Fix The Debt

The Campaign to Fix the Debt has drafted an open letter to the President and Congress, signed by a broad group of Americans, including:

• Over 300,000 Americans
• Former Cabinet Officials, Federal Budget and Policy Leaders, White House Chiefs of Staff and Budget Experts
• Thousands of Small Business Owners
• Hundreds of Business Leaders and CEOs
• Fix the Debt State Steering Committee Chairs
• Civic Leaders
• Former Senators, Members of Congress and Governors

The full letter is included below: 

Mr. President and Congress,

With the election behind us, and the country facing the impending fiscal cliff, we call on you to join together to resolve one of the greatest challenges to America’s future – our unsustainable national debt – and chart a course for job creation and long-term economic growth.

While we are not endorsing any one plan in particular, we believe the following core
principles should guide your actions as you address the issue:

• Policymakers should acknowledge that our growing debt is a serious threat to the economic well-being and security of the United States.
• It is urgent and essential that we put in place a plan to fix America's debt. An effective plan must stabilize the debt as a share of the economy, and put it on a downward path. 
• This plan should be enacted now, but implemented gradually to protect the fragile economic recovery and to give Americans time to prepare for the changes in the federal budget.
• In order to develop a fiscal plan that can succeed both financially and politically, it must be bipartisan and reforms to all areas of the budget should be included.
• The plan should reform Medicare and Medicaid, improve efficiency in the overall health care system, and limit future cost growth; strengthen Social Security, so that it is solvent and will be there for future beneficiaries; and include comprehensive and pro-growth tax reform, which broadens the base, lowers rates, raises revenues, and reduces the deficit. 
• The recommendations of the Simpson-Bowles Commission and other recent bipartisan efforts, which saved at least $4 trillion and addressed all parts of the budget, provide effective frameworks for such a plan. 
• The plan should be conducive to long-term economic growth, protect the vulnerable, include enforcement mechanisms to ensure that the debt reduction is achieved, and leave the next generation better off. 

Click here to download the letter in PDF form.