Congressmen Join Forces To Urge People To Save, Reduce Debt

Kansas City, MO (AHN) - With the ongoing financial crisis two Congressmen say that personal debts are crippling the nation's ability to recover and they are urging consumers to save more.

For three hours in Kansas City, Missouri on Tuesday night, Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, II (D-MO) and Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS) joined forces in a bipartisan effort to urge people in the metro area to save.

Roberts reportedly blamed predatory lenders for the current financial crisis, but he and Cleaver said that while Congress deals with finding out who is to blame, people need to find ways to reduce their personal debts and save money.

"We are vulnerable," Cleaver was quoted as saying by KHSB NBCActionnews. "We are very vulnerable economically."

Cleaver and Roberts were joined by financial planners and debt counselors who took some 531 phone calls from people nervous over the upheavals in financial markets and seeking financial advice.

One financial counselor urged people to save more because she has heard that lenders will begin lowering credit limits even for people with good credit scores.

Cleaver explained that people's personal spending habits are causing problems for the federal government.

"We spend all we earn and we borrow with credit cards," Cleaver was quoted as saying. "So, we cannot borrow money domestically, we being the federal government, because there is no money domestically."

He compared the fact that Americans save little or nothing to the Chinese and Japanese, who save 20 percent of their paychecks on average.

China has loaned a great deal of money to America.

Call For Action provided volunteers to answer questions from nervous consumers for the three-hour event. It is an international, nonprofit network of consumer hotlines affiliated with local broadcast partners that offers free, confidential services to individuals and small businesses, according to a statement on its website.