Remarks on the economic plan in Hyde Park, New York - Bill Clinton's speech, February 19, 1993 - Transcript

Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, March 1, 1993

I want to simply take responsibility. And as I told the Congress the other night, if we turn this country around, I don't care who gets the credit for it, either. I just think the time has come to make a change. We have tried one thing 12 years. It obviously has problems. It is time to change.

Now, what does that mean? Change for change sake is not good. What does it mean? It means to me that we should do the following things. First of all, the Government should pursue a policy of increasing investment in those things which contribute to a growing economy. What are those things? We should invest more than we are now and more toward what our competitors do, in the infrastructure of the country, in transportation and communications, in environmental cleanup, in those things which increase productivity and put people to work.

It means we should do whatever it takes to educate people for a lifetime at very high levels, because the skill level of the work force is the single most important determinant of income and the capacity to grow new jobs rapidly as new areas of opportunity open up. It means that we should invest in partnership with the private sector in new technologies which will determine the future of the country. And it means we should not give up on those areas where we have a lead. And let me just give you two examples:

One is in computer technology and information technology. That's why what's happening to some of our big companies is very disturbing and why I'm going to California this weekend to announce a new technology policy to try to revitalize this whole sector of our economy.

I'll give you another example which doesn't affect New York much, but it affects our country desperately, and that is aerospace. Boeing just announced 23,000 layoffs when we know that aerospace jobs are growing in number worldwide, high-wage jobs. And we sat here for 10 years and let Europe put $26 billion into an airbus program, direct government subsidies, to throw Boeing workers, McDonnell-Douglas workers, and other aerospace workers in America out of work because we said, "Well, we don't practice those kind of partnerships." So we have got to face the fact that we've taken a new direction.

And finally, it means that we must reduce the Government's debt. Why? Because if the debt gets bigger and bigger and bigger, two bad things happen: Bad thing number one is the Congress spends more of your tax money every year paying interest on the debt rather than investing in your future. It's now up to 15 cents on the dollar. If we do not change present spending patterns--when you hear people oppose the program I outline, ask them what the cost of the status quo is.

If we behave for 4 more years like we have for the last 12, here's what will happen: By the end of the decade, the deficit will be $650 billion a year, and we'll be spending about 22 cents of every one of your tax dollars just paying interest on the debt. We'll be spending by then, because of the growth of health care costs, about 65 cents of your tax dollars on entitlements, and being in Congress will be a matter of how you spend 5 or 6 cents on every dollar. The rest of this will be just be rubber stamped. You can just have a computer instead of Congress.