Issue Position: Addressing Our Nation's Debt

Issue Position

With our debt at $16 trillion, our nation is on an unsustainable path. Instead of making tough choices about spending and entitlement reform -- mandatory spending that accounts for roughly 60 percent of yearly, dedicated spending -- we borrow more than $1 trillion a year. This borrow and spend mentality is impractical, unacceptable and without leadership to change course, a sure recipe to end up in the same financial dire straits as Greece and Spain. The House has already put our ideas on the table for balancing the budget and lowering our long-term debt. Yet facing this crisis, the current Administration has yet to release a proposal that ever brings the budget deficit into balance. This lack of leadership is only overshadowed by the Senate's inability to consider ANY budget in the last three years. To lower the debt, we need to decrease the size of government and cut spending across the board. Every agency in the government needs to do their share to help us out of this mess. We need a complete overhaul of the tax code so that it's fairer, flatter and simpler for everyone. No more loopholes that allow large corporations to pay nothing, and asks families and small businesses to pay too much. Coupled with significant spending cuts, we need to grow the economy to get more people back to work who in turn will pay more taxes to help lower the debt.

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