The challenges this nation faces are among the largest in its history. For years, bad policies and unrealistic promises advanced by both political parties have contributed to an irresponsible build-up of federal debt, and this debt now poses a fundamental challenge to the American way of life and standard of living. Without bold leadership, the unsustainable trajectory of the national debt will trigger a sharp and sudden debt crisis that would threaten national security, hit seniors and low-income Americans the hardest, and leave all Americans with a diminished future.

This looming crisis represents an enormous challenge, but it also represents a defining choice: whether to continue down the path of debt, doubt, and decline – or put the nation back on the path to prosperity. Last year, Republicans introduced and passed a budget that would lift the crushing burden of debt and restore economic growth. Meanwhile, President Obama and leaders in the Senate are still refusing to take seriously the urgent need to advance credible solutions to the looming fiscal crisis. Instead, they are still offering little more than false attacks and failed leadership.

The greatest example of this is President Obama's budget proposal for FY2013, which contains massive tax increases, continues the trend of out-of-control spending, and does nothing to pay down our national debt. Failing to heed the warnings of economists and the demands of the American people, the President's budget regrettably accelerates our country down the path to bankruptcy. Since January 20, 2009, when President Obama was sworn into office, the national debt has increased 45 percent, from $10.6 trillion to more than $15 trillion. Disappointingly, the President's FY2013 budget simply continues to pile on more debt by spending money that we simply don't have on government programs that don't work. As a result, under the President's budget the national debt is projected to reach $26 trillion by 2022. Along with adding $11 trillion to the national debt, his budget would impose a $1.9 trillion tax hike, creating more uncertainty for American families and businesses. These aspects of President Obama's budget proposal, coupled with the fact that it has now been more than 1,000 days since the Democratic-led Senate passed a budget, shows that the President and the Democratic leaders who control the Senate are not serious about confronting our nation's most pressing challenges.

The budget proposal for FY2013 that my colleagues on the House Budget Committee and I have put forward, The Path to Prosperity, addresses these challenges and serves as a blueprint for American renewal. It cuts more than $5 trillion in spending from the President's budget over the next 10 years, puts the nation on a path to pay off our national debt, offers pro-growth reforms to our broken and burdensome tax code, and saves and strengthens the social safety net.

This budget sets forth a model of government guided by the timeless principles of the American Idea: free enterprise and economic liberty; limited government and spending restraint; traditional family and community values; and a strong national defense. While, our government has strayed from these American principles, this budget offers a set of fundamental reforms to put the nation back on the right track.

Specifically, The Path to Prosperity would do the following:

• Change Washington's Culture of Spending

  This budget offers responsible spending cuts now and structural reforms of government spending programs going forward, to ensure that government spending remains on a sustainable path. Under this budget, government spending will fall from its current elevated level of 24 percent of the economy to below 20 percent by 2015. Relative to the President's budget, this budget cuts spending by more than $5 trillion over the next ten years, producing $3 trillion in lower deficits. By restoring spending discipline to Washington, this budget also tackles the drivers of our debt and averts the fiscal crisis ahead – cutting debt as a share of the economy by roughly 15 percent over the next decade.

• Strengthening Health and Retirement Security

  This budget puts an end to empty promises from Washington, offering instead real security through reasonable reforms. Medicare is facing an unprecedented fiscal challenge. Its failed reliance on bureaucratic price controls, combined with rising health care costs, is jeopardizing seniors' access to critical care and threatening to bankrupt the system – and ultimately the nation. According to the Medicare trustees, without substantial changes, the Medicare program will collapse in 2024. This budget saves Medicare by fixing flaws in its structure so it will be there for future generations. By putting these solutions in place now, this budget ensures that changes will not affect those in and near retirement in any way. No changes will be made to Medicare for anyone 55 and older.

  When younger workers become eligible for Medicare a decade or more from today, they will be able to choose from a list of guaranteed coverage options, including traditional Medicare. This flexibility will allow seniors to enjoy the same kinds of choices in their plans that members of Congress and federal employees enjoy. Medicare will provide a payment to subsidize the cost of the plan, and forcing plans to compete against each other to serve the patient will help ensure guaranteed affordability. In addition, Medicare will provide increased assistance to lower-income beneficiaries and to those with greater health risks. Plans will not be able to "cherry pick" beneficiaries or deny coverage to those with pre-existing conditions. Reform that empowers individuals – with a strengthened safety net for the poor and the sick – will guarantee that Medicare can fulfill the promise of health and security for America's seniors.

  In contrast, President Obama's health care law takes $500 billion from the Medicare Trust Fund to pay for the costs of his new health care entitlement. With no serious plan to save and preserve Medicare for current and future seniors, the President would allow parts of Medicare to go bankrupt in 2024. The President's law also empowers a board of unelected bureaucrats, known as the Independent Payment Advisory Board, or IPAB, to cut Medicare through formulaic rationing and determine what services your doctor and hospital can and cannot give you, hurting both Medicare recipients and health care providers. Conversely, the budget I authored ends the raid on the Medicare Trust Fund by repealing the President's health care law, including IPAB, and ensures that any potential savings in current law would go to help Medicare, not to pay for new entitlements. In addition to repealing the health care law's new rationing board and its unfunded long-term care entitlement, our budget stabilizes plan choices for current seniors.

  This budget also calls for action on Social Security by requiring both the President and the Congress to put forward specific ideas and legislation to ensure the sustainable solvency of this critical program. The risk to Social Security, driven by demographic changes — namely 10,000 baby boomers retiring every day — is nearer at hand than most acknowledge. According to the 2011 Social Security Trustees Report, beneficiaries will face a painful 23 percent benefit cut in 2036 when the Social Security Trust fund is exhausted. Both parties must work together to chart a path forward on common-sense reforms, and this budget provides the nation's leaders with the tools to get there.

• Pro-Growth Tax Reform

  The current tax code for individuals is too complicated, with high marginal rates that discourage hard work and entrepreneurship. This budget embraces the widely acknowledged principles of pro-growth tax reform by proposing to consolidate tax brackets and lower tax rates, to just two rates of 10 and 25 percent, while clearing out the burdensome tangle of loopholes that distort economic activity and primarily benefit the wealthiest Americans.

  American businesses are also overburdened by the highest corporate income tax rates in the developed world. The perverse incentives created by the corporate income tax do a lot of damage to both workers and investors, yet the tax itself raises relatively little revenue. This budget improves incentives for job creators to work, invest, and innovate in the United States by lowering the corporate rate from 35 percent (the highest in the industrialized world) to a much more competitive 25 percent (the international average) and by shifting to a territorial system that will ensure a level playing field for American businesses.

  It is also important to remember that 9 out of 10 businesses in Wisconsin file their taxes as individuals, not as corporations. These small businesses, known as "sub-chapter S corporations," limited liability corporations (LLCs) and partnerships employ more than half of all private sector workers. The President is proposing that the top tax rate for these businesses be raised to 45% in January of 2013. With two thirds of the net new jobs in America being created by small businesses, the President's tax proposal is a plan to kill job creation. Some of our foreign competitors are lowering their tax rates on businesses to as low as 15%. As noted above, our budget lowers the top individual tax rate to a more competitive 25% while broadening the tax base by eliminating loopholes and tax shelters.

• Providing for the Common Defense

  With American men and women in uniform currently engaged with a fierce enemy and dealing with emerging threats around the world, this budget takes several steps to ensure that national security remains government's top priority. This budget rejects proposals to make thoughtless, across-the-board cuts in funding for national defense. Instead, it provides $554 billion for national defense spending, an amount that is consistent with America's military goals and strategies. This budget preserves necessary defense spending to protect vital national interests today and ensures future real growth in defense spending to modernize the armed forces for the challenges of tomorrow.

  The defense budget is slated to be cut by $55 billion, or 10 percent, in January of 2013 through the sequester mechanism enacted as part of the Budget Control Act of 2011. This reduction would be in addition to the $487 billion in cuts over ten years proposed in President Obama's budget. The President's proposal for defense spending represents a budget-driven strategy, not a strategy-driven budget. Our budget eliminates these additional cuts in the defense budget by replacing them with other spending reductions. Spending restraint is critical, and defense spending needs to be executed with effectiveness and accountability. But government should take care to ensure that spending is prioritized according to the nation's needs, not treated indiscriminately when it comes to making cuts. The nation has no higher priority than safeguarding the safety and liberty of its citizens from threats at home and abroad.

  This budget also honors the brave soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines who have served our country and made tremendous sacrifices on behalf of this nation. Not only does it match the President's FY2013 request for $61.34 billion to spend on veterans, it calls for more than $16.6 billion in additional spending on veterans and their families over the next ten years. As a country, we must remember the sacrifices of our veterans and their families, who have bravely served our nation, and this budget proves committed to providing the best care possible for them and uniformed service members.

The budget I helped write came before the House for a vote on March 29, 2012, and was passed by a vote of 228 – 191. I was encouraged that my colleagues voted in favor of The Path to Prosperity instead of continuing down the path of debt, doubt, and decline. Before voting to pass this budget proposal, the House had the opportunity to vote on President Obama's budget proposal for FY2013. The House unanimously rejected the President's proposal, by a vote of 0 – 414, a clear indication that Republicans and Democrats alike did not believe the President put forth a credible plan to address America's challenges.

The choice of two futures presented in this budget is premised on the wisdom of the American people to build a prosperous future for themselves and for future Americans to come. Today, America is struggling — these are tough times and people are rightfully anxious about the future. But as the challenge grows, so does the opportunity to restore America's promise and prosperity. This budget recommits the federal government to the security of every American citizen's natural right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, while fostering an environment for economic growth and private-sector job creation.

To learn more about The Path to Prosperity, please visit: http://paulryan.house.gov/Issues/Issue/?IssueID=56750.