Rob Portman: “Mr. Speaker, again I would make the point what we are proposing here today, what is before us, is a substantial change…”

“Mr. Speaker, again I would make the point what we are proposing here today, what is before us, is a substantial change from current law, and it does address the Enron issue. My friend across the aisle just said that he believed that no one was looking after the employees' interests over the last 20-some years as we put together defined contribution plans. I would respectfully disagree. I would ask him to ask the thousands of constituents in his district how they feel about it, maybe ask the 55 million Americans who currently have the benefits of defined contribution plans. I would ask him to go to some of the smaller businesses in his community that would never have offered a defined benefit plan, never had one, who now offer a SEP or a simple plan or a 401(k) or a safe harbor 401(k) and are giving people the ability to save for their own retirement. There are people who will retire today in my hometown of Cincinnati with hundreds of thousands of dollars in their account, even with what the market has done in the last year, who turned a wrench their entire lives. They were technicians or mechanics and never had access to any kind of retirement savings. These are some of the 55 million people who now have a defined contribution plan. We do not want, in response to the Enron situation, to have those plans and those people lose their promise, lose their dreams, lose their ability to do that.”