BUFFETT RULE | Proposed Amendment

Warren Buffett

Emails have been circulating about a proposed Amendment to the Constitution that originated mostly from a comment by Warren Buffett, in an interview with CNBC:

I could end the deficit in five minutes. You just pass a law that says that anytime there is a deficit of more than 3% of GDP, all sitting members of Congress are ineligible for re-election.

The other Buffett-originated rule is that there should be a minimum tax rate of 30 percent for people who earn more than $1 million. 

This proposal was put forward by Obama in 2011 and 2016, with a graduated phase-in up to $2 million (it would affect an estimate one-third of the top 1 percent of U.S. earners). In her campaign for the presidency, Hillary Clinton supported this idea  (http://www.snopes.com/politics/quotes/buffett.asp).

Here are the first five points of the proposal that is circulating. It expands on the quotes from Buffett.

Congressional Reform Act of 2017
1. No Tenure / No Pension. A Congressman/woman collects a salary while in office and receives no pay when they're out of office. 
2. Congress ( past, present, & future ) participates in Social Security. All funds in the Congressional retirement fund move to the Social Security system immediately. All future funds flow into the Social Security system, and Congress participates with the American people. It may not be used for any other purpose. 
3. Congress can purchase their own retirement plan, just as all Americans do. 
4. Congress will no longer vote themselves a pay raise. Congressional pay will rise by the lower of CPI or 3 percent.
5. Congress loses their current health care system and participates in the same health care system as the American people.