Congressman Scott Garrett Proudly Serving the 5th District Of New Jersey

Congress has long had a spending problem. It is not just that Congress spends too much (it does), but the whole legislative process and culture of Congress is set up to find new ways to spend more money. It is almost unheard of for Congress to consider bills to actually eliminate wasteful programs or reduce unnecessary spending. In fact, more time has been devoted to considering bills to name post offices (62 and counting) or congratulate sports teams (62 and counting) than to considering bills to reduce spending.

The YouCut project is designed to challenge Congress’s culture of spending. It is a first-of-its-kind effort designed to engage the public in refocusing Congress’s priorities. With a deficit near $1.5 trillion, we don’t think it is too much to ask of Congress to spend some time debating bills to actually reduce spending.

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Our national debt is simply unsustainable. Not only is it immoral to keep passing along such debt to our children and our grandchildren, but we have reached a point where our current debt and deficit levels are hurting our economy and the prospects for job creation and future economic growth.

The proposals put forward for consideration as a part of this project will not in and of themselves solve our deficit and debt problems. The YouCut project is not about finding the one silver-bullet to our debt problems. It is designed, rather, to challenge Washington’s culture of spending and replace it with one of savings. After all, if Congress can’t bring itself to make the small decisions to reduce wasteful spending, how can we ever trust them with the big decisions that must be made?

1. Each week, the House Economic Recovery Solutions Group will post online (at http://republicanwhip.house.gov/YouCut) a list of five proposals to reduce wasteful or unnecessary spending. The public will have a chance to vote online or on their cell phones on the proposal they would most like to see Congress take up the next week. (You Vote)

2. And the next week House Republicans will force the House to vote on whether or not to take up and debate the bill. (We Cut)