[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 74 (Thursday, May 23, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H5503-H5504]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
EMPLOYEE COMMUTING FLEXIBILITY ACT OF 1996
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The unfinished business is the further
consideration of the bill (H.R. 1227) to amend the Portal-to-Portal Act
of 1947 relating to the payment of wages to employees who use employer
owned vehicles.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the order of the House of
Wednesday, May 22, 1996, 1 hour of debate remains on the bill. The
gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Goodling] and the gentleman from
Missouri [Mr. Clay] will each control 30 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Goodling].
Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Since our gentle debate has strayed from the base bill, which is what
we were supposed to be debating for these 90 minutes, I suppose I will
join the crew and stray also.
I would say that from what I have heard thus far, it would appear
that we are following the big lie phenomena: ``If you tell the big lie
enough times, you will eventually begin to believe it yourself.'' And
then, ``If you tell it some more, you eventually get others to believe
it.''
If we have agreed, or do by the time the day is over, that we should
increase the minimum wage, then it seems to me it is time to turn our
attention to the whole idea of job loss and what that problem presents
to the most vulnerable, the unskilled, the poorly educated, the teens,
and the senior citizens.
Now, that gets us to the big lie issue, because we will hear over and
over again that raising the minimum wage does not cause unemployment or
does not remove the possibility that people with few skills and little
education have when they try to get a job. But yet we are told by the
Congressional Budget Office that a 90-cent increase could produce
unemployment losses from 100,000 to 500,000 people.
A 1995 study by the University of Michigan and an economist there
revealed that New Jersey's minimum wage increase led to a 4.6-percent
reduction in employment.
A 1995 report from the University of Chicago and Texas A&M University
found that with the last increase in the minimum wage, employment of
teenage males fell 5 percent while employment of teenage women fell 7
percent.
In 1978, the Minimum Wage Study Commission determined that for every
10 percent increase in the minimum wage, it results in a 1- to 3-
percent job loss for teenagers.
A 1995 study by economists from Ohio University found a link between
the
[[Page H5504]]
minimum wage increases and the recessions of 1990-91 and 1974-75.
Further, the study determined that higher unemployment rates during the
recession of 1990-91 and 1974-75 explained why, over the past two
decades, the poverty rate rose in the year after the completion of each
minimum wage increase.
So, again, I think it is time to stop indicating that there are no
problems for thousands of people in this country when we talk about a
minimum wage increase.
So what do we do about that? Well, we do the same thing we have done
every time we have had a minimum wage increase, we go back and do what
we can possibly do to make sure that those, in this case, 100,000 to
500,000, are not without employment. And so we look at those ways, as
we did in the past.
In the past we had a small business exemption. Well, when we talk
about a small business exemption we have to understand that every other
major workplace policy statute contains an exemption for our Nation's
smallest business. Consider the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It exempts
businesses with less than 15 employees. The Americans With Disabilities
Act exempts businesses with less than 15 employees. The Family and
Medical Leave Act exempts those with less than 50 employees.
The overwhelming majority of businesses who have $500,000 or less in
gross annual sales have 10 or less employees. They are a ma-and-pa
program. Virtually every Democrat Member of the House have supported
exemptions for our Nation's smallest businesses from a wide variety of
labor statutes. Remember ADA, FMLA and the Civil Rights Act?
Again, providing an exemption for small business is not a new
concept, many of its opponents today have supported that concept in the
past. So we look at that as one possibility to help those who may be
unemployed because of the increase.
We continue the tip credit provision which is in the present law; we
continue the present laws that relate to computer professionals; and we
reinstitute the opportunity wage, but this time we limit it to 90 days;
calendar days. We do not have two periods of 60 working days.
So I would hope as we proceed today that we spend a great deal of
time talking about facts rather than fantasies, and by the time we are
finished, hopefully, we will have helped all Americans, including that
100,000 to 500,000 that could find themselves in real difficulty if we
do not make some of the decisions that we have made in the past when
dealing with minimum wage increases.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. CLAY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from
New York [Mr. Schumer].
Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Missouri for
yielding me this time, and I rise to oppose strongly the Goodling
amendment and to talk about its effect on the underlying bill.
Today we were supposed to vote on a bill to increase the minimum wage
by 90 cents and to pay working families a living wage. We were going to
raise the minimum wage from its lowest level in 40 years. And what do
the American people wake to this morning? The Goodling surprise, an
amendment which says that any business with annual sales of under
$500,000 is exempted from the Fair Labor Standards Act.
In other words, if an individual happens to be one of the 10.5
million Americans who work in these small businesses, they do not have
to get paid overtime; they do not earn the minimum wage. Not the old
one or the new one.
In my region, the New York City metropolitan area, over 130,000
businesses will be exempt from fair labor laws and 200,000 workers will
be left unprotected.
The minimum wage vote should be called the Gingrich two-step. Take
one step forward by raising the minimum wage for some people, take two
giant steps back by exempting millions from overtime and minimum wage
laws all together.
Why must the GOP continue to gratuitously slap American workers? Why
did they break their promise to offer a clean minimum wage increase?
The only answer must be, as the gentleman from Texas, Majority Leader
Dick Armey, stated, that they oppose the minimum wage with every fiber
in their being, and they will raise it but they will exact their pound
of flesh from American workers.
This mean-spirited assault on those who work every day and barely eke
out a living wage is horrid. These people work in textiles, in retail,
on farms. They work hard, they deserve a raise, not to be punished
because the gentleman from Georgia, Newt Gingrich, will do anything to
keep minimum wage from happening.
Now, if the Goodling amendment passes, the President, thankfully, has
said he will veto the bill, and I am sure there is a little nefarious
plan out here: Goodling will pass, the President vetoes the bill,
nothing happens, and the Republicans say we have tried.
But let me assure my coleagues that from this side of the aisle,
until there is a minimum wage increase for all Americans, not one out
of two or one out of three, we will be on this floor every week and
every month to make sure that the minimum wage passes. The Republicans
cannot and will not avoid a clean minimum wage increase with this kind
of cheap trick.
Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I would remind the gentleman from New York
that unless we make some changes, New York will face a loss of 29,000
jobs.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Arkansas,
Congressman Hutchinson.
Mr. HUTCHINSON. Mr. Speaker, I just wonder where all of this passion
was 2 years ago when Democrats controlled this Chamber, controlled the
other Chamber and controlled the White House. Not once, not once, was a
minimum wage proposal brought up before the full House, before a
committee, or before a subcommittee. What we are seeing now is
rhetoric. What we are seeing is election year politics.
I rise to oppose increasing the minimum wage, not because I do not
want to help working Americans, but because I do want to help them. We
know, we know, that raising the minimum wage will kill jobs. It will
take opportunities away from those who we claim we want to help the
most.
I point to Melody Rane and her family who own two Burger King
franchises in Eureka, CA. A minimum wage hike will force her to lay off
four full-time and eight part-time workers at her stores. She will also
be forced to raise her prices, which will hurt everyone, especially the
working poor, whom we claim that we have compassion for.
According to Melody, raising the minimum wage will hurt teens more
than anyone else she employs because she will no longer be able to
provide entry-level jobs for them. The young people that she has hired
have not stayed on at minimum wage for very long. They learn their jobs
and they move up quickly. All her managers started at minimum wage and
her top manager today has been with them since he was 16 years old.
We know that raising the minimum wage is a job killer on the most
vulnerable people in our society. A 1993 study by the American
Economics Association of over 22,000 economists found that 77 percent
of them said that if we raise the minimum wage, there will be
significant job loss in our economy.
We know it is inflationary, because if they do not lay them off, they
have to raise the price of their goods and services, and that
disproportionately impacts poor people who are going to have to pay
more for those products that they buy.
Raising the minimum wage is the poorest way to target working poor
people. The last time we raised the minimum wage, in 1991, only 17
percent of the new benefits went to people living below the poverty
line. Most of them are teenagers living at home with mom and dad. Only
17 percent went to those who are working poor.
Now, I suggest to my colleagues that there is a better way. If we
really care about working poor people, there is a better way to do it.
I propose that we reform and we refocus and we retarget the earned
income tax credit, a program that has enjoyed support from the 1970's
on from both sides of the aisle.
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