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The Savings for Working Families Act of 2000 will benefit working, low-income families across this country to share in the unprecedented prosperity of our booming economy. Our bill brings together Republicans and Democrats, policy wonks and working mothers, and even financial institutions and consumers, all in support of a new approach to sustaining some American ideals--hard work, thrift, individual responsibility, and entrepreneurship. The Savings for Working Families Act of 2000 provides the real incentives and real opportunities for the working poor to build assets, both human and financial capital, which they in turn will be able to invest in our national economy.
Today's economy is defying gravity. The stock market is jumping to record highs while inflation and unemployment are hovering at record lows. Millions of Americans are reaping the benefits of the longest economic expansion in our history, including millions of working middle class families. Unfortunately, millions more are not.
Several recent studies have documented a growing income gap in the U.S.--an increasing income disparity between the rich and poor with declining incomes for both poor and low-income families. In addition to that income gap, a report released recently by the Federal Reserve Bank, has identified a significant asset gap in this country. A gap where the net worth--or assets--of the typical American family has risen substantially since 1989, while the net worth--or assets--of lower income families has actually declined during the economic boom of recent years.
According to the Fed report, families earning under $10,000 a year had a median net worth of $1,900 in 1989. That climbed to $4,800 in 1995, but had slipped back to $3,600 by 1998. Those families earning $10,000 to $25,000 saw their net worth drop from $31,000 in 1995 to $24,800 in 1998. More specifically, while the percent of all U.S. families that own a home or business has risen during the boom years of 1995-98, the percent among lower income families has decreased. For example, in 1995, 36.1% of families earning under $10,000 annually owned their home. By 1998 the rate had dropped to 34.5%. The drop for families earning $10,000 to $25,000 was from 54.9% to 51.7%. The same story is true for the percent of lower income families owning a business.
The Savings for Working Families Act of 2000 will directly address exactly this asset gap. Our bill seeks to address this imbalance by dramatically expanding the use of IDAs. IDA programs
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In my home state of Connecticut, there is today only one pilot IDA program in existence. A handful of low income individuals are now starting to take part in a strong IDA program run by the Committee for Training and Employment, or CTE, a cutting edge community-based organization providing a range of services and activities to address poverty issues in the greater Stamford area. In Connecticut we are hopeful that we will soon be seeing an expansion of IDA accounts and programs. A statewide IDA Task force, convened by Connecticut State Treasurer, Denise L. Nappier, recently released a report to jump-start more IDA activity in the state. Its thoughtful analysis and authoritative recommendations will certainly help to increase IDAs in our state. The Savings for Working Families Act of 2000 was drafted in consideration of the excellent IDA work under way in states and communities all across the country.
The idea is simple, but powerful. Low income workers who put their hard earned dollars into IDAs would get matching funds from financial and other private entities. A federal tax credit will provide the incentives for those private sector investments in IDAs. The IDA savings could then be used by low income working families to develop assets, specifically for the purchase of a home, the pursuit of a postsecondary education, or to start a business. In essence, this legislation extends to lower income working families the type of incentives for building assets, such as the home mortgage interest deduction, preferential capital gains rates and pension funds exclusions and incentives, that are now available on a large scale to the non-poor and wealthy.
Just last week, President Clinton underscored the promise of this approach in his State of the Union Address, when he put forward his Retirement Savings Account (RSA) proposal. Those RSAs are similar to the IDAs in this bill. In his proposal, the President rightly identified the potential of the private sector in strengthening the economic security of many of our most vulnerable citizens. Just as important, he made clear, as we do in the Savings for Working Families Act, that these IDA accounts are not simply an empty promise for a handout. They are a means to integrate more Americans into the broader economic mainstream.
In drafting this new IDA legislation, our objective was to keep it simple and based closely on S. 895, a bill that Senator SANTORUM and I introduced last year and that enjoyed strong bipartisan support. Modifications in the Savings for Working Families Act of 2000 are primarily technical in nature, recognizing that the IDA field has grown and evolved in the last year. We have also made a concerted effort in the new bill to realize the potential of critical private sector and nonprofit organizations to be effective IDA providers, including credit unions and community service organizations.
Moving forward, we are confident that we can get this bill passed because it addresses a threat to our fundamental faith in the American dream and to the vitality and long-term stability of our national economy. Our bill cannot singlehandedly eliminate the wealth gap, but we are confident that it will help carve out a little more space in that winner's circle and move us a step closer to making the American dream real for more working families.
Finally, I would like to thank each of the cosponsors of this bill, especially Senators SANTORUM and ABRAHAM. Through their hard work, and in conjunction with the financial services industry and the IDA field, we have legislation that achieves a very public interest. In particular, I would like to note the leadership of the Corporation for Enterprise Development (CFED) for helping to bring the voice of the IDA community to this creation of this bill. With the Savings for Working Families Act of 2000, we are able to harness the creative forces of the marketplace to help secure our core democratic values, holding out the hope of free enterprise without the false promise of a free lunch, and giving some tangible meaning to those core values of community, opportunity and responsibility. In expanding the use of IDAs across the country as an empowerment tool for working families, this legislation speaks to our shared aspirations as Americans.
Mrs. BOXER (for herself, Mr. SMITH of Oregon, and Mr. KENNEDY):
S. 2026. A bill to amend the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 to authorize appropriations for HIV/AIDS eff orts; to the Committee on Foreign Relations.
THE GLOBAL AIDS PRE VENTION (GAP) ACT OF 2000
Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, last month, the United States held the rotating presidency of the U.N. Security Council. And something historic happened. Under the leadership of Ambassador Holbrooke and Vice President Gore, the Security Council for the first time ever discussed an international health issue.
The issue was the spread of AIDS, pa rticularly in sub-Saharan Africa. In raising the profile of this issue--in putting it before the U.N. Security Council--there was a recognition that the AIDS cri sis is a security threat--a threat to the peace, stability, and prosperity of nations around the world.
Nowhere is that more true than in sub-Saharan Africa, wh ere the United Nations has said that AIDS is ``the worst infectious disease catastrophe since the bubonic plague.''
Since the beginning of the HIV/AIDS epi demic, 13.7 million people in sub-Saharan Africa hav e died of AIDS. Th at is 84 percent of all the people in the world who have died of AIDS sin ce the beginning of the epidemic. Last year, two-thirds of all new cases of HIV/AIDS wer e in sub-Saharan Africa. An d of all the people in the world living with HIV/AIDS, 69 percent of them live in sub-Saharan Africa. < p> Mr. President, this is not just a matter of more deaths and more cases because there are more people. Of adults in sub-Saharan Africa who are aged 15-49, eight percent of them have HIV/AIDS. Pe rcentages from specific countries are even more dramatic. In Zimbabwe, it is estimated that 26 percent of all adults aged 15-49 are living with the disease. In Botswana, it is 25 percent, and in Namibia, it is 20 percent.
Unlike any other area of the world, the HIV/AIDS epi demic in sub-Saharan Africa is predominately a woman's disease. A majority of infected adults--55 percent to be exact--are women.
This creates ripple effects. When women get the disease, they often pass it along to their unborn babies. As a result, about 10 percent of the HIV/AIDS cas es in sub-Saharan Africa are children. More dramatically, when women die, their children often become orphans. By the end of this year, the HIV/AIDS epi demic will be the reason that over 10 million children in sub-Saharan Africa are orphans.
How many children is that? There are about 10 million people 18 years old and younger in California. Imagine if every single one of them was an orphan. That is what we are talking about in sub-Saharan Africa. Te n million children. Even worse, according to those who are working on this issue in Africa, th e number of children orphaned there because of HIV/AIDS cou ld double, triple, or even quadruple in the next decade.
I have mentioned, Mr. President, a lot of statistics, a lot of numbers. but behind each number there is a face. A face of a man living with HIV; a face of a woman dying of AIDS; a
face of an orphan with no family and no place to go. In Sub-Saharan Africa, th ere are faces upon faces upon faces.
This is a global tragedy, a global catastrophe, a global emergency. It requires a global response. And the United States must lead the way.
So today, I am introducing, along with my colleague on the
Foreign Relations Committee, Senator GORDON SMITH, the Global AIDS Pre vention Act--the GAP Act. It calls
on the United States Agency for International Development--USAID--to make
HIV/AIDS a p riority in the
foreign assistance program and to undertake a comprehensive, coordinated effort
to combat HIV/AIDS. Th at effort
must include primary prevention and education; voluntary testing and counseling;
providing medications to prevent the transmission of HIV/AIDS fro m mother to child; and care for
those living with HIV/AIDS. To accomplish this, the GAP Act would increase funding for
USAID's international HIV/AIDS eff
ort. Over five years, the bill would authorize $2 billion for the fight against
AIDS, an d at least $1 billion of
that is dedicated to the problem in sub-Saharan Africa. Now, Mr. President, I have talked about the problem in
sub-Saharan Africa. Th at is where
the problem is the worst and where the need is most urgent. It has also been the
focus of most of the public attention in the last few months.
But, be warned. We must not fool ourselves into thinking
that sub-Saharan Africa is the
only place with a problem. In terms of raw numbers, India has more people living
with HIV/AIDS tha n any other
nation in the world. And experts tell us that in the near future, the problem
may actually grow faster in Southeast Asia than in Africa. As I mentioned, Mr. President, I am joined in this effort
by Senator GORDON SMITH. He and I worked together last summer in
introducing a bill to fight the international tuberculosis problem. I am pleased
and honored to join with him again in introducing bipartisan legislation to
address an urgent international health problem.
Mr. President, in the United States, When the epidemic
first hit two decides ago, too many people in positions to make a difference ran
inside, locked the doors, closed the curtains, and just hoped it would go away.
The victims were blamed instead of helped. Those at risk were ridiculed instead
of educated. Those who were dying were shunned instead of cared for.
We did not begin to make progress against HIV/AIDS in this country until we discussed the
problem in the light of day and until we made a serious investment in education,
prevention, treatment, care, and research. Progress will not be made in
Africa or anywhere else in the
world unless we do the same. Now is not the time to pretend the problem does not
exist or that it does not matter to us. Now is the time to act.
The GAP Act would help to close the gap between what we
need to fight this disease and what we are now spending. The GAP Act would help
to close the GAP between the developed and the developing world in dealing with
this epidemic. The GAP Act would help to close the gap between our words and our
actions. I ask my colleagues to close these gaps by cosponsoring the GAP Act.
Finally, I ask that a copy of the bill and a letter of
endorsement from Family Health International be inserted in the RECORD.
The material follows:
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of
Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Global AIDS Pre vention Act of 2000''.
SEC. 2. FINDINGS.
Congress makes the following findings:
(1) Since the beginning of the HIV/AIDS epi demic 2 decades ago, more than
16,300,000 people worldwide have died of the disease.
(2) More than 33,600,000 people in the world are living
with HIV/AIDS; mo re than
3,000,000 of them are children.
(3) Sub-Saharan Africa has been particularly hard hit by the
disease, as the region has accounted for--
(A) 84 percent of the worldwide deaths from HIV/AIDS; (C) 69 percent of those living with the disease.
(4) In sub-Saharan Africa, 55 percent of the infected adults
are women and, as a result, more than 10,000,000 children have been orphaned in
sub-Saharan Africa bec ause of
HIV/AIDS--a figure that could
double or triple in the next decade.
(5) According to the United Nations, HIV/AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa is the ``worst infectious disease
catastrophe since the bubonic plague''.
(6) The HIV/AIDS
pro blem in Southeast Asia is growing dramatically. In 1999, 20 percent
of the new infections in the world were in Southeast Asia.
(7) New investments and treatments hold out promise of
making progress against the HIV/AIDS
epi demic. For example, a recent study in Uganda demonstrated that a new
drug could prevent almost one-half of the HIV transmissions from mothers to
infants, at a fraction of the cost of other treatments.
(8) Making progress against HIV/AIDS req uires a global commitment, with a
leadership role from the United States.
SEC. 3. AMENDMENT OF THE FOREIGN ASSISTANCE ACT OF 1961.
Section 104(c) of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 (22
U.S.C. 2151b(c)) is amended by adding at the end the following new paragraph:
``(4)(A) Congress expects the agency primarily responsible
for administering this part to make HIV/AIDS a p riority in the foreign assistance
program and to undertake a comprehensive, coordinated effort to combat
HIV/AIDS. Th is effort shall
include providing--
``(i) primary prevention and education;
``(ii) voluntary testing and counseling;
``(iii) medications to prevent the transmission of
HIV/AIDS fro m mother to child;
and
``(iv) care for those living with HIV/AIDS.
``(B)(i) In addition to amounts otherwise available
for such purpose, there are authorized to be appropriated to the President to
carry out this paragraph $300,000,000 for fiscal year 2001, $350,000,000 for
fiscal year 2002, $400,000,000 for fiscal year 2003, $450,000,000 for fiscal
year 2004, and $500,000,000 for fiscal year 2005.
``(ii) Not less than 50 percent of funds made available
each fiscal year under clause (i) shall be used to combat the HIV/AIDS epi demic in sub-Saharan Africa.
``(iii) Funds appropriated under this subparagraph
are authorized to remain available until expended.''.
FAMILY HEALTH INTERNATIONAL,
FAMILY HEALTH INSTITUTE,
Arlington, VA, January 31, 2000. DEAR SENATOR BOXER: Based on Family Health
International's 14 years of experience managing more than 1,200 HIV/AIDS pre vention and care projects in 60
countries--the majority in sub-Saharan Africa--we strongly support The Global
AIDS Pre vention Act of 2000.
The need for scaling up HIV/AIDS pre vention and care programs in
Africa is urgent. We know
firsthand that the United States needs to provide more assistance than it has in
the past to save more lives, bolster regional security and protect the interests
of the United States not only in sub-Saharan Africa, bu t around the world.
We are pleased that you and members of the U.S. Senate and
Congress recognize the urgency of this need and the crucial role the United
States plays in international HIV/AIDS
pre vention and care programming. We have the tools and expertise needed
to make a dramatic difference in preventing more people from being infected with
HIV and caring for people living with HIV/AIDS. Bu t, this difference can only be made
by providing the level of resources it will take to greatly expand the
initiatives the United States already has underway with our hundreds of local
partners overseas.
[Page: S289] GPO's PDF
--
Hon. BARBARA
BOXER,
Hart Senator Office Building, U.S. Senate, Washington,
DC.
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