[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 162 (Thursday, October 19, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S15327-S15329]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           NO BALANCED BUDGET

  Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, let me first congratulate the 
distinguished Senator from North Dakota, Senator Dorgan, and the 
distinguished Senator from North Dakota, Senator Conrad. These two 
gentlemen have been persistent on this issue, and this particular 
Senator from South Carolina is most grateful because for a long time I 
have felt a little like a Johnny One Note. I took the floor 2 days ago 
and now again today to reiterate what Senator Dorgan just said--namely, 
that the Republican budget is not balanced. A couple weeks ago, when we 
were passing the State, Justice, Commerce Appropriations bill I said 
that if there were a way to balance the budget without increasing 
revenues as well as holding the line on spending, I would jump off the 
Capitol dome.
  Let me turn, Mr. President, to the subject raised by these two 
gentlemen and the response given to their inquiry by the Director of 
the Congressional Budget Office.
  While my distinguished colleague from Mississippi congratulated the 
chairman of the Budget Committee, I was sorry that I could not join in 
those congratulations, and I wish to explain in a very dignified way 
just exactly why.
  On July 10, 1990, we voted in the Budget Committee by a vote of 20 to 
1 to put the Social Security trust fund off budget--20 yeas, 1 nay. The 
one nay was the distinguished Senator from Texas, Mr. Gramm, but the 
distinguished present chairman of the Budget Committee, Senator 
Domenici, voted for my Social Security preservation amendment.
  I ask unanimous consent to include the committee rollcall in the 
Record.
  There being no objection, the vote was ordered to be printed in the 
Record, as follows:

     July 10, 1990--Hollings Motion To Report the Social Security 
                            Preservation Act

       The Committee agreed to the Hollings motion to report the 
     Social Security Preservation Act by a vote of 20 yeas to 1 
     nay:

                                                                        
                Yeas                                 Nays               
                                                                        
Mr. Sasser                           Mr. Gramm                          
Mr. Hollings                         ...................................
Mr. Johnston                         ...................................
Mr. Riegle                           ...................................
Mr. Exon                             ...................................
Mr. Lautenberg                       ...................................
Mr. Simon                            ...................................
Mr. Sanford                          ...................................
Mr. Wirth                            ...................................
Mr. Fowler                           ...................................
Mr. Conrad                           ...................................
Mr. Dodd                             ...................................
Mr. Robb                             ...................................
Mr. Domenici                         ...................................
Mr. Boschwitz                        ...................................
Mr. Symms                            ...................................
Mr. Grassley                         ...................................
Mr. Kasten                           ...................................
Mr. Nickles                          ...................................
Mr. Bond                                                                
                                                                        

  Mr. HOLLINGS. I thank the Chair. On October 18, 1990, I toiled 
alongside the distinguished Senator from Pennsylvania, our late, 
wonderful Senator and friend, John Heinz. He had been working 
diligently on this issue as well. He was not on the Budget Committee, 
but I said to John, if you can get the votes on the Republican side, I 
think we can really finally fix this problem. It needed fixing because 
everyone had been playing games.
  The truth of the matter is, Mr. President, that beyond using the 
surpluses in the Social Security trust fund, another $12 billion comes 
from other trust funds. They use the highway trust fund. They use the 
airport and airways trust fund, the civil service retirement, the 
military retirement trust fund. You can go right on down the list. Back 
in 1990, you could not get anybody's attention talking about these 
other trust funds, but I said on Social Security I think we have got 
them.
  Mr. President, the vote on October 18, 1990, was 98 to 2. 

[[Page S 15328]]

  I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the Senate vote 
on the Hollings-Heinz amendment putting Social Security off budget.
  There being no objection, the vote was ordered to be printed in the 
Record, as follows:

       Subject.--Hollings-Heinz, et al., amendment which excludes 
     the Social Security Trust Funds from the budget deficit 
     calculation, BEGINNING in FY 1991.


                               yeas (98)

       Democrats (55 or 100%)--Adams, Akaka, Baucus, Bentsen, 
     Biden, Bingaman, Boren, Bradley, Breaux, Bryan, Bumpers, 
     Burdick, Byrd, Conrad, Cranston, Daschle, DeConcini, Dixon, 
     Dodd, Exon, Ford, Fowler, Glenn, Gore, Graham, Harkin, 
     Heflin, Hollings, Inouye, Johnston, Kennedy, Kerrey, Kerry, 
     Kohl, Lautenberg, Leahy, Levin, Lieberman, Metzenbaum, 
     Mikulski, Mitchell, Moynihan, Nunn, Pell, Pryor, Reid, 
     Riegle, Robb, Rockefeller, Sanford, Sarbanes, Sasser, Shelby, 
     Simon, Wirth.
       Republicans (43 or 96%)--Bond, Boschwitz, Burns, Chafee, 
     Coats, Cochran, Cohen, D'Amato, Danforth, Dole, Domenici, 
     Durenberger, Garn, Gorton, Gramm, Grassley, Hatch, Hatfield, 
     Heinz, Helms, Humphrey, Jeffords, Kassebaum, Kasten, Lott, 
     Lugar, Mack, McCain, McClure, McConnell, Murkowski, Nickles, 
     Packwood, Pressler, Roth, Rudman, Simpson, Specter, Stevens, 
     Symms, Thurmond, Warner, Wilson.


                                nays (2)

       Democrats (0 or 0%).
       Republicans (2 or 4%)--Armstrong, Wallop.


                             not voting (0)

       Democrats (0).
       Republicans (0).

  Mr. HOLLINGS. I thank the distinguished Chair.
  And then on November 5, Mr. President, George Bush, President George 
Bush, signed into law, Public Law 101-508, saying here:

       Section 301(a) of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 is 
     amended by adding at the end the following: The concurrent 
     resolution shall not include the outlays and revenue totals 
     of the old age, survivors and disability insurance program 
     established under title II of the Social Security Act or the 
     related provisions of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 in 
     the surplus or deficit totals required by this subsection or 
     in any other surplus or deficit totals required by this 
     title.

  I ask unanimous consent to include in the Record at this particular 
point section 13301 of Public Law 101-508 of the United States.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                      Subtitle C--Social Security

     SEC. 13301. OFF-BUDGET STATUS OF OASDI TRUST FUNDS.

       (a) Exclusion of Social Security From All Budgets.--
     Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the receipts and 
     disbursements of the Federal Old-Age and Survivors Insurance 
     Trust Fund and the Federal Disability Insurance Trust Fund 
     shall not be counted as new budget authority, outlays, 
     receipt, or deficit or surplus for purposes of--
       (1) the budget of the United States Government as submitted 
     by the President,
       (2) the congressional budget, or
       (3) the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act 
     of 1985.
       (b) Exclusion of Social Security From Congressional 
     Budget.--Section 301(a) of the Congressional Budget Act of 
     1974 is amended by adding at the end the following: ``The 
     concurrent resolution shall not include the outlays and 
     revenue totals of the old age, survivors, and disability 
     insurance program established under title II of the Social 
     Security Act or the related provisions of the Internal 
     Revenue Code of 1986 in the surplus or deficit totals 
     required by this subsection or in any other surplus or 
     deficit totals required by this title.''.
  Mr. HOLLINGS. I thank the distinguished Chair.
  Mr. President, my friends on the other side are well rehearsed in 
repeating their little drumbeat--balanced budget, balanced budget, 
balanced budget, balanced budget. But like they say back home: no 
matter how many times you say it, it doesn't make it so.
  Chairman Kasich filed a conference report on June 26, 1995, and on 
page 3 you will see the word ``deficit''--not ``balance''--for fiscal 
2002, $108.4 billion.
  We need to open our eyes. When we started the budget process at the 
beginning of the year, the distinguished chairman of the committee said 
that we were going to provide the American people with a down payment. 
We were not going to balance the budget.
  As we marked up the budget, the distinguished chairman of the Budget 
Committee said, ``Now, we require that the reconciliation bill be 
passed into law before we do any tax cut.''
  That has been changed, Mr. President. Now we have a different process 
where we give CBO certain assumptions. We send them over one day and 
they say we have a $10 billion surplus. We come back the next day and 
they say you have a $100 billion deficit.
  In the Commerce Committee, where I am the ranking member, we are 
charged with saving $15 billion. Mr. President, $8 billion of our 
allotment has already been spent on the telecommunications bill. Half 
of our assigned savings in the Commerce Committee is absolutely false. 
The same may be true in other committees as well.
  It is like Cato's famous couplet, ``The politician makes his own 
little laws and sits attentive to his own applause.'' Why, heavens 
above, you will probably be able to say something else tomorrow.
  What we are trying to do is to level with the American people. What 
we are trying to do is cut spending, freeze spending, close loopholes. 
But you cannot balance the budget, Mr. President, you cannot do it 
without also increasing revenues. Nobody around here wants to say that, 
but that is the truth.
  I was put to the metal when the distinguished chairman of the Budget 
Committee, and others, appeared on December 18. Mr. Kasich, Senator 
Domenici, and others, said, ``We are going to have three budgets. We 
don't care what the President has got. We are going to balance the 
budget without taxes.'' I went to the budget staff and said, ``I'm 
missing something.''
  I had worked with Senator Baker on a freeze and back in 1981. Then I 
got together with Senator Gramm and Senator Rudman, and we had a freeze 
and cuts across the board. In 1986 we closed the loopholes with tax 
reform. Then in 1989 and in 1990 we appeared before the Finance 
Committee and in the Budget Committee proposing a value-added tax.
  We got eight votes in the Budget Committee on that proposal. We got 
Senator Danforth, Senator Boschwitz and others to work as part of a 
bipartisan group with truth-in-budgeting.
  But now we have a big act going on now. Pressure is being exerted by 
the House leadership over there, pressuring my friend, the 
distinguished chairman of the Budget Committee. He should know better 
than anybody else that this budget we are talking about has no idea of 
being balanced by the year 2002.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record 
a budget table compiled by my staff using CBO figures at this 
particular point.
  There being no objection, the table was ordered to be printed in the 
Record, as follows:

                                                  BUDGET TABLES                                                 
                                              [Outlays in billions]                                             
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                           Grosss               
               Year                  Government  Turst funds    Unified        Real       federal       Gross   
                                       budget                   deficit      deficit        debt       interest 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1968..............................        178.1          3.1        -25.2        -28.3        368.7         14.6
1969..............................        183.6         -0.3         +3.2         +2.9        365.8         16.6
1970..............................        195.6         12.3         -2.8        -15.1        380.9         19.3
1971..............................        210.2          4.3        -23.0        -27.3        408.2         21.0
1972..............................        230.7          4.3        -23.4        -27.7        435.9         21.8
1973..............................        245.7         15.5        -14.9        -30.4        466.3         24.2
1974..............................        269.4         11.5         -6.1        -17.6        483.9         29.3
1975..............................        332.3          4.8        -53.2        -58.0        541.9         32.7
1976..............................        371.8         13.4        -73.7        -87.1        629.0         37.1
1977..............................        409.2         23.7        -53.7        -77.4        706.4         41.9
1978..............................        458.7         11.0        -59.2        -70.2        776.6         48.7
1979..............................        504.0         12.2        -40.7        -52.9        829.5         59.9
1980..............................        590.9          5.8        -73.8        -79.6        909.1         74.8

[[Page S 15329]]
                                                                                                                
1981..............................        678.2          6.7        -79.0        -85.7        994.8         95.5
1982..............................        745.8         14.5       -128.0       -142.5      1,137.3        117.2
1983..............................        808.4         26.6       -207.8       -234.4      1,371.7        128.7
1984..............................        851.8          7.6       -185.4       -193.0      1,564.7        153.9
1985..............................        946.4         40.6       -212.3       -252.9      1,817.6        178.9
1986..............................        990.3         81.8       -221.2       -303.0      2,120.6        190.3
1987..............................      1,003.0         75.7       -149.8       -225.5      2,346.1        195.3
1988..............................      1.064.1        100.0       -155.2       -255.2      2,601.3        214.1
1989..............................      1,143.2        114.2       -152.5       -266.7      2,868.0        240.9
1990..............................      1,252.7        117.2       -221.4       -338.6      3,206.6        264.7
1991..............................      1,323.8        122.7       -269.2       -391.9      3,598.5        285.5
1992..............................      1,380.9        113.2       -290.4       -403.6      4,002.1        292.3
1993..............................      1,408.2         94.2       -255.1       -349.3      4,351.4        292.5
1994..............................      1,460.6         89.1       -203.2       -292.3      4,643.7        296.3
1995..............................      1,518.0        121.9       -161.4       -283.3      4,927.0        336.0
1996 estimated....................      1,583.0        121.8       -189.3       -311.1      5,238.0        348.0
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Source: CBO's 1995 Economic and Budget Outlook: An Update, August 1995.                                         




                                                    Year 2002 (billion)
1996 Budget: Kasich Conf. Report, p. 3 (deficit)..................-$108
1996 Budget Outlays (CBO est.)....................................1,583
1995 Budget Outlays...............................................1,518
                                                             __________

      Increase spending.............................................+65
                                                               ==========
_______________________________________________________________________

CBO Baseline Assuming Budget Resolution:
  Outlays........................................................$1,874
  Revenues........................................................1,884
                                                               ==========
_______________________________________________________________________

This Assumes:
  (1) Discretionary Freeze Plus Additional Cuts (in 2002)..........-121
  (2) Other Spending Cuts (in 2002)................................-226
  (3) Using SS Trust Fund (in 2002)................................-109
                                                             __________

      Total reductions (in 2002)...................................-456
                                                               ==========
_______________________________________________________________________

  Mr. HOLLINGS. Since my time is limited here, let me just point out 
one thing. The interest costs are growing faster than the cuts. The 
interest costs on the gross debt are scheduled to total $348 billion 
for this fiscal year. That is almost $1 billion a day. In addition, 
over the 7-year period you know how much we use of Social Security, 
$636 billion. It is not a balanced budget, Mr. President, and it's high 
time we recognize this fact.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Carolina's time has 
expired.
  Mr. HOLLINGS. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. INHOFE addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.

                          ____________________