Democrats and Republicans should work together to increase revenue and curb the government's spending on social benefit programs to improve U.S. fiscal sustainability, John Boehner, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, said here Wednesday.

Democrats should agree to put the nation's entitlement spending, the primary driver of U.S. mounting debt, on a sound footing, the top Republican lawmaker of the House, said Wednesday at a press conference.

One day after U.S. presidential and congressional elections, Boehner urged both parties to find the common ground and adopt a new round of tax reform since the 1980s to increase revenue for the government.

However, he stressed that the world's largest economy could not solve its fiscal challenge overnight and President Barack Obama should lead to ink a balanced debt reduction plan.

Unless U.S. Congress acts by the end of this year, a combination of tax hikes and sweeping spending cuts, dubbed as the "fiscal cliff" and with the combined amount of about 600 billion U. S. dollars, was set to kick in. Democrats and Republicans locked horns over how to reduce the nation's public debt hovering at 16.2 trillion dollars and tide over the "fiscal cliff." Endi

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