My name is Jimmy Carter, and I'm not running for president. - Jimmy Carter

I believe that you would agree that when John Kennedy was President and when Lyndon Johnson was President, that the community action agencies had a life of their own and helped to make decisions about government programs. In the last 8 years--and I won't call the names of the Presidents who were in the White House--[laughter]--those community action agencies were put into a very secondary position and lost the influence and the decisionmaking authority that they formerly had under the leadership of people like Joe Califano in HEW, who helped to put into effect many of the Johnson programs 10 years ago. And under the leadership of Pat Harris and Juanita Kreps and Grace Olivarez and others, we're trying to bring back the life of those community action groups. I think that it's impossible, no matter how intelligent or how dedicated a Washington official might be--it's impossible for them to know what the needs are in your community as well as you know them. That's the reason that I brought Grace Olivarez with me today, because that's her responsibility, working with the people that I've just named, to make sure that in the future we have a reviving of the community group influence and authority, whether it's a Hungarian American community or a Spanish-speaking community or a predominantly black community in Youngstown where a steel mill has shut down or a community of older people in Florida who have moved down there on a very low income; that doesn't matter. I want that particular community to let me know, through the Government agencies, how we can best address your problems. I want to thank you for that good question. I think Grace would agree that we're making a move in the right direction. And I think meeting with you today will help to expedite what we want to do. I think that everybody in the audience would agree that we've had a superb panel. They've asked very good questions, brought forward very good ideas for us. And I and all my staff members who are here, the different Federal agencies represented-and almost all of them are represented-the national news media that will repeat what you have said to the world at large tonight will benefit greatly from the sound, good judgment that you have provided and the personal experience that make your words carry even more authority than the words of a President. You know what you're talking about. I'm trying to learn what you're talking about.

In many ways, our economy last year was good. The inflation rate went down, and wages, profits, production, housing starts, real income, investment all went up. Four million new jobs were created, an all time record, and many of these jobs, I'm glad to say, were in New England. Employment here in New England last year went up 5 1/2 percent. The unemployment rate dropped 3 full percentage points, from 8 1/2 percent down to 5 1/2 percent. But unemployment and inflation is still higher than I'm willing to accept, and so my top priority this year on the domestic scene is still the economy. I've asked the Congress to help me put into effect a coherent program to make more jobs and to bring inflation closer under control. We need a cooperative anti-inflation effort, with voluntary action being taken by industry and by labor to keep wages and prices from pushing each other up. We need an expanded jobs program to help those who are hit hardest by unemployment. Next week I will send to the Congress legislation that would reauthorize the $12 billion Comprehensive Employment and Training Act, provide for 725,000 public service jobs and for a billion dollar youth employment and training program.

The complexity of the system is almost incomprehensible, and the consolidation of the cash. payment into one basic aid to the poor--those who cannot work, those who cannot earn enough income to support their families--will be a major step forward. Another problem arrives from the lack of incentive to work. For instance, a father who heads up a family with four people in it, either a mother and two children or three children, in Michigan, working full time at the minimum wage, has a total income of $5,678. A same-sized family without the father in the home with still four people there, not working at all, has an income of $7,161. A family with the head of the household--a mother and three children--if she goes to work at the minimum wage, has a total income of $9,530 [$8,970.] This shows that the best thing that a working father can do to increase the income of the people that he loves is simply to leave home.