Tierney tells Lynn area Chamber: Job creation key to future

LYNN – U.S. Rep. John Tierney, D-Salem, addressed the Lynn Area Chamber of Commerce at the Volunteer Yacht Club Friday morning, saying it?s essential to the economic recovery for Congress to remain focused on helping small businesses and encouraging entrepreneurs to take the risk on launching new business.?We?ve all heard the caveat that small businesses are creating the jobs. But in truth, within small businesses it?s new businesses that do most of the hiring,” Tierney said, adding some positive steps have been taken but there is much more to do. “There are way too many people out of work right now.”Bills including the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), the Hire Act and National Health Care, he said, are helping to level off – and in some areas have begun to reverse – unemployment, with measures including tax incentives for those who make capital investments in their businesses, subsidies lasting several months for businesses that employ people who have been jobless for eight or more weeks and allowing those who are self-employed to write off their own health care costs.And the ARRA makes vital investment in our roads, bridges and seaports, he said, as well as science, research and development, and clean energy technology, which Tierney said is the way of the future.Tierney spoke for 20 minutes defending Congress and the Obama Administration?s move to inject billions of federal money to jump start the economy.?President Obama came into office on January 20 of 2009,” he said, “and some of my friends in Congress, including (House Minority Leader) John Bohner (R-Ohio) and (Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky), believe that?s when all the problems started; that no sooner did we swear him (Obama) in that we headed off the cliff.”Tierney said the crisis the nation continues to grapple with was borne of the “Trickle Down” economic policy implemented by President George W. Bush.?The last three years of the Clinton Administration we had surpluses; we were working on paying down the debt and there was a $5.7 trillion surplus when the keys were handed over to George W. Bush. But (President Bush) didn?t like surpluses. He was afraid of them.”As a result, Tierney said, the Bush tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 were targeted toward the 2 percent of our population in the top income brackets.?The Trickle Down theory is that the richest will invest (in businesses and job creation), and the rest of us will be taken care of, but that?s not what happens,” Tierney said.Instead, he said, the Bush tax cuts cost $1.7 trillion a year, which was never offset by budget cuts or new revenue sources.Add the trillions of dollars in borrowed money to fund the war in Iraq, he said, “and it?s no mistake or accident that we are where we are today.?The ones in Washington screaming the loudest today about the deficit are the ones who didn?t say a word from 2001 through 2008,” he said.Tierney said he agrees with the president that the Bush tax cuts for those earning more than $250,000 should expire.The Recovery and Reinvestment Act, Tierney said, was the only way to try and pull the nation out of recession; the only way to help get the 10 million who are jobless back to work and back to paying taxes and mortgages and spending to support businesses.He said Democrats, meanwhile, are dedicated to bringing the $12 trillion federal deficit down.Difficult cuts will need to be made, he said, including billions in cuts from Defense.Tierney said according to the General Accountability Office, “Just 93 of our (defense) programs have a total of $296 billion in cost overruns and are anywhere from three months to 30 years behind schedule. We can do better,” he said, noting some projects will have to be sped up and other eliminated.?We can cut $1 trillion from Defense over the next 10 years and at the end have even stronger National Security.”However, Tierney said he is confident the secondary engine for the Joint Strike Fighter, the F-35, produced by GE an