There were 59 million Americans employed at the start of 1949; now there are more than 85 million Americans who have jobs.  In comparable dollars, the average income of the American family has doubled during the past 26 years.

Now, I want to speak very bluntly.  I’ve got bad news, and I don’t expect much, if any, applause.  The American people want action, and it will take both the Congress and the President to give them what they want.  Progress and solutions can be achieved, and they will be achieved.

My message today is not intended to address all of the complex needs of America.  I will send separate messages making specific recommendations for domestic legislation, such as the extension of general revenue sharing and the Voting Rights Act.

The moment has come to move in a new direction.  We can do this by fashioning a new partnership between the Congress on the one hand, the White House on the other, and the people we both represent.

Let us mobilize the most powerful and most creative industrial nation that ever existed on this Earth to put all our people to work.  The emphasis on our economic efforts must now shift from inflation to jobs.

To bolster business and industry and to create new jobs, I propose a 1-year tax reduction of $16 billion.  Three-quarters would go to individuals and one-quarter to promote business investment.

This cash rebate to individuals amounts to 12 percent of 1974 tax payments—­a total cut of $12 billion, with a maximum of $1,000 per return.

I call on the Congress to act by April 1.  If you do—­and I hope you will—­the Treasury can send the first check for half of the rebate in May and the second by September.

The other one-fourth of the cut, about $4 billion, will go to business, including farms, to promote expansion and to create more jobs.  The 1-year reduction for businesses would be in the form of a liberalized investment tax credit increasing the rate to 12 percent for all businesses.

This tax cut does not include the more fundamental reforms needed in our tax system.  But it points us in the right direction—­allowing taxpayers rather than the Government to spend their pay.

Cutting taxes now is essential if we are to turn the economy around.  A tax cut offers the best hope of creating more jobs.  Unfortunately, it will increase the size of the budget deficit.  Therefore, it is more important than ever that we take steps to control the growth of Federal expenditures.

Part of our trouble is that we have been self-indulgent.  For decades, we have been voting ever-increasing levels of Government benefits, and now the bill has come due.  We have been adding so many new programs that the size and the growth of the Federal budget has taken on a life of its own.

One characteristic of these programs is that their cost increases automatically every year because the number of people eligible for most of the benefits increases every year.  When these programs are enacted, there is no dollar amount set.  No one knows what they will cost.  All we know is that whatever they cost last year, they will cost more next year.