On the recordMarch 3, 2015
I thank the gentleman for yielding. South Carolina thanks you. What an honor it is to stand here before this group to talk about the Federal budget. These were a couple of slides that were actually handed out to the Budget Committee that illustrate very wonderfully the challenge that we face. The total revenue for the Federal Government for fiscal year 2014 is $3.02 trillion, most of it from individual income taxes. And then social insurance is the payroll taxes we pay for Social Security and Medicare, and then we have the spending. You can compare the two. Revenues are $3.02 trillion. Spending is $3.5 trillion. Our deficit is half a trillion dollars, roughly, projected this year. That sounds terrible. Of course, 3 years ago, just before I was elected to Congress, it was a $1.4 trillion deficit. So it has, in fact, been cut well down. It is about 40 percent of what it was. And I will take all the credit for that. Actually, it has come down dramatically. But we are still on an unsustainable path, and it is projected to rise, largely because of demographics. The baby boomers are retiring, and the need for social insurance is going to rise in the coming decades. It will overwhelm us if we do not prepare for it. Republicans, Democrats, the Congressional Budget Office, the Office of Management and Budget, and any known economist will tell you that if we don't deal with this issue, it will overwhelm us. We are on an unsustainable path.…
