claire mccaskill comments on budget

Yahoo! Mail Reply from Senator McCaskill Tuesday, November 20, 2012 12:52 PM From: "senator@mccaskill.senate.gov" To: November 20, 2012 Dear M Thank you for contacting me regarding your priorities for the federal budget. I appreciate hearing from you and welcome the opportunity to respond. The growing federal debt is an imminent threat to our nation's economy and the long-term viability of our most essential federal programs. Today our nation's gross debt is $14 trillion. If we do nothing, interest payments on the debt alone will limit our ability to invest in essential programs. For example, current projections show that by 2035, we will be paying more in interest than we currently spend on Medicare and Social Security combined. In the Senate, I have been focused on reducing the annual budget deficit in a responsible way. I have never requested an earmark and I worked to ban earmarks from Congress. As Chairman of the Subcommittee on Contracting Oversight, I have been working to root out waste and fraud in government contracting, especially in the Defense Department. I support allowing the Bush era tax cuts to expire for multi-millionaires, and I sponsored Pay-As-You-Go legislation that would require any new tax cuts or spending to be deficit neutral. With Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama, I fought to impose binding caps on discretionary spending that came within one vote of passing the Senate. However, I will continue to oppose any budget proposal, like the Ryan budget plan passed by House Republicans and supported by nearly every Senate Republican, which would end Medicare as we know it. Instead of guaranteed access to affordable health insurance, the Republican plan would give seniors a voucher and force them to fend for themselves against health insurance companies in the private market. Under the Republican plan, when health costs go up, seniors would be forced to shoulder the burden. In fact, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office concluded that the Republican budget would double senior's out-of-pocket costs for health care. For most seniors, who are on a fixed income, this poses an impossible and unacceptable burden. I am also committed to protecting Social Security. That is why I am a cosponsor of the Keeping Our Social Security Promises Act, S. 1558. Introduced by Senator Bernard Sanders of Vermont, this legislation would eliminate the cap on Social Security payroll taxes for income above $250,000. Currently, these payroll taxes are only assessed on an individual's first $106,800 of income. If enacted, this legislation would ensure that Social Security remains fully funded for the next 75 years, strengthening the program without cutting benefits. I also know that the absence of a cost-of-living adjustment for Social Security beneficiaries for 2010 and 2011 only made getting by more difficult, which is why I voted three times in 2009 and 2010 to provide Social Security and Medicare beneficiaries with additional support. Providing Social Security is a pact we have made with our nation's seniors and I will oppose any attempt to privatize Social Security, which would fundamentally undermine the program and jeopardize the benefits of millions of beneficiaries. And, I will not support any plan to drastically slash benefits for future beneficiaries. I am committed to reducing our nation's deficit and the debt, and that means I consider any serious proposal to address these challenges. Because, in the long term, doing nothing is the surest way to jeopardize middle-class priorities like education, veterans' benefits, Social Security and Medicare. I assure you, I will continue to work with my colleagues to address our growing federal debt in a balanced manner that protects our most important federal programs, especially Medicare and Social Security. Again, thank you for contacting me. Please do not hesitate to contact me in the future if I can be of further assistance to you on this or any other issue. Sincerely, Claire McCaskill United States Senator P.S. If you would like more information about resources that can help Missourians, or what I am doing in the Senate on your behalf, please sign up for my email newsletter at http://mccaskill.senate.gov. ------------------------------------------------------------------------