[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 63 (Wednesday, April 5, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5165-S5166]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


  TRUSTEES' REPORT ON SOCIAL SECURITY, DISABILITY AND MEDICARE TRUST 
                                 FUNDS

  Mr. SIMPSON. Mr. President, I cannot tell you how much I enjoy 
working with the Senator from Nebraska. He and I are going to involve 
ourselves in a bipartisan effort as a form of a national wake-up call. 
After the recess is concluded, we will introduce a series of bills 
which will deal with the real hard stuff in America, which is Social 
Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and Federal retirement. I cannot tell you 
how much I enjoy and respect and admire the Senator from Nebraska.
  I have some remarks to make about Social Security. But in my limited 
time, and listening to the previous debate, I cannot help but reflect, 
as I listened to the rather dramatic presentation of how, apparently, I 
gather, Republicans love to be cruel to children and to veterans and to 
old people, how absurd and bizarre that is. That is the most stupefying 
type of debate to listen to.
  It will really be interesting to see how everyone handles the tough 
votes, the ones that really count, when we try to do something which 
will assure the future for veterans and the children and the old 
people; and that is to do something with the entitlement programs which 
are sucking it all up.
  We here do not even vote on 68 percent of the Federal budget--no, 
that just goes out the door to people, regardless of their net worth or 
their income. Absolutely absurd.
  All we are trying to do, at least in our party, is to slow the growth 
of the programs. There is not a ``cut'' in a carload here. We are not 
``cutting'' anything. We are trying to slow the growth of programs. If 
the American people cannot understand that, well, get the other party 
back in power and start spending it up, because that is exactly where 
we are.
  Let us look at that school lunch caper over there in the House. Do 
you know what they really did? They took a program going up 5.4 percent 
a year and said, ``Let's let it go up only 4.5 percent a year and let 
the States handle it with flexibility and less administrative costs,'' 
which was then reported to the public as breaking catsup bottles over 
children's heads, and the prospect of swollen-bellied children in 
little school districts all over America starving to death. That is 
bosh; absolutely stupefying drivel.
  So every one of these programs is going up, and we are trying to say, 
``slow the growth.''
  And try this one, because you will want to be ready for it when we do 
something to Medicare. And, brothers and sisters, we will do something 
to Medicare because it is going up 10.5 percent per year regardless of 
what we do. Then you can watch what happens when we do not allow it to 
go up 10.5 percent. We are going to let it go up probably 5 percent. 
The headline will be: ``Congress slashes Medicare 50 percent.'' Be 
ready for that one.
  When a 5-percent increase is described as a 50-percent cut, and it is 
believed the American people deserve exactly what they are going to 
get.
  I keep hearing about Head Start. Guess what? Why not use the correct 
figures? Head Start is mentioned every single day as some kind of thing 
the Republicans love to chop on.
  Well, here are the correct figures and they come from Democrats and 
Republicans alike in this body. In fiscal year 1990, $1.6 billion; in 
fiscal year 1996, $3.9 billion. So from fiscal year 1990 through fiscal 
year 1996, Head Start has more than doubled. It has had more than a 
140-percent increase, and everybody knows it. If they do not, they are 
going to get exactly what they deserve.
  It comes from a bent of being stupid about what is really happening 
in America.
  The recent trustees' report on Social Security is another classic 
example of stupefying logic. We are now told that, instead of going 
broke in the year 2029, it will go broke in the year 2031. Is that not 
thrilling? Nearly the same numbers as last year; certain disaster. The 
facts all speak for themselves.
  The trustees say Social Security will start running deficits in 2015 
and go broke in 2031. Disability insurance is already running deficits 
and it will go broke in the year 2016. The Medicare trust fund will 
start running deficits in 1996, and will go broke in the year 2002. But 
have stout heart, because last year, it was to go broke in the year 
2001. So this is cheerful news It will now go broke in the year 2002. 
That is like a cancer patient being told, ``You lucky fellow, you are 
going to have 6 months to live instead of 5.''
  The trustees go on to use phrases like ``extremely unfavorable'' and 
``severely out of financial balance'' when talking about the Medicare 
trust fund. And the trustees urge that all these reforms be undertaken 
sooner rather than later.
  So that is where we are. Doomsday dates, just about the same, using 
intermediate assumptions--not the best assumptions, not the worst--but 
the best ``in between'' estimate of what the future holds. And we know 
that they assume that the Consumer Price Index will hover between 3 and 
4 percent until the year 2002 and will never go above 4 for the year 
2070.
  Yet one uptick in the Consumer Price Index of one-half of 1 percent 
will cost the Government about 7 billion bucks annually for Social 
Security alone. And if we were to see another few years of high 
inflation, as in the late seventies and early eighties when the CPI hit 
13.4 percent, Mr. President, I say to my colleagues, only 1 year of 
that type of increase would cost the Government more than 126 billion 
bucks--1 year.
  In light of this report, it is well to reflect on the real, honest-
to-God reasons for exploding Federal spending. I know the AARP, the 
American Association of Retired People, hates to hear this, but it is 
time they do. That group is the 33 million people paying 8 bucks a year 
dues to do it. They are bound together by a common love of airline 
discounts and auto discounts and pharmacy discounts and all the rest. 
Here is what they do not want you to hear:
  The growth of these programs is what is creating the true hazard in 
America. They have consistently argued that other than health care, 
entitlements are not growing faster than the rest of the GDP. That is 
simply wrong--it is a misapplication of fact--it is actually a lie. 
According to the trustees themselves, Social Security costs would grow 
from 4.2 of GDP in 1995 to 5.1 by 2020, and more than 5.7 by the year 
2045. That is a 40-percent increase relative to the current share of 
GDP.
  I hope when we listen to the debate and when the organs of the AARP 
and other senior groups begin to rap on us, that we remember that these 
nonprofit organizations have myriad and lucrative activities in which 
they engage. We will have them before the subcommittee, of which I 
chair, to tell us 
[[Page S5166]] of their prowess in the fundraising arena.
  So here we go. By the year 2045, the trustees' report shows that more 
than 14 percent of the GDP will go into Social Security and Medicare 
programs alone. And get this one: In the year 2030, there will have to 
be a 30 percent payroll tax to pay for Social Security. Oh, yes, you 
can get there; yes, you can; you can do it with more payroll tax; you 
can get there that way to pay for Social Security and Medicare.
  And we here have done all this to ourselves. The President did not do 
it. President Clinton did not do it. President Bush did not do it. We 
did it. We have done it ourselves. We have served as pack horses to 
drag money back to our States, and we have done a magnificent job for 
50 years. Just look at our record. The more you drag home, the more you 
get reelected. Now the people are waking up from a long slumber. Rip 
Van Winkle could not have matched it.
  I plan to work hard with my good friend, Bob Kerrey, to introduce 
legislation to shore up the Social Security and Medicare trust funds in 
order that it will not be in the cards to leave our children and 
grandchildren with the burden of paying payroll tax rates of 30 percent 
and beyond in all the years to come.
  You can run but you cannot hide on this one. The tough votes will be 
coming, and it will be very interesting to see who casts them. My hunch 
is the people who give us the business about this and this and this 
item, which is really peanuts in the great scheme, will not cast the 
tough votes when they know we full well have to have those votes to 
stop runaway systems that we do not even vote on, which are up now to 
68 percent of the entire national budget.
  I earnestly hope that we will have a good bipartisan effort to 
resolve it. I thank the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Dakota has 22 minutes 
remaining.


                          ____________________