[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 48 (Tuesday, April 16, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H3391-H3392]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     TRAVEL AND TOURISM IN AMERICA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of May 
12, 1995, the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Roth] is recognized during 
morning business for 5 minutes.
  Mr. ROTH. Mr. Speaker, I congratulate the Speaker for the good job he 
is doing in the Chair.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Thank you sir. You are not doing so badly 
yourself.
  Mr. ROTH. Mr. Speaker, I am excited this morning. We now have 219 
cosponsors to the Travel and Tourism Partnership Act. That means that 
we have more than a majority of the Members in the U.S. House of 
Representatives that have signed onto this legislation, and it is only 
appropriate that it happened on April 15--tax day. That is the day the 
American people focus on how much it costs to run their Government.
  The American people know that travel and tourism is the second 
largest industry in America, and it is going to be the largest industry 
in America in only 4 years. What this means is that one out of every 
nine Americans who works, works in the travel and tourism industry.
  Travel and tourism has only one problem: The people in the industry 
do not know how powerful they are politically. So the people that work 
in travel and tourism, that work in our hotels, motels, and our 
restaurants, small businesses up and down Main Street, America, they 
work hard and they pay their taxes. They do not do a lot of screaming. 
So whenever a tax bill comes to pay for more and more taxes, the 
American Congress puts it on the hard-working people that work in 
travel and tourism. Because they are so

[[Page H3392]]

busy working, they do not have time to demonstrate.
  The American people ought to know that every household in America, 
because of the travel and tourism industry, pays $652 less in taxes. 
That is right. if you live and own a home anywhere in America, 
yesterday, on tax day, you paid $652 less in taxes because of this 
industry, because so many people are employed in this industry. The 
travel and tourism industry pays a total of $54 billion a year in 
taxes, and that benefits all Americans.
  What has this Congress done? This Congress has closed down the U.S. 
Travel and Tourism Administration. Travel and tourism is the second 
largest industry in America and we have stopped advertising. What 
does every small business person in America know? You have to do some 
advertising. But Congress said ``We are going to save a few dollars,'' 
being very myopic, ``and we are going to close down the U.S. Travel and 
Tourism Administration.''

  What I have done is introduce this legislation, and it does not cost 
1 dollar in taxes. With this legislation will have the Government and 
private industry, travel and tourism, working together to let the world 
know what we have got to offer right here in America.
  Every day we can see the benefits of travel and tourism. We had one 
of our Members here this morning talking about the environment and 
Earth Day. The money we spend on Earth Day, what will it do? It's just 
1 day, where people work on a project, and speak to the TV news in the 
evening; but the next day it is all forgotten.
  Not with travel and tourism. People in travel and tourism are 
environmentalists every day of the year. Why? It's their business. We 
want to have clean water. We want to have clean air. We want to make 
sure we have recreational areas for people to enjoy and to have a 
healthy environment: All of this means tourism.
  I think the U.S. Congress, Mr. Speaker, is waking up to that message, 
and that is why we have 219 cosponsors on this bill. Very few bills 
ever get that kind of support.
  But the flip side is we have 216 Members of Congress in the House who 
are not yet signed on. Do they not care about one out of every nine 
working people in America? I want the travel and tourism industry to 
contact these Members too. To let them know this is going to be an 
election issue, and that travel and tourism means jobs.
  There are three industries that jobs for the American people will 
come from the rest of this decade and into the 21st century. What are 
they? Telecommunications, information technology, and travel and 
tourism. These are the three great job-producers in America's future.
  So when we talk about travel and tourism, we are talking about an 
industry that is going to produce the jobs that our people need if we 
are going to have a strong economy.
  The U.S. Congress is not going to produce jobs. Travel and tourism 
produce jobs for one out of every nine working Americans. In only 4 
years, 661 million people will be traveling worldwide. Why is that 
important? Because that number of people will spend more than $585 
billion in the process. That is a lot of money to be added to the 
American economy.
  Mr. Speaker, our Travel and Tourism Caucus is the largest caucus in 
Congress--304 Members. I ask all Members to join this caucus, because 
travel and tourism is the wave of the future.

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