Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for her hard work on this important issue. Mr. Speaker, every American should be able to trust in the promise that, after a life of hard work, a secure and dignified retirement will be there for them. But today, that promise is at risk. Half of all private sector employees in America, almost 60 million people, do not have access to any type of employer-sponsored retirement plan. It is a problem that Republicans should remember when they plan to raise costs on seniors, when they work to slash Medicaid and they destroy the sacred guarantee of Medicare. Yet, once again, Republicans have come to this floor not with the retirement security of hardworking families in mind, but with a greedy Wall Street first agenda. Under the Obama administration, the Department of Labor empowered the States to create innovative solutions to the retirement savings crisis. The gentleman is talking about--some of these savings didn't even exist when we had the majority. In States across the Nation, the great laboratories of our democracy went to work just as they should. My State of California decided to create something called Secure Choice, a State-run retirement plan that allows employees to be auto-enrolled into an IRA if they work for a business with five or more employees. In doing so, California will give almost 7 million workers access to retirement savings--no substitute for a pension or a 401(k), but a vital step toward a greater retirement security.…”