncontroversial way. That is the reason for the reallocation of payroll taxes between the Social Security retirement fund and the Social Security disability fund. As this chart shows, reallocation was done in 1968 under President Johnson; in 1970 under President Nixon; in 1978, 1979, and 1980 under President Carter; in 1982, 1983, and 1984 under President Reagan; and in 1994, 1997, and 2000 under President Clinton. In other words, this is a commonplace procedure which has happened under Democratic and Republican Presidents in an absolutely noncontroversial way. Interestingly, of the 11 times funds were reallocated, it turns out that on 5 occasions it was the disability fund that was reallocated to help the retirement fund. In other words, money was shifted from disability to the retirement fund. This time it is going the other way. At an interesting committee hearing yesterday, a number of colleagues--Republicans and Democrats--made the point that the reallocation of funds in order to prevent a 19-percent cut in disability benefits was a short-term solution; that it was not going to solve the overall issue of how do we fund Social Security for our kids and our grandchildren. That point is clearly right. No one can argue with that. What we have to do right now in fact is to prevent a massive cut to the disability program, but at the same time, while Social Security can pay out all benefits for the next 18 years, it is important that sooner than later we begin to address the problem of how do we make Social Security solvent, not just for 18 years but for decades beyond that. In terms of the disability program and the need to go forward with reallocation, every major senior organization in this country, representing tens of millions of people, wants us to do just that. These organizations include AARP, the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, and the Alliance for Retired Americans, which together represent over 60 million older Americans. What they are saying loudly and clearly is it is imperative we go forward with this reallocation to prevent cuts in the Social Security disability fund. They are united in opposition to the rule passed by the House Republicans to make reallocation more difficult. Yesterday AARP wrote a letter to the chairman of the Budget Committee, Senator Enzi, and to myself, the ranking member. Let me quote from this letter: To prevent any imminent reductions in SSDI benefits, we urge you to rebalance the allocation of social security payroll taxes between the OASI trust and the DI trust as Congress has done with success in the past. Because of SSDI, millions of disabled Americans are able to live their lives with dignity, and support their families. The highest priority in the near term is to ensure that SSDI beneficiaries, most of whom are older Americans, are not put at risk of a 20 percent benefit cut in the very near future. That is from AARP and virtually every major senior organization. Together, they represent some 60 million older Americans and agree exactly with the sentiment expressed by AARP. I am delighted President Obama proposed this reallocation plan in his budget request. I applaud the President for doing that. As I mentioned, the Social Security trust fund can pay out every benefit owed to every eligible American for the next 18 years. At yesterday's hearing, my Republican friends--and, again, some Democrats--made the very valid point that we have to go further than just reallocation, that we need a long-term solution to make certain our children and our grandchildren will have all of the benefits to which they were promised. I agree with that sentiment. That is why last year I introduced far-reaching Social Security legislation which in fact would make Social Security solvent for decades to come. The concept behind this legislation is pretty simple. It would simply apply the Social Security payroll tax on income above $250,000. In other words, it would scrap the cap that currently exists. Right now in the midst of massive wealth and income inequality in our country, a Wall Street CEO who makes $20 million a year pays the same amount into Social Security as someone who makes $118,500. If you make $20 million or you make $118,000, the amount of money you put into the Social Security trust fund is the same because the cap is now at $118,000. In 2013 I asked the Chief Actuary of the Social Security Administration to estimate how long the solvency of Social Security would be extended if we simply applied the Social Security payroll tax on income above $250,000. His answer was that Social Security would be made solvent until 2060--45 years from today. I refer my colleagues to the letter from the Social Security Chief Actuary that I had printed in the Congressional Record on February 5 of this year. Further, the Center for Economic and Policy Research has estimated that my proposal--my legislation--would only impact the top 1.5 percent of wage earners. More than 98.5 percent of Americans would not see their taxes go up by one dime under this plan. So I say to my colleagues, if you want to extend the solvency of Social Security--not just for the next 18 years, which is currently the case, but for the next 40 to 45 years--I hope you will join me in making sure the very wealthiest people in our country--the top 1.5 percent--pay their fair share into the Social Security trust fund. To my mind that is a much better idea than raising the retirement age, forcing hard-pressed workers to work another year or two before they get their benefits. It is a much better idea than cutting the cost of living adjustment. It is a much better idea than many of the ideas I have been hearing for the last few years. We all know that the huge increase that we have seen in this country in wealth and income inequality has resulted in millions of Americans seeing a decline in their income, and we have people from one end of this country to the other working longer hours for lower wages. In fact, while the wealthiest people have become much richer, real median family income today is almost $5,000 less than it was in 1999. Incredibly, the typical male worker--the man right in the middle of our economy--made $783 less last year than he did 42 years ago. The typical female worker--the woman in the middle of the economy--earned $1,300 less last year than she did in 2007. Today the top one-tenth of 1 percent owns more wealth than the bottom 90 percent. As this chart shows, the top one-tenth of 1 percent owns as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent. In terms of income what we are looking at is a situation where almost all of the new income generated since the Wall Street crash goes to the top 1 percent. Why is this significant? Well, obviously it is significant because millions of Americans have not seen growth in their income. In fact, they have seen a decline in their income. But what makes it also significant is that this decline in income for millions of Americans-- this growth in income and wealth disparity--has also had a profound impact on the solvency of Social Security. I want all of my colleagues to understand that if income inequality remained at the same level today as it was in 1983, Social Security would have $1.1 trillion more in the trust fund than it does today. Why? Because, obviously, when workers saw their wages go down, less money went into the Social Security trust fund. When people on the top went over the cap, they were no longer contributing from their income that was above the cap. So less money goes into the Social Security trust fund. If the payroll tax had simply continued to cover 90 percent of all earnings, which it did in 1983, rather than the 83 percent that it covers today, the Social Security trust fund would be able to pay every benefit owed to every eligible American--not just for the next 18 years but for the next 38 years. So when we talk about income and wealth inequality in this country, that is not only a tragedy unto itself; when we see the middle class shrinking and real wages for American workers going down, in some cases significantly, it is also a major problem for the Social Security trust fund. Once again, if income levels had remained the same today as they were in 1983--if incomes had gone up rather than gone down--we would see over $1 trillion more in the Social Security trust fund. So, I agree with my Republican colleagues who say that doing the reallocation for the disability trust fund is a temporary solution. It is. But it is an important solution, and it is something that has been done 11 times in the past. It is something that is supported by the AARP and every major senior organization. It is something we must do right now to prevent a 19-percent cut in benefits for some of the most vulnerable people in this country. So I won't argue with anyone who says, well, that doesn't go far enough. We need a long-term solution. So I challenge my Republican friends: Do you have the courage to come up with a solution other than cutting benefits for seniors? Do you have the courage to come up with an idea that says: No, it is bad, it is wrong to raise the retirement age, and it is wrong to cut cost of living adjustments. Are you prepared to deal with the reality that because of the growing disparity in income in America, we have lost substantial funding for Social Security, and the way to address that issue--the way to extend Social Security--is to ask the people on top, the people who have been doing phenomenally well in recent years, to pay more into the Social Security trust fund? I do agree with my Republican colleagues that we have to look at Social Security from a long-term perspective for our kids and our grandchildren. We have brought forth an idea: Raise the cap. Ask people making more than $250,000 a year to pay the same percentage of their income into the Social Security trust fund as somebody making $50,000 a year. I think that is a sensible idea, and I look forward to hearing some of my Republican friends work with us on this concept. With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, let me be very clear and say that this fight--what some of us see on our TV screens and what we hear from some politicians--the simple truth is that Social Security is not going broke. Social Security is not going broke. Today, Social Security has a $2.8 trillion surplus in its trust fund and can pay out all benefits to all beneficiaries, the elderly and the disabled, for the next 18 years. This is not the opinion of Senator Bernie Sanders. This is the opinion of the Social Security Administration in their latest report. There is and can be no debate about these simple facts. If we rebalance funds, as President Obama and many others have proposed, all benefits-- retiree benefits for our older Americans and disabled benefits for disabled Americans--would be paid out for the next 18 years--the next 18 years. So people who come before you and say Social Security is going broke, they are simply not telling the truth. While this 18-year period makes it clear that we do not have an imminent crisis with regard to Social Security, I do agree with those who want to make sure Social Security is solvent for a lot longer than 18 years, for our kids and for our grandchildren. Frankly, when we talk about the long-term solvency of Social Security, and that of course includes disability insurance as well, there are two basic approaches we can take for those who want to extend Social Security for many decades. One approach is what many of my Republican colleagues are talking about. What they are saying, in essence, is that in order to save Social Security we have to cut Social Security. Some are talking about a so-called chained CPI, which would mean a cut in cost-of-living adjustments, some are talking about raising the retirement age, at which point seniors will be able to get benefits, and some in fact are talking about privatizing Social Security and giving that program over to Wall Street. That is one approach. That is one way we could deal with Social Security and the future of the program. Needless to say that is an approach I very strongly disagree with. The other approach, an approach which is widely supported in poll after poll by the American people, extends Social Security and protects Social Security in a very different way than many Republicans are proposing; that is, it addresses the issue that right now, as most Americans know, there is a cap on the income that is subject to the Social Security payroll tax. That cap is now at $118,500; in other words, one individual makes $11.8 million a year but only pays 6.2 percent on the first $118,500 he earns. The second individual makes $118,500 and pays Social Security taxes on all of that income. That, I think most Americans believe, is patently unfair. I have introduced legislation in the past, and I am now working with other Senators who have introduced similar types of legislation which eliminates the cap on income subject to the Social Security payroll tax. My own view is we should apply the Social Security payroll tax to income above $250,000. If we do that, if we go down that very simple and fair route of asking very wealthy individuals--the top 1 percent, the top 1\1/2\ percent--to contribute more into the Social Security trust fund, the fact is we could extend Social Security for decades, disability benefits for decades, and in fact we would have enough money to expand benefits, not cut them. On March 19, 2013, in response to a letter I wrote to the Social Security Chief Actuary, he wrote back and he told us that taking the approach my legislation lays out, raising the cap on taxable income starting at $250,000, would extend the life of Social Security past the year 2060. So for anybody to come on this floor and say in order to save Social Security we have to cut benefits, at a time when millions of senior citizens in this country are struggling to pay for the medicine they need, to keep warm in the winter, to buy the food they need, people out there living on $13,000, $14,000 a year--and there are some who say we have to cut Social Security--let me go on record and say I strongly disagree. The far better and far fairer approach is to lift the cap on taxable income and start at $250,000. So if we are serious about extending the life of Social Security, if we are serious about not cutting disability benefits, there is a path forward. Yes, it does ask the people on top to contribute a little bit more. I know that with all of the lobbyists and all the campaign contributions coming in here that sometimes becomes tough, but it is the right thing to do. Let's stand with the millions of seniors who are struggling to stay alive economically in these tough times, rather than wealthy campaign contributors. I ask unanimous consent that the March 19, 2013, letter from the Chief Actuary of the Social Security Administration be printed in the Record.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, it is not just the AARP that holds that view. It is dozens and dozens of senior organizations all across the country. Let me read very briefly from a letter written by the Leadership Council of Aging Organizations, dated October 9, 2014. It is a letter that goes to the President--to President Obama. What it says is: We urge you to include a non-controversial, commonsense legislative adjustment in your 2016 budget for Congress to temporarily reallocate the Social Security payroll contributions to address the anticipated shortfall in the Social Security Disability Insurance (DI) program. We also strongly urge you to reject proposals to cut Social Security benefits, coverage, or eligibility. That is the Leadership Council of Aging Organizations. I ask unanimous consent that letter also be printed in the Record.

Mr. SANDERS. I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, as ranking member of the Budget Committee, this afternoon I would like to discuss an issue of very serious concern to tens of millions of Americans; that is, the Republican effort to cut Social Security disability insurance benefits and perhaps benefits for Social Security retirees. In my view and in the view of seniors throughout the State of Vermont, this is a very bad idea. As you know, on the very first day of the new Congress, House Republicans passed a rule--later adopted by the full House--which would prevent the common practice of rebalancing funds from the Social Security retirement program to the Social Security disability program. This rule adopted by the Republicans in the House would lay the groundwork for a 19-percent cut in disability benefits next year. President Obama, in his budget, did exactly what has been done on 11 separate occasions in the past, always--and here is the point I want to make time and time again and why this is a manufactured crisis--this has been done 11 times in the past, always in a noncontroversial way, and that is to rebalance the funds between the two programs. This is not a big deal. The Republicans are manufacturing a crisis where none exists. Time and time again, Democratic Presidents and Republican Presidents, with absolutely no controversy, have done what President Obama has proposed. This was done in 1968 under President Johnson; in 1970 under President Nixon; in 1978, 1979, and 1980 under President Carter; in 1982, 1983, 1984, and 1987 under President Ronald Reagan; in 1994, 1996, 1997, 2000, and beyond under President Bill Clinton. In other words, this is a totally noncontroversial process that has been done time and time again under Republican Presidents and Democratic Presidents. What the President is suggesting today is that we reallocate funds from the senior retirement fund to the disability fund. But interestingly enough, of the 11 times the funds were reallocated, it turns out that on five occasions it was money going from the disability fund to temporarily help out the retirement fund. There are some people who sadly are trying to divide the senior population from the disability population. What they are saying in a way that is untruthful and unfair is that by reallocating money into the disability fund, we are taking funding away from seniors and the retirement fund. This is absolutely untrue because, as I have indicated, on 11 occasions we have seen this reallocation, and sometimes, in fact, it comes from the disability fund to help the retirement fund. I am very happy to tell you that virtually every senior organization in America--organizations representing tens of millions of senior citizens--has made it clear that we must reallocate funds, we must prevent a cut in disability benefits, and we must do what has been done time and time again. Let me briefly read a letter from the AARP. The AARP is the largest senior organization in America. This letter was written on July 22, 2014. It went to chairman Ron Wyden and ranking member Orrin Hatch of the Finance Committee. What the letter says: As the largest nonprofit, nonpartisan organization representing the interests of Americans age 50 and older and their families, we write in advance of the Committee's legislative hearing on the Social Security Disability Insurance program (SSDI) to express our support for Social Security, including its disability insurance functions, and our support of rebalancing payroll taxes to ensure the earned benefits of 11 million disabled Americans and their families are not reduced or put at risk. Once again, AARP: We ``support the rebalancing of payroll taxes to ensure the earned benefits of 11 million disabled Americans and their families are not reduced or put at risk.'' I ask unanimous consent that letter be printed in the Record.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to address the Senate for up to 20 minutes.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, the good news is the country has made substantial economical progress in the last 6 years since President Bush left office. Instead of losing 800,000 jobs a month as we were during the final months of the Bush administration, we are now creating some 250,000 jobs a month and have seen steady job growth over the last 58 months. Instead of having a record-breaking $1.4 trillion deficit as we did when President Bush left office in January 2009, the Federal deficit has been cut by more than two-thirds. Today the 10-year deficit projection is now $5.5 trillion lower than what the projections were back in 2010. Six years ago the world's financial system, as we all remember, was on the verge of collapse. Today that is not the case. In fact, some might suggest that Wall Street is doing too well. While we can take some satisfaction as to what has been accomplished in the last 6 years, one would be very naive not to appreciate there is also a lot of very bad news in our economy, especially for working families. Most significantly, the simple truth of the matter is the 40-year decline of the American middle class continues. Real unemployment is not 5.6 percent--including those people who have given up looking for work or people who are working part time when they want to work full time--it is over 11 percent. Youth unemployment--something we almost never talk about in this country--is a horrendous 17 percent, and African-American youth unemployment is over 30 percent. It is totally unacceptable. Real median family income has declined by nearly $5,000 since 1999. All over this country--in Vermont and in every other State in this country--we have people working longer hours for lower wages. We have husbands and wives working 50, 60 hours a week just to pay the bills. Incredibly, despite huge increases in productivity, in technology, and all of the global economy we hear so much about, the median male worker now earns $783 less than he did 42 years ago. Let me repeat that. That American male worker right in the middle of the economy now earns, after inflation adjusted for wages, $783 less than he did 42 years ago. The female worker right in the middle of the economy now makes $1,300 less than she made in 2007. When you ask why people are angry, why people are stressed, why people are frustrated, that is exactly why. Further, this country continues to have, shamefully, the highest rate of childhood poverty of any major country on Earth, and 40 million Americans still have zero health insurance. In the midst of this tragic decline of the American middle class, there is, however, another reality. The wealthiest people and the largest corporations are doing phenomenally well. The result: The United States today has more income and wealth inequality than at any time since the Great Depression. Today the top one-tenth of 1 percent own almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent. Let me repeat that because that truly is a startling fact. Today the top one-tenth of 1 percent--which is what this chart talks about--owns almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent. Today 1 family--the Walton family, owners of Walmart--owns more wealth than the bottom 40 percent of the American people, some 120 million Americans. I don't believe most of our people think this is what the American economy should be about. In fact, this is not an economy for a democracy. This is what oligarchy is all about. One-tenth of 1 percent owning almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent, 1 family owning the equivalent of what 131 million Americans own, that is wealth. In terms of income--which is what we make every year--what we have seen in the last number of years since the Wall Street crash is virtually all new income is going to the top 1 percent. Last year--just as one example--the top 25 hedge fund managers earned more income than 425,000 public school teachers. Does anybody believe that makes sense? Twenty-five hedge fund managers making more income than 425,000 public school teachers. That gap between the very rich and everybody else is growing wider and wider and wider. The fact is that over the past 40 years, we have witnessed an enormous transfer of wealth from the middle class to the top 1 percent. In other words, what we are seeing in our economy is the Robin Hood principle in reverse. We are taking from the poor and the working families and transferring that income and wealth to the very wealthy. From 1985 to 2013 the share of the Nation's wealth going to the middle class has gone down from 36 percent to less than 23 percent. If the middle class had simply maintained the same share of our Nation's wealth as it did 30 years ago, it would have $10.27 trillion more in cumulative wealth than it does today. Almost $11 trillion would have stayed with the middle class but has disappeared since 1985. But while the middle class continues to shrink, while millions of Americans are working longer hours for low wages, while young people cannot afford to go to college or leave school deeply in debt, while too many kids in this country go hungry, we have seen, since 2009, that the top 1 percent has experienced an $11.5 trillion increase in its wealth. So the top 1 percent in recent years sees an $11.5 trillion increase in wealth, while in roughly the same period the middle class sees a $10.7 trillion decrease in wealth. This $11.5 trillion transfer of wealth from the middle class to the top 1 percent over a 5-year period is one of the largest such transfers of wealth in our country's history. Here is my point. This is not just a moral issue, although it is a profound moral issue--and Pope Francis, by the way, deserves a lot of credit for talking about this issue all over the world. Are we satisfied as a nation when so few have so much and so many have so little? Are we satisfied with the proliferation of millionaires and billionaires, at the same time as we have millions of children living in poverty? Is that what America is supposed to be about? That is the moral component of this debate. But this is not just a moral issue. It is also a fundamental economic issue. As we know, 70 percent of our economy is based on consumer spending. When working people do not have enough income, enough disposable income, they are unable to go out and buy goods and services that they would like or that they need. The so-called job creators that my Republican friends often refer to are not the CEOs of the large corporations. The CEOs of large corporations cannot sell their products or services unless people have the income to buy them. Someone can come up with the greatest product in the world, but if people do not have the money, they are not going to sell that product, they are not going to hire workers to produce that product. The truth is that the real job creators in this country are those millions of people who every single day go out and purchase goods and services, but if they do not have adequate income, the entire economy suffers. There was a very interesting article, I believe it was yesterday or today, in the Wall Street Journal, written by Nick Timiraos and Kris Hudson, talking about how a two-tier economy is reshaping the U.S. marketplace. What they talk about is: It is a tale of two economies. Said Glenn Kelman, chief executive of Redfin, a real estate brokerage in Seattle. There is a high-end market that is absolutely booming. And then there's everyone in the middle class. They don't have much hope of wage growth. The article continues. Indeed, such midtier retailers as J.C. Penney, Sears and Target have slumped. ``The consumer has not bounced back with the confidence we were looking for,'' Macy's chief executive Terry Lundgren told investors last fall. I ask unanimous consent that the article be printed in the Record.

Mr. SANDERS. So what we are hearing--basically what this article tells us--is if people's income is going down, they are not going to Macy's, they are not going to Target. Those stores are not hiring workers or are getting rid of workers because the middle class does not have the income it needs. Here is a very important point. Within President Obama's recent budget--by the way, I think the President's budget is beginning to move us in the right direction--there was a very interesting projection that unfortunately got very little attention. Here is the point: Over the last 50 years GDP growth in the United States of America averaged about 3.2 percent. What the President's budget is suggesting is that more or less over the next 10 years we are going to see 3-percent growth, 3- percent--2.7, 2.5, 2.3. For the rest of the decade, 2.3 percent. The bottom line is, if we continue along the same type of economic growth we have had over the previous 50 years, unemployment would be substantially lower, people would be paying more taxes, Social Security, among other programs, would be in much stronger shape. The debate we are going to be having in the Budget Committee--I am the ranking member of the Budget Committee--are two very different philosophies. Our Republican friends believe in more austerity for the middle class and working families. Their goal, over a period of months and years, is to cut Social Security, cut Medicare, cut Medicaid, cut nutrition programs for hungry children, not invest in infrastructure, and then give huge tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires. In other words, more austerity for the middle class, tax breaks for the wealthy and large corporations. I believe that philosophy is wrong for many reasons, the most important being that if we want to grow the overall economy, if we want to create jobs, we have to put money into the hands of working people. We do not do that by cutting, cutting, cutting, and imposing more austerity on people who already desperately are hurting. A far more sensible approach is to create the millions of jobs that our country desperately needs by, among other things, investing heavily in our crumbling infrastructure. Last week I introduced legislation that would invest $1 trillion over a 5-year period into rebuilding our crumbling roads and bridges, rail, airports, water systems, wastewater plants. If we do that, we make our country more productive, safer, and create up to 13 million jobs, putting money into the hands of working people. It not only will improve their lives, but they will then go out and spend their money in their communities, creating further economic growth. That is the direction we should be going. We also have to raise wages. People cannot survive on the starvation minimum wage imposed at the Federal level of $7.25 an hour. If we raise the minimum wage over a period of years to $15 an hour, we are going to have billions of dollars go into the hands of people who need it the most, improve their lives, allow them to go out and invest in our economy, spend money and create jobs. We need pay equity for women workers. It is not acceptable that women are making 78 cents to the dollar for men who are doing the same work. We need to address the scandal of overtime right now, where we have so- called supervisors at McDonald's who work 50, 60 hours a week, but because they are so-called supervisors do not get time and a half. We need to make college affordable for all of our workers. In a global economy we need the best educated workforce in the world, not the one where people cannot afford a higher education. We need trade policies that benefit working people and not just large multinational corporations, which is why we should defeat the Trans-Pacific Partnership. So there is a lot of work that needs to be done. But the bottom line is, if we are serious about dealing with the deficit and debt reduction, if we are serious about growing the middle class, we need an agenda which creates jobs, raises wages, makes college affordable, demands that corporate America start investing in this country and not in China. We need a proworker agenda, not an austerity agenda which will strangle the middle class of this country even more than it is hurting today. I yield the floor.