Dear XXX,
If we want to lead - and in these times our nation is in desperate need of leadership in a different direction - we must dream big and act boldly. After all, we will never get what we don't reach for.
We need to be ambitious to build the kind of America that we all want - one where we are respected in the world, our homeland is safe and free, our schools are first-rate and we are less dependent on fossil fuels. Today, I am giving a speech at the National Press Club in Washington, DC that will focus on the first of several ambitious -- but achievable -- goals. I wanted you to hear about some of my ideas first.
I believe we can end poverty in the United States within 30 years. We can start by cutting poverty by one-third over the course of the next decade. That's moving 12 million Americans out of poverty in ten years.
Poverty is not an issue at the top of the polls. It doesn't come up first in focus groups. But it is wrong that we live alongside 37 million people who live in poverty. We all pay a price when the American Dream no longer seems American.
This is not about pumping money into a broken government program. It's about finding ways to help everyone who works hard and makes responsible choices get ahead. It's about creating a new kind of social contract that I call the "Working Society." Here's how we start.
First, we should make work pay fairly. Raising the minimum wage to at least $7.50 an hour would be a huge step in the right direction -- a step that, by itself, would give full-time workers a $4800 raise and lift more than a million people out of poverty. Our online community has done enormous work to put the minimum wage on the national agenda. Just yesterday, the Senate voted 52 to 46 in favor of increasing the minimum wage - thanks to your hard work. However, a minority of Republican senators blocked the bill using procedural maneuvers. Our work continues, especially at the state level where we are winning ballot initiatives to increase the minimum wage.
If we believe that everyone who is capable of working should work, then we need to make sure that they have the opportunity to do so. I believe that we should create one million "stepping stone" jobs over five years. These would be good jobs that will let people work their way out of poverty in the short term, and help them get experience so they can get better jobs in the future.
There are many other pieces we need to put in place - giving workers the real right to organize, helping families build assets, creating "work bonds" that would match low-wage workers' wages with a tax credit to jumpstart their savings accounts. The cornerstone is always the same: we expect people to work hard, but they have a right to expect they'll have something to show for it.
Second, we should radically overhaul federal housing. Our current housing policies segregate too many low-income families far from jobs and good schools. We need to see that housing policy can be an engine of opportunity. For starters, we should create one million more housing vouchers for working families over the next five years. If conservatives really believed in markets, they would join with us and enable people to vote with their feet to demand safe communities with good schools.
We also need to put families ahead of bureaucracy. HUD is bloated and has a track record of mismanaging money. We should start by cutting back HUD's excessive, unnecessary, and sometimes incompetent contractors. Second, we should trim the agency by at least 1,500 employees and get the money out where it can do some good.
Next, we should make work the centerpiece of our housing policy. We should make a contract with folks getting new housing vouchers - they must work and we'll help them earn more and save more. A program like this already works for 75,000 families - let's expand on the ideas that work.
Third, we must make college affordable for every young person who's willing to work for it. You have probably heard or read about a program I call "College for Everyone." It allows students to go to the first year of college for free if they are willing to stay out of trouble and take a part-time job. I have some good news. We've shown that College for Everyone works.
Last month, I attended a high school awards ceremony in Greene County, North Carolina. Through a pilot program we were able to provide students there over $300,000 in aid. That means kids who never before would have dreamed of going to college are not only leaving for school this fall - but paying for their first year without going into debt.
Imagine the opportunities we could create for our children if a program like this was available nationwide.
Fourth, we should open the world of learning to every child and teenager, and stop settling for failing schools. There are many challenges facing our schools, but one of the most troubling is that more than a million students drop out of high school every year. We must stem the tide, while being careful not to write off the young people who have dropped out.
America is a nation built on the idea of second chances, and I'd like to see us create second chance schools. These schools would offer young adults who realize later that dropping out was a mistake the chance to earn a diploma and get on with their lives. For me, education was the key to achieving the American Dream. We have to make sure that's true for the next generation as well.
I'm sure that a cynic would hear all of these ideas and say all this is too much, too soon. But I am tired of people pushing for incremental gains and half-measures, even from our own Democratic Party. We do not have to accept mediocrity or compromise our values.
We can decide to be great, we can address great problems, we can see great possibilities.
Achieving bold goals like ending poverty in the United States within 30 years will not be easy. It will take the best in us - our sacrifice, commitment, hard work and deep faith. But how we respond to the plain fact that millions of our own people are living in squalor and despair says everything about our Party and the country we believe in.
I learn so much from you, the members of this online community and the people I meet as I travel around the country. I hope you will take a moment to post a comment on my blog and let me know what you think about what you've heard and read.
Click here to visit our blog. Thank you for all that you've done, and all that you will do.
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