Political Quotes

“Mr. Tonko, thank you very much. You are quite correct that we need to move in that direction. The American economy is about 60-70 percent based upon consumer purchases of homes and cars and all those other goods. Part of that reason that we're not seeing the kind of economic growth that would normally occur in a recovery is the 99 percent don't have money. They lost a great deal of their wealth. Trillions of dollars of their wealth was wiped out in the financial collapse, their pensions, their homes and equity in their home. As the economy has recovered, the creation of the growth, the wealth, didn't go to them so they have not been able to really increase their purchasing power, which has dampened the economy. Now, there are things that we can do. You were beginning that process. Let's go through them. I'm going to put this back up because this is not just a picture of the distribution of wealth in the economy, that is, the economic growth; it is also a picture of why the economy hasn't really returned. There are other factors, to be sure, but clearly the absence of purchasing power, that is, new wealth in the hands of the 99 percent, the absence of that has retarded the economic recovery. This is something we have talked about here many, many times, and Mr. Tonko brought this up, many of these issues. We call it the Make It In America agenda. This follows along on President Obama's jobs program. Many of these elements are the same as he proposed.…”