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An America that Works for All of Us
- 1. An America that works for ALL of us
- 7. Do what you want…
- 9. Say what you want…
- 17. Working families are being crushed
- 18. 400 richest have more than 150 million Americans
- 19. Over the last 30 years: wages cut, jobs shipped overseas
- 20. Over the last 30 years: corporate lobbyists paid their way
- 22. Liberty, justice and prosperity for all
- 23. Working families and the middle class are the engines of the economy.
- 24. “Tax Code May Be the Most Progressive Since 1979” New York Times, 1/4/2103
- 25. Sequester = meat axe cuts Food pantry closed in Murray, Utah closed Primary health care workers laid off in Saranac Lake, NY 100 children denied Head Start in Bethlehem, PA. Work study for college students cut at University of North Carolina Teachers laid off in Hampton Roads, Virginia http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/02/sequestration-effects_n_2996101.html?1364903667.
- 26. Make millionaires and big corporations pay their fair share Ending tax breaks for shipping jobs overseas - $221 billion Tiny (.0003%) tax on Wall Street speculation - $353 billion A 5.6% tax surcharge on millionaires - $453 billion End tax breaks for oil companies - $25 billion
- 27. Put our troops first - reshape the Pentagon budget to meet 21st century needs
- 29. INVEST Opportunity and security for families INNOVATE Pave the way for businesses to innovate meet the future CREATE JOBS Common sense rules that benefit businesses and communities The middle class doesn’t prosper by accident Decisionswe make together
- 30. A road map for aspiring citizens
- 33. A common sense immigration process
- 34. We need to ask the president and members of congress Whose side are you on?
- 35. Good jobs for everyone in America Protect vital services for our families and communities Make millionaires and big corporations pay their fair share Pull the Pentagon pork A road map for aspiring citizens Tell Congress:
- 39. An America that works for all of us
Editor's Notes
- Today we’re going to talk about how we create an America that works for all of us.
- You know, America is a nation of values. We’re founded on an idea - that all men
- and women are created equal.
- That families should stick together.
- That we should look out for each other.
- That hard work should be rewarded.
- In the freedom to do what you want
- Be what you want.
- And say what you want.
- That we all should have the opportunity to realize the American promise of liberty, justice and prosperity for all.
- From the end of World War II through the mid-1970s, working families powered our economic progress as we built the great American middle class.
- We made college affordable, with the GI bill and state colleges and universities. More workers joined unions, banding together to win good wages and benefits, even for people without a college education.
- We built the Interstate highway system to get our goods to market. Our government funded research in new technologies and medical science, paving the way for our businesses to lead the world in innovation.
- Our tax system was based on the richest paying more than the rest of us and corporations paying their fare share.
- Together, we tackled the big problems facing our country. Established Medicare and Medicaid. Passed the voting rights act. The Clean Water and Clean Air acts reversed the terrible pollution, threatening our health and our children.
- The result, the biggest middle class in history. It wasn’t perfect. But we were expanding opportunities even for those we had left out. Expanding freedom to realize our dreams.
- But our American Dream is in trouble. For the past three decades, working families and the middle class have been getting squeezed. And they were squeezed even harder during the great recession.
- We got into this mess because we forgot that it is working families and the middle class who are the engines of our economy. Instead, the rich got a lot richer at our expense, while most people – no matter how hard they worked - fell backwards or just managed to keep up. If economic progress had benefited everyone fairly and not gone to the wealthy, the average family would earn $9,000 more a year.
- What did many of the biggest corporations do? They pushed up profits by pushing down wages and benefits and shipping our jobs overseas.Corporations are sitting on $2 trillion in cash – instead of creating jobs in America they are making CEOs and shareholders richer. So now it’s harder then ever to meet the basics to care for and support our families.
- It’s not like the economy didn’t move forward - If our nation’s economic growth had been shared fairly for the past 30 years, wages would be 60% higher. But the super rich and CEO campaign contributors got the government to slash their taxes. When the housing bubble burst, bankers got the to government to bail out Wall Street but let homeowners go underwater, drowning the economy.
- We’ve lost sight of a basic truth: we all do better when we all do better. That’s an important expression of our values, but it’s more than just that.
- It’s a statement of what it will take to realize the American promise of liberty, justice and prosperity for all.
- What drives our prosperity? Working families and the middle class – they are the engines of the economy. It’s not the stock market or corporate profits that define an economy that works for people. It’s whether we have good jobs, we can educate our children, shop on Main Street, afford our health care and retire with security.
- So what are our elected officials in Washington doing to build an America that works for all us? At the end of last year, they took one step forward, by ending some tax breaks for the very rich. That helped to lower the deficit and restore some fairness to the tax system.
- But then they took a big step backwards with a meat axe approach tobudget cuts. Cuts that will throw three-quarters of a million people out of work. Here are just a few examples of how our families and communities are already being harmed across the country.
- There is another way. A path that will reduce the deficit, safeguard our communities and families and create good jobs in America. It has two parts. One, we can raise more than $600 billion by requiring millionaires, Wall Street speculators and multi-national corporations to pay their fair share.
- Two, we can pull the Pentagon pork sent to big contractors, reshaping the Pentagon budget to protect our troops as we meet 21st Century needs. As you can see, Pentagon spending, even without the costs of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, dwarfs spending on other programs. For example, we can save $1.5 trillion dollars just be eliminating the F-35 plane, which Robert Gates, the Defense Secretary under Presidents Bush and Obama called, “unnecessary and extravagant.”
- Those two steps can raise enough money stop the cuts to vital services, keep bringing down the deficit and allow us to do what we really need to do; rebuild the middle class.
- We protect our families and build a secure middle class by decisions we make together. We can make sure that quality education and job training is available and affordable. We can create jobs by paving the way for businesses to invest and innovate. Repairing our roads and bridges. Investing in energy independence. And we can be sure that every job pays enough for families to meet the basics, starting by raising the minimum wage. That’s an America that works for all of us.
- There’s another thing we need to do. An America that works for all of us also means creating a common sense immigration process, one that includes a roadmap for new Americans who aspire to be citizens.
- Our country’s strength is grounded in our ability to work together as fellow Americans. As Americans, we all do our part to contribute and we’re all better off for having hardworking new immigrants as contributing members of our community.
- But the current patchwork of immigration policies and programs doesn’t make any sense. It’s mismanaged and broken and it breaks up families. There’s a maze of regulations with no line to become a fully participating American.
- That’s why we need to create a commonsense immigration process that recognizes the hardships and contributions of people moving here, keeps families together and creates a roadmap to citizenship for new Americans who aspire to be citizens. For aspiring citizens, the essential right of citizenship should be reachable by taking a test of our history and government, paying an appropriate fee and pledging allegiance to our country.
- Creating good jobs for everyone in America. A budget that expresses our values. Or a common sense road map for aspiring citizens. On all these issues, we need to ask the President and Congress to decide – whose side are you on?
- It won’t be easy, but it’s up to us - everyday, ordinary Americans to hold our elected representatives responsible for protecting and expanding the middle class. We owe it to our children to be sure that the American promise is within their reach too.
- Together, we can do this. Despite the odds, we beat the health insurance companies to enact the Affordable Care Act, so starting next year, no one will be denied health care because of a pre-existing condition. We rolled back tax breaks for the super-rich. We blocked their plan to turn to Medicare into a voucher program.
- That’s why USAction is working with our members, our volunteers and our organizational allies across the country to tell our elected representatives that it’s time to take our side – to build an America that works for all of us, with liberty, justice and prosperity for all.
- It really is true. We all do better when we all do better. America works best when we all do our part and work together as one nation, indivisible and strong.
- When each of us does our part in exchange for the blessings of liberty, committed to the country we love. We can do this. This is what America is all about. Together, we can create an America that works for all of us.