 Ladies and gentlemen, the president of the United States. Thank you all very much. Thank you very much. And thank you, Congressman Duncan. Believe me, it is wonderful to be here. You know, I always wanted to speak on democracy and good government in Athens. Now, it is absolutely not true that I taught Plato all he knew. So I thank you for this opportunity. It's good to see my friends, Senator Baker and Congressman Quillen and Congressman Ford and Mayor Breakbill. Governor Alexander wanted to be here, but he's all finding new business opportunities for Tennessee. And I suspect that he will have the same success on this trip as he did in recent dealings with a company in Detroit. But I want to speak to you today about changing our tax system. I'm going to speak briefly so I don't hold you up too much from your day. I learned once a very important lesson about the importance of brevity in a speech. I was making a speech and in the audience was a minister from Oklahoma, Bill Alexander, who had been quite well known around the country, and Bill told me after I had spoken about his first sermon. And I've always thought there was a connection between my speech and his story. He said that he had been ordained and then he was invited to speak at a little church out in the country. And he worked for weeks on that first sermon and then stood up in that little country church that was empty except for one lone little fellow sitting out there among all the empty pews. Well he went down and he said to my friend you seem to be the only member of the congregation that showed up I'm just a young preacher getting started should I go through with it. The fellow said well I don't know about that sort of thing I'm just a little old cow poke out here in Oklahoma but I do know this, if I loaded up a truckload of hay ticket out in the prairie and only one cow showed up I'd feed it. Well Bill thought that was a cue so he got back up in the pulpit with his carefully prepared sermon and an hour and a half later said amen. Then he went down again and said my friend you seem to have stuck with me I'm a young preacher like I told you just getting started what'd you think. And he said well like I told you I don't know about that sort of thing but I do know this if I loaded up a truckload of hay took it out in the prairie and only one cow showed up I sure wouldn't give her the whole load. Well to start with the whole struggle for tax reform in our country is a kind of drama with good guys and bad guys and even a damsel in distress. But like all dramas it occurs within a certain context and here's ours our economy the American economy has never been stronger never been bigger and never been better since the economic recovery began we've created over eight million new jobs well over a million new businesses were incorporated in the last two years alone the American standard of living has increased our tax cuts put more money back in the American wallet interest rates are down from 21.5% to 9.5% so we can build houses and make big purchases again and most important in the past five years we chased inflation we caught it we wrestled it to the ground and stopped it from robbing the American consumer that's a long that's a long way of saying that inflation when we got to Washington was 12% and so far this year it has only been 3.3% and for the last four months it has only been 2.5% and we're not going to stop until we get it even lower and eliminate it entirely so we're in good shape and because of that we can afford finally to turn to one big area of American life that's been a mess for years now I'm talking about our current tax system now I sometimes do an informal poll about what the people think about taxes and if you'll cooperate do you love our current tax system do you like our current tax system well how about this do you find our present tax system utterly disgusting and demoralizing well I'm with you a system that penalizes people for working overtime a system that allows some to unfairly shelter their income from taxation well that's a system that just doesn't deserve to survive what we want to put in its place is a tax system that to begin with will reduce the 14 tax brackets we have now down to a number three we want to simplify the system and make it loophole free we want to see that everyone pays their fair share but no one pays more than that our tax plan is aimed at helping the family we're raising the personal exemption for each dependent from about $1,040 to $2,000 we're going to raise the standard deduction to $4,000 for a married couple filing jointly and under our plan a family of four won't pay one cent in federal income tax on the first $12,000 of earnings now we're also giving non-wage earning spouses an equal chance to have an IRA the tax deductible savings account you'd have to be pretty brave or awfully foolish to suggest that a housewife a homemaker isn't working you bet you are well one of the keys to our tax proposal is that we went in with a clear intent to try to lower the personal income taxes faced by the American people so we devised a system in which a full 79% of the taxpayers of our country would either get a tax cut or see their taxes for now remain unchanged barely 20% would face a tax increase and they are mostly the folks who've been using shelters and loopholes and such to avoid paying their fair share by the way there's been a little inaccurate information provided by some of our opponents on this they say that under our plan the rich will benefit the most they have it exactly backward under our proposal those who make $20,000 a year or less will enjoy the biggest tax cut it will average about 18% the second biggest tax cut goes for those who earn from $20,000 to $50,000 a year and they will get a cut that averages 7% and the smallest cut but still a cut nonetheless goes to those who make $50,000 a year or more and their tax cut is just little less averages a little less than 6% and I want to be very clear on why we think it's important to keep trying to keep striving to get your tax bills lower I want you to think about the cash that you've got in your pocket right now in your wallet or your purse the money that is then there you earned the less of it the government takes from you the more freedom you will have you can take that money and spend it and give a boost to retail sales and encourage millers and profits to hire more workers you can take it and save it and add to the capital available for all kinds of investment or you can take it and ultimately invest it in a business new firm or a new idea of your own but whatever you do spend, save or invest you'll be making a wonderful contribution to the quality of life of your fellow citizens you'll be creating jobs you may have heard that our council of economic advisors has just done a study of the expected economic impact of our tax plan they said the economic growth it will inspire should create the equivalent of almost 4 million new full-time jobs they found that the personal economic gain for each household will be about $600 a year for every household in America and they came up with something else that was pretty interesting there are some people who go around saying the American people are under taxed and we can't give them a break now because it will lower the amount of revenues coming into the government and I know that people are concerned about the deficit and we are and we're going to do something about it but what we're going to do something about is or the something we're going to do is reduce government spending not increasing taxes now the funny thing is that our tax plan by reducing individuals and businesses their taxes will ultimately bring a lot more money into the government with the rates lower the revenues become greater because of economic growth and increased prosperity one reason is that every time we cut tax rates in one area say on capital gains we bring in more capital gains revenues because the cut in rates stimulates economic activity when we cut in 1981 the top tax rate of 70 percent down to 50 percent actually the people paying in that bracket ended up paying more money to government at 50 percent than they had been at 70 because there was an incentive now for them to go out and do better and earn more and not try to find ways just to evade their taxes but to pay them because they got to keep more of the share of the dollar there's another element that figures in here our plan closes unproductive loopholes and eliminates the welter of shelters and that will cut down on legal tax avoidance a few minutes ago I said the tax reform is a drama with heroes and villains and a damsel in distress well the heroes are the citizens across this country who are asking for tax justice the villains are the special interest the I got mine gang and the damsel in distress well that's a last named endless economic growth and she's tied to the tracks and struggling to break free what do you say will you help us untie her thanks I needed that I want to mention something that's kind of funny and I hope you can help me with it I've been going all over the country talking about tax reform and wherever I go the people tell me they're frustrated by the current system and they back our plan and then they ask me what can they do to help well it's up to us together now maybe you can help me and congressman Duncan and Quillen and Ford maybe we can make Washington listen do you want a fairer tax system Washington's kind of far away I'm not sure they can hear you and our friends there in the press they want to know if you really want a fairer tax system I think I've just fallen in love with Tennessee well I'm not surprised Andrew Jackson started here that couldn't have been me Andrew Jackson started here and he was a president who cared about the average American he knew you weren't so average and this great town in Athens city you have a you have a history of standing up to special interests I guess you just can't stop Athens and McKinnon County from backing justice and fairness I'll tell you what you've done here today and with these congressmen here to carry the message back to Washington in person even if some of them didn't hear you way back there I'm sure they tried I've heard from so many up in the hill it said well we just haven't heard anything from the people yet about tax reform we don't know whether they're very interested or not but every place I've gone it's been just like this you are interested and you want what tax reform means a reduction of the rates making it simpler so that you don't have to hire an expert to tell you how to pay your tax making it simpler and making it fairer all of this I'll go back to Washington now and tell them that out here in the real America we found out that people do want something done about this hodgepodge tax system that's been growing like a Jerry built something or other for the last several decades well your support means a lot to me I know it means a lot to them and we're going to do everything we can to see if we can't get this passed this year so you'll know in a hurry that April's from here on are going to be a little happier around the 15th than they did well just so I say I love you too somebody had a sign up thank you for letting me come here and thank you for listening to me God bless you all and God bless Tennessee we're indeed honored today with your presence and sincerely appreciate your comments and challenging not only those represented here but those citizens nationwide to join together in solving a major problem in this country we believe in your leadership we're proud of your leadership and we continue to support your efforts also if I might Mr. President I'd like to ask you with your permission to join Chairman Joe Gaston and myself here at the podium to present you with a small gift symbolizing our appreciation for your visit today and for your continued leadership Athens and McMint County is proud of its industry we would like to present you with a gift today that was manufactured here in Athens we also think this gift symbolizes two things first we know of your great love of your beautiful ranch in California and we know that you love horseback riding we also know that you're going across this nation to carry your message concerning tax reform with this gift we would like to call upon the Congress of the United States and the citizens of this country to join with you in setting up for tax reform Mr. President good luck and God bless you thank you very much thank you all if I had known about that I would have brought my horse