[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 30 (Thursday, March 7, 1996)]
[House]
[Page H1780]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      EXAMINING CORPORATE WELFARE

  (Mr. BASS asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. BASS. Mr. Speaker, in about an hour the House Committee on the 
Budget will begin its process of developing a new budget for fiscal 
year 1997. The hearings this morning will focus on the subject of so-
called corporate subsidies or corporate welfare. One of our witnesses 
defines corporate welfare as the use of Government authority to confer 
special benefits to specific firms or industries where there is no 
corresponding societal benefit. I am pleased to say that in the 
balanced budget or in the budget resolution, 1995, the Committee on the 
Budget identified over $95 billion worth of unnecessary spending on 
corporations.
  Mr. Speaker, I am going to be releasing today a GAO report to the 
Committee on the Budget which will outline over 25 different projects 
that we could undertake to reduce corporate spending or Government 
spending, unnecessary Government spending, on corporations. It is time, 
as we face the 1997 budget cycle, to look to individual responsibility, 
but also corporate responsibility, and I commend the Committee on the 
Budget for taking the lead in this process.

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