Chris Van Hollen: “At the outset of his remarks, Mr. Price referenced the economy and the President's plan. I think it is important to…”

“At the outset of his remarks, Mr. Price referenced the economy and the President's plan. I think it is important to remember that when the President came before this body for the first State of the Union address, the economy was in absolute free fall. In fact, we now know it was even worse than people realized at the time. We were losing GDP at a rate of more than 7 percent. {time} 1420 We were losing over 800,000 jobs in this country every month. And as a result of the passage of the recovery bill, the Congressional Budget Office, the same nonpartisan, independent office that this bill is asking for a report from, has told Congress that because of the recovery bill, we saved or created up to 3 million jobs in 2010. Those are the facts reported by the Congressional Budget Office, that we helped reduce unemployment in this country in 2011 by over 1.4 percent. When you're headed down fast, you've got to stop the slide, pick yourself up and begin to climb back up. And that's what the President and the earlier Congress did together. Now, are we where we want to be? Of course not. That's why it's important that we begin to move forward on the jobs plan the President asked this Congress to take up last September, major new investment in infrastructure, stuff that will really help move the economy. We haven't voted on that. I hope we'll move forward on the payroll tax cut extension for 160 million Americans.…”