Jan Schakowsky Quotes

Millions of people are falling out of the middle class into the ranks of the poor.

The middle class has just fallen further and further behind the rich.

The middle class of this country, our historic backbone and our best hope for a strong society in the future, is losing its place at the table.

We have an economy that's really geared toward rewarding the investor class. What are we doing to make sure that people who want to have a middle-class life are able to keep up?

It's no longer an exaggeration to say that middle-class Americans are an endangered species.

One thing we're going to focus on is the middle class and the crushing prices and stagnant wages they're facing. What motivates me is looking at my 3-year-old son and thinking about what we're passing on to him and his future wife and their future kids.

The truth is that beginning in the 1970s, the heart of our Democratic party, America's strong striving middle class, began drifting away from us.

The middle class, one of the great achievements in history, is becoming more of a relic than a reality.

Whoever rises to deliver the inaugural Address of 2013 will speak to a nation in which the American Dream is under profound economic and cultural pressure. This is perhaps best measured by the state of the middle class.

We cannot run a democracy without a strong middle class.

The middle-class ladder has rungs that no longer exist for many trying to climb higher. Instead, for too many, in too many places, their chore is simply trying to hang on.

This is the defining issue of our time. This is a make-or-break moment for the middle class and for all those who are fighting to get into the middle class.

Today, families like the one I grew up in still believe in that American dream. But as President Obama says, it's a make-or-break moment for the middle class. Mitt Romney's plans would make things worse.

A strong economy depends on a strong middle class, but George Bush has put the middle class in a hole, and John McCain has a plan to keep digging that hole with George Bush's shovel.

We don't need to solve the problem of the rich-poor gap. We need to solve the problem of common prosperity.

I believe a solid, really strong middle-class is the key to making the country in the best way.

Americans are falling out of the middle class, not into it. And they deserve relief. I absolute support extending the Bush tax cuts for those who work the hardest and invest the most in our economy - the real drivers of American growth, the middle class.

We need to make sure middle-class people are able to pay the bills. We need to make sure that poor people don't starve. Those are values, too.

If people continue to feel like Democrats are looking after poor folks and Republicans are looking after rich folks and nobody is looking after me, then we don't get a lot of stuff done. And the trend lines evidence the fact that folks have gotten squeezed. And obviously, 2007, 2008 really ripped open for people how vulnerable they were.

We need the middle class to feel more confident about its prospects and about its future. We need to cut down on this anxiety that sees some people succeeding and the majority struggling - having to make choices between paying for their kids' education or saving for their own retirement.

But I don't think the Democratic Party is at eye level with the middle class.

I don't mind the rich getting richer, but the poor shouldn't be getting poorer, and there should be more people moving into the middle class.

The biggest single challenge to America and our future is income inequality. We've got to fix it.

President Obama believes that income inequality is one of the most pressing matters facing the nation. If we are going to be a country that provides ladders of opportunity and believes in a thriving middle class, then we have to raise the minimum wage.

The best social programs we've had in this country are those that have united the middle class and the poor.