[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 1 (Wednesday, January 4, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S24-S26]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


      SENATOR DASCHLE'S IMPORTANT MESSAGES TO THE AMERICAN PUBLIC

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, at the beginning of every session of 
Congress the Senate, both the minority and the majority, introduce five 
bills. These are deemed to be the most important bills of the two 
parties during a Congress. I would like to congratulate and applaud the 
minority leader, Senator Daschle of South Dakota, for the choice he 
made in the bills that are part of the legislation that will be 
addressed by this Congress. The bills he has introduced are important 
messages to the American public.
  I first want to talk about S. 6. This is a bill dealing with the 
American working class. It is called the Working Americans Opportunity 
Act. We have made great strides, these past couple of years, in 
creating new jobs. Over 5 million new jobs have been created. We have 
the lowest inflation rate since John Kennedy was President. Three years 
in a row we have had a deficit reduction. We will have a reduction in 
our annual deficit this year, the third year in a row. This is the 
first time in 50 years this has happened.
  Industrial production is the highest since the days of President 
Lyndon Baines Johnson. Real business investment is the highest since 
World War II.
  Mr. President, we have 100,000 fewer Federal employees than we had 
years ago. Corporate profits soared 45 percent in the last quarter. 
Productivity as I indicated is skyrocketing.
  What then is the problem? The problem is that the American public 
generally is not benefiting from the gains that are being made.
  Let me read from a speech that was given by the Secretary of Labor 
very recently. He said among other things, and I quote:

       The old middle class has become an anxious class--worried 
     not only about sustaining their incomes but also about 
     keeping their jobs and their health insurance. Our large 
     corporations continue to improve productivity by investing in 
     technology and cutting payrolls. In a recent survey three out 
     of four employers say their own employees fear losing their 
     jobs. Meanwhile, 1994 is on track to become history's second-
     biggest year for mergers and acquisitions. But who wins in 
     this $300 billion deal? Certainly not the average American 
     worker. When two industry giants merge, the advantages of the 
     deal often come from layoffs. Across America, I hear the same 
     refrain: ``I've given this company the best years of my life, 
     and now they dispose of me like a piece of rusted 
     machinery.'' What has happened to the men and women who have 
     lost their jobs? Some have navigated their way to new and 
     better opportunities. But nearly one out of five who lost a 
     full-time job since 1991 is still without work. And among 
     those Americans who have landed new jobs, almost half--47 
     percent --are now earning less than they did before.
       In sum, tens of millions of middle-class Americans continue 
     to experience what they began to face in the late 1970's--
     downward mobility. They know that recoveries are cyclical, 
     but fear that the underlying trend is permanent. They voted 
     for change in '94 just as they voted for change in '92, and 
     they will do it again and again until they feel that downward 
     slide is reversing. But what so many Americans find shocking 
     about today's economy is the seeming randomness of their 
     fates.
       On a recent poll, 55 percent of American adults said they 
     no longer believe that you can build a better life for 
     yourself and your family by working hard and playing by the 
     rules. Of those without college degrees, 68 percent no longer 
     believe it. Because they 
     [[Page S25]] have been working hard and they are still 
     falling behind.

  Mr. President, sure things are happening. Corporate profits are up 45 
percent, and I am happy. That is the way it should be. We have added 
new jobs. But the problem is, I repeat, the middle class is not 
benefiting from what is taking place. That is why we had the vote in 
1992 that was a minirevolution, and a vote in 1994 that was an outright 
revolution. People of the middle class that make up the vast majority 
of the people of this country are dissatisfied with what is going on.
  Last year alone the top 20 percent of American households took home a 
record 48 percent of this Nation's total income. This same group, the 
top 20 percent of American households, pocketed 72 percent of the 
growth in incomes that took place. The top 5 percent of people who work 
in America took home 20 percent of the Nation's total income and more 
than 40 percent of all the growth that took place in income in this 
country. We know about rising interest rates that are also hitting the 
middle class with higher car payments, mortgages, and credit card 
payments.
  Mr. President, men who lack a college degree--nearly three out of 
four working men--have suffered a decline in average real income since 
1979 and women have just barely stayed even.
  So as to the bill, the Working Americans Opportunity Act, I will not 
repeat what my colleague from Louisiana, Senator Breaux, said, but I 
believe, as Senator Breaux believes, that it is one of the most 
important pieces of legislation introduced in these Chambers in 
decades. Why? Because it is directly related to the American middle 
class. The bill will take bold steps, Mr. President, to complete the 
responsibility for economic viability for all American citizens. The 
bill will replace nine Federal job training programs. I mentioned nine 
job training programs. Each of these job training programs have a 
series of subcategories under them, dozens, as Senator Breaux said. 
Many of them are not relevant to the people that are coming to them 
seeking help. We want to replace these nine Federal job training 
programs with a new training account system for working Americans.
  Mr. President, the vast majority of the people in America do not go 
to college. There is nothing wrong with that. I am not going to get 
into a debate about how our high schools only generally push college 
courses. I think that we should be more in tune with what people want 
and need in this country. But suffice it to say, the vast majority of 
people in this country do not go to college. We need people that do not 
go to college to be able to compete in the modern-day American 
workplace, and many people are not. They are being lost in the cracks. 
They go to find help from an agency that is supposed to help them and 
retrain them. They have lost jobs. They do not have a job. They are 
lost. The job agencies simply do not give them the help they need.
  These workers will be given a voucher. It is not welfare. We will 
save money in this program. Instead of giving this money to a 
Government bureaucrat we will give the money to an individual. That 
individual can look around and find a program that is in keeping with 
what they should do, what they want to do.
  Mr. President, this is the way that we used to do things. We should 
now again take up what worked before.
  They will receive training vouchers for job training and employment-
related services. This legislation will offer workers who seek 
assistance a list of State-certified places to obtain job training and 
employment services. The places they will go will have been certified, 
and they will have a report card, so to speak, to indicate their 
success and failures.
  It will establish through Federal grant programs to States a one-stop 
information center that provides easy access to a full range of job 
training and placement services. It will establish in the labor market 
an information system providing current data on available jobs and 
training to help working Americans keep pace with the changing 
workplace.
  This legislation should receive bipartisan support. I am hopeful and 
I am confident that it will. There is no reason that we cannot join 
together in this. It does a number of things. It reduces the 
bureaucracy, returns programs to the State level, and gives individuals 
choice in how they are going to be able to complete the rest of their 
lives. There will not be meaningless programs that they are sent to for 
retraining.
  So I do hope very much, Mr. President, that we can receive bipartisan 
support for this legislation that has been introduced by Senator 
Daschle.
  Also part of Senator Daschle's legislation is the Family Health 
Insurance Protection Act. We all know that the work that was done in 
the hours and days and weeks and months spent on this floor and in the 
other body on health care reform bore no fruit. We can pass a lot of 
blame as to why.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to speak for 
an additional 5 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, if we had to pick winners and losers in the 
health care debate, the winner clearly is the health insurance 
industry. They set out to confuse and frighten the American public, and 
they did that. I have to tell them that I think they did a good job. 
But that does not take away from the fact that we still now have 
problems with health care in this country.
  Senator Daschle has recognized this in his legislation which 
continues a commitment to provide Americans with accessible and 
affordable health care by addressing those pressing concerns of working 
families. This legislation will clamp down on insurance practices that 
often cause families and small businesses to lose their coverage.
  I learned in this health care debate that we did not spend enough 
time trying to look out for small businesses. This legislation does 
that.
  The elements in this bill are those areas upon which there is I 
believe, and Senator Daschle believes, broad bipartisan consensus to do 
some health care reform.
  This bill will ensure portability, eliminate preexisting conditions 
exclusions, and prohibit companies from charging consumers higher rates 
than others with the same policy or raising rates after consumers get 
sick. This bill will also require all insurers to offer at least one 
plan that will give benefits similar to what Members of Congress have.
  Also, I think very important--and I believe this is the most 
important part of Senator Daschle's bill--if we pass no other part, we 
should pass the part that says: This bill will return buying power to 
consumers by requiring health care providers, health plans, to make 
cost and quality information available to consumers so they can compare 
plans and make informed choices about the coverage.
  We would require that the health care providers, in effect, have a 
report card so consumers can make an intelligent choice. We want to 
also reduce paperwork and have administrative simplification and reform 
of malpractice. I believe this is another piece of legislation on which 
we can join with our neighbors across the aisle and reform health care 
in America today.
  Another piece of legislation is the Teen Pregnancy Prevention and 
Parent Responsibility Act. I am concerned about this issue. I am not 
proud of the fact, but the State of Nevada, in 1990, ranked No. 2 in 
the Nation in teenage pregnancy rates. There is only one other State in 
the Union that has a higher teenage pregnancy rate than the State of 
Nevada.
  We have to address welfare reform generally. This legislation does 
this, with emphasis on the problems we have with teen pregnancy and 
establishes parent responsibility. We must have the parents of these 
children responsible for their well-being.
  It is important to note, Mr. President, that 70 percent of births to 
teenage mothers were fathered by men who were 21 years of age and 
older. They should pay and be responsible. We know what is going on in 
our country today. It is devastating and it is hurting the moral fabric 
of this country. This legislation addresses that.
  Because of the lack of time, I am not going to go into detail, but I 
say to my friends on the other side of the aisle that this is the third 
piece of legislation I have talked about today where we should have 
bipartisan support. 
[[Page S26]] Senator Exon talked about joining the Republican 
colleagues on the balanced budget amendment. We need to do that.
  The last part of the legislation that the minority leader introduced 
as part of the Democratic legislation is congressional coverage reform. 
It is important that we deal with Senate coverage. We are going to do 
that. That is going to be a bipartisan effort. I worked as chairman of 
a task force last year to report to the majority leader, and then the 
minority leader Senator Dole, and I think much that we did on the 
bipartisan task force is going to be part of the legislation. Lobbying 
reform, gift ban and campaign finance reform are a part of Senator 
Daschle's legislation. I recommend it to my colleagues on this side and 
the other side of the aisle and say to the American public I think this 
is the year we are going to accomplish something through teamwork.
  Mr. LOTT addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Mississippi.
  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I have been pleased to listen to the 
statement of the distinguished Senator from Nevada, and I am very 
encouraged to hear his comments. I am satisfied that there are going to 
be many issues we will work together on, and I believe there are going 
to be many opportunities for cooperation in a bipartisan way this year.
  I want to commend our new Republican majority leader for scheduling 
as the first piece of legislation we will take up the Congressional 
Accountability Act. We will have bipartisan support for that effort, 
and I think it is appropriate that we begin this year by saying we are 
going to have all the Federal laws that apply to the American people--
in the States of Nevada, Tennessee, Mississippi, all across the 
country, apply to us also. So we will begin that debate on the first 
full legislative day of this year, and hopefully we will be able to 
reach an early agreement and pass that legislation quickly--perhaps in 
the next 2 days, or certainly by early next week. I look forward to 
working with the Senator from Nevada and others. I yield to the Senator 
from Nevada.
  Mr. REID. I say to the Senator, my friend from Mississippi, through 
the Chair, that I congratulate him on his recent leadership position. I 
am glad to see that my former colleague from the House is doing well. 
He had good training there. I served in the House when the Senator from 
Mississippi was minority whip. He did a fine job there, as I am sure he 
will do here. I wish him the very best in this Congress.
  Mr. BRADLEY addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Jersey is recognized.
  Mr. BRADLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be 
permitted to proceed as if in morning business for 5 minutes.
  Mr. LOTT. Reserving the right to object, Mr. President.
  Just for clarification, under a previous unanimous-consent agreement, 
there was a time agreement, I believe, for an hour and 20 minutes on 
each side. What is the present status of that time? All time has 
expired on the minority side. How much time is remaining on the 
majority side?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority has 28 minutes and 16 seconds, 
and the minority is out of time.
  Mr. LOTT. And when all time is used or yielded back, is the next 
order of business a statement by the Senator from Iowa [Mr. Harkin], on 
his amendment?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The next order of business would be to resume 
consideration of Senate Resolution 14.
  Mr. LOTT. I thank you, Mr. President.
  I withdraw my reservation.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BRADLEY. I thank the Chair.
  (The remarks of Mr. Bradley pertaining to the introduction of 
legislation are located in today's Record under ``Statements on 
Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')
  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Warner). The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I may speak 
for up to 10 minutes as in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? Without objection, it is 
so ordered.

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