[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 138 (Monday, September 30, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Pages S11825-S11828]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




         THE CLINTON RECORD AND SENATOR DOLE'S ECONOMIC AGENDA

  Mr. CONRAD. Madam President, we have now come to what may be the last 
day of the congressional session. Perhaps it will take another day or 
two for Congress to adjourn.
  I would just like to observe that this is what we have been handed on 
the final day. I do not know how many pages are here. I assume it is at 
least a thousand pages. We are handed this massive bill--that few of us 
have seen--because once again Congress has failed to do its job on 
time.
  Here we are on the eve of the next fiscal year, and six 
appropriations bills have to be rolled into one in order to prevent a 
shutdown of Government. Madam President, this is not the way to do 
business. I doubt there are very many Members who have any idea what is 
in this omnibus consolidated appropriations bill. I certainly do not.
  We got this stack this morning. We are going to vote, they tell us, 
sometime this evening. You know, I am a pretty fast reader, but I do 
not think I can get this job done in time to make any kind of reasoned 
judgment on what is included. This is not the way we ought to do our 
business.
  Madam President, it does seem to me to be an appropriate time to 
review the record of what has happened over the last several years. I 
would just like to start with the question of deficit reduction, 
because we hear a lot of talk about who is conservative and who is not 
conservative. Frankly, I do not think it matters so much who is 
liberal, who is conservative; I think what the American people are 
interested in is who gets results, because that is at the end of the 
day what really matters.
  If we look at our last three Presidents on the question of the 
deficits, the results are now very clear. We look back to 1981, 
President Reagan inherited a deficit of about $79 billion. Very quickly 
the deficit skyrocketed to over $200 billion, and it was stuck at that 
figure for most of his term. At the end of President Reagan's term we 
saw some slight improvement, but still the deficit was about twice as 
high as the deficit he had inherited. So it is not surprising that the 
American debt grew dramatically during those years.
  Then, of course, came the Bush administration. President Bush 
inherited a deficit of $153 billion, and it promptly went out of 
control. In the last year of the Bush Presidency, the deficit was up to 
$290 billion.
  Then President Clinton came in, and in each and every year of the 
Clinton administration, the deficit has gone down; $255 billion the 
first year, down to $116 billion this year. So the President has done 
an outstanding job of deficit reduction.
  Some have said, ``Well, he doesn't really deserve any credit.'' It is 
interesting to look at what an impartial observer says. The head of the 
Federal Reserve, Chairman Greenspan, says the deficit reduction in 
President Clinton's 1993 economic plan was ``an unquestioned factor in 
contributing to the improvement in economic activity that occurred 
thereafter.'' Certainly Mr. Greenspan is correct.
  We passed in 1993 an economic plan that cut spending and that raised 
revenue, and that in combination reduced the budget deficit. Because 
the deficit was coming down, interest rates came down, and economic 
activity increased. Mr. Greenspan says that plan was ``an unquestioned 
factor in contributing to the improvement in economic activity that 
occurred thereafter.''
  Perhaps this is an appropriate time to start looking at the record. 
What did happen? Well, one of the things we often talk about is the 
misery index. The misery index is a measure of unemployment and 
inflation.
  Look what has happened to the misery index over the last 28 years. We 
have the lowest misery index now, after 4 years of the Clinton 
administration, the lowest misery index in 28 years.
  The good news does not stop there. We have also seen strong economic 
growth under the Clinton administration. Real private-sector economic 
growth, under the Bush administration, averaged 1.3 percent. Under the 
Clinton administration, real private-sector GDP growth has averaged 3.2 
percent; a very good record and a dramatic improvement over what we 
have seen previously.
  Real business fixed investment. I think one of the best measures of 
whether an economic plan is successful is what happens to real business 
fixed investment. We can see that under President Clinton, we have the 
best rate of increase in real business fixed investment of any 
President since World War II. If we look at the last 4 years--since the 
Clinton administration took control, since we passed the 1993 economic 
plan--we see a dramatic increase in business fixed investment, in fact, 
the best record that we have seen in decades.
  President Clinton delivered on his promise to reduce the deficit--we 
can all recall he said he would cut it in half. It was $290 billion in 
the year before he took office. He has more than met that promise. He 
has reduced the deficit to $116 billion, a 60-percent reduction.
  That is not the only promise he has delivered on with his economic 
plan. He said his plan would deliver 8 million new jobs. But instead, 
we now have over 10 million new jobs created during the Clinton 
administration.
  Let me just turn to one other matter because unemployment is also a 
very significant measuring point as to how well an economic plan is 
doing.
  Back in December 1992, before Bill Clinton came into office, the 
unemployment rate in this country was 7.3

[[Page S11826]]

percent--7.3 percent. In June of this year it was down to 5.3 percent, 
a dramatic reduction in unemployment. In fact, we now know the 
unemployment rate fell to 5.1 percent in August 1996. That is the 
lowest level of unemployment that we have had in 7 years.
  Last week we got more good news with respect to what was happening in 
the economy. The Census Bureau issued its analysis of what has been 
occurring. What we found is that incomes have been going up and poverty 
has been coming down, another good measure of whether or not an 
economic plan is working. In fact, what we saw was that median 
household income is up the largest increase in a decade.
  We saw the largest decline in income inequality in 27 years.
  We saw 1.6 million fewer people in poverty, the largest drop in 27 
years.
  We saw the poverty rate for elderly Americans at 10.5 percent, its 
lowest level ever, lowest level ever in terms of the number of elderly 
living in poverty; again, I think a good measure of how well this 
Clinton economic plan has worked.
  I might say, I was proud to have voted for that plan. We had a tie 
vote here in the U.S. Senate, broken by a vote of the Vice President of 
the United States. Our friends on the other side of the aisle said this 
economic plan, the results of which I have just reported on, would 
crater the economy. That was their commentary at the time. They said it 
would increase the deficit. They said it would increase interest rates. 
They said it would increase unemployment. They were wrong on every 
count. They were wrong on every single count.
  Madam President, we have seen the results of the Clinton economic 
plan. I think that raises the question of what would the Dole economic 
plan do?
  Senator Dole, running for President, has said that he has a plan, and 
the cornerstone of that plan is a $550 billion tax cut. I thought, in 
order to put in perspective what the Dole plan is likely to do, that we 
ought to look ahead to the next 6 years, because his plan covers the 
next 6 years.
  It is very interesting. If one looks at what we are facing in the 
next 6 years, from 1997 to 2002, this is the projected spending of the 
United States under current law. We would spend $11.3 trillion. But 
this is our income. Our income is only $9.9 trillion. So we are going 
to be adding $1.4 trillion to the national debt--debt held by the 
public.
  The first thing Senator Dole says we ought to do is cut the revenue 
another $550 billion, reducing it to $9.4 trillion. So, now the gap 
between income and outgo is bigger. He is digging the hole deeper 
before he starts filling it in. He is adding to the debt. That is going 
in precisely the wrong direction.
  If one looks at what is necessary for an economic plan to add up, one 
finds the following: We would need $584 billion of spending cuts 
necessary to balance the unified budget. That includes all spending and 
all revenues--that is the unified budget. That includes the Social 
Security surpluses that we are scheduled to run over the next 6 years. 
So we would need $584 billion of spending cuts in order to balance the 
unified budget. But Senator Dole says he wants a $551 billion tax cut. 
So now we would need $1.1 trillion of cuts in order to balance the 
unified budget and prevent adding to the debt held by the public over 
this next 6-year period.
  It does not stop there. Senator Dole's plan assumes that he is going 
to count all of the Social Security surpluses over the next 6 years to 
help balance the budget. That is $525 billion of Social Security 
surpluses. Now, if we were really going to honestly balance this 
budget, we would need the $584 billion of spending cuts just to balance 
the unified budget, then we need the $551 billion to cover his tax cut 
so we do not add to the debt, then we need another $525 billion so that 
we are not raiding the Social Security trust funds. So now we need $1.6 
trillion in spending cuts.
  Madam President, we will look at what Senator Dole is proposing and 
see if he meets those tests. Does he come up with $1.1 trillion of cuts 
to prevent adding to the debt with his tax cut? Or does he honestly 
balance with $1.6 trillion of cuts necessary to prevent raiding the 
Social Security trust fund? What are the cuts he has come up with? Has 
he come up with anything close to $1.1 trillion to prevent adding to 
the debt to cover his tax cut, or to really do the job and have $1.6 
trillion of cuts to prevent raiding the Social Security trust fund?
  Here is the spending that is outlined over the next 6 years under 
current law. Social Security, $2.1 trillion, about 20 percent of 
projected spending over the next 6 years. Interest on the debt, nearly 
as much, $2 trillion. Defense, $1.7 trillion. Of course, Senator Dole 
says defense is off the table. He will not cut defense, he will not cut 
Social Security. Medicare is $1.6 trillion projected over the next 6 
years. Medicaid, almost $1 trillion over the next 6 years. Other 
entitlements--student loans, food stamps, child nutrition--those are 
other entitlements. Then we have nondefense discretionary, which is 
$1.7 trillion over the next 6 years. Nondefense discretionary is roads, 
bridges, law enforcement, jails, parks--all of that is in nondefense 
discretionary.
  Now, we will look for a moment at whether or not Senator Dole's plan 
adds up. Taking the savings he has talked about, he said he will take a 
sliver out of the $1.6 trillion of Medicare, and he has that savings of 
$158 billion. So that is in the cookie jar. We will see when we are 
done if he has $1.1 trillion of cuts or the $1.6 trillion necessary to 
prevent raiding the Social Security trust fund. We have so far in the 
cookie jar $158 billion of Medicare cuts. He says on Medicaid, he will 
take a sliver out of that, which is the equivalent to $72 billion, and 
we will put that down and it is in the cookie jar. That is $72 billion 
of Medicaid cuts. He also says he will take a chunk out of other 
entitlements, which is right here. He will take a chunk out of this 
spending category. And, again, he is talking about $124 billion of 
other entitlements--again, that is child nutrition and a number of 
other areas we have talked about, including food stamps, Federal 
retirement, student loans. He has $124 billion there. We will put that 
in the cookie jar. Then he says he will cut nondefense discretionary. 
That is one of his biggest cuts, nondefense discretionary. He has $300 
billion that we can put in the cookie jar out of nondefense 
discretionary spending.

  What is nondefense discretionary spending? That is an area in which 
we are projected to spend $1.7 trillion over the next 6 years. He has 
$300 billion in cuts out of that category. That is roads, bridges, 
airports, education, law enforcement. That is the biggest place he is 
cutting.
  Does that make sense? Is that where we want to cut in this country--
education, roads, bridges, airports, law enforcement? Well, Senator 
Dole says cut that $300 billion. He is not done yet because he also has 
some interest savings, a little sliver of interest savings. That is $50 
billion of interest savings.
  Then Senator Dole sees he is nowhere close to adding up so he goes 
back to the spending pie and he says, ``I have to take some more out of 
`other entitlements.' I have to take some more out of child nutrition, 
student loans. I have to take some more out of Federal retirement.'' So 
he comes up with another $66 billion of other entitlements. But still 
he is nowhere close to adding up. He is at about $750 billion so far, 
so he is way short of adding up to the $1.1 trillion necessary to keep 
from adding to the debt to finance his tax cuts. So he is way short.
  What he does is go back to nondefense discretionary spending again, 
hits that again. Education, roads, bridges, airports, law enforcement, 
environmental protection. He says take another $150 billion out of that 
category and put it in the cookie jar.
  Now, one can see he is drastically cutting this category of spending. 
Senator Dole started with $302 billion in nondefense discretionary 
cuts, and then he took another $150 billion out of this category. So he 
is up to $450 billion out of nondefense discretionary spending, which 
is $1.7 trillion to begin with. We are talking about cutting education, 
roads, bridges, airports, law enforcement, and jails by 30 percent in 
the Dole economic plan. But still it does not add up. Still it does not 
add up. If you add up all of what he has talked about cutting, he is 
just over $900 billion. And we showed on the previous chart that you 
need $1.1 trillion in cuts in order to prevent adding to the debt 
because of his tax cut. And you need $1.6 trillion of cuts if you are 
going to avoid raiding the Social Security trust fund.

[[Page S11827]]

  So if $1.1 trillion is the test, Senator Dole has a $200 billion gap 
here in terms of spending cuts. Even with that, he has taken huge 
chunks out of education, roads, bridges, airports, law enforcement. He 
says he is going to be tough on law enforcement, but he takes 30 
percent of the money that we are projected to spend over the next 6 
years out of the category that law enforcement spending comes from. If 
he is not going to cut law enforcement as much, he is going to have to 
cut education more. He is going to have to cut roads more or airports 
or bridges more. Still he is nowhere close to adding up.
  Madam President, it just seems to me that the Dole plan is at least 
$200 billion short of adding up, and that even assumes that Senator 
Dole is going to use all $525 billion of Social Security surpluses.
  Well, it doesn't take an awful lot of mathematical calculation to 
figure out the problem. We remember the last budget that was offered by 
his party had $245 billion of tax cuts, and in order to help finance 
that, they had $163 billion in reductions to Medicaid. All you have to 
do to reality test here is ask what would be the Medicaid cuts 
necessary to finance the bigger Dole tax cut? Because instead of a $245 
billion tax cut, he is now talking about a $550 billion tax cut. How 
big would the Medicaid cuts have to be? They were $163 billion to 
accommodate a $245 billion tax cut. How big would they have to be to 
accommodate a $550 billion tax cut?
  Domestic discretionary spending. The same way. Under the previous 
Republican budget, they had $245 billion of tax cuts. They had domestic 
discretionary cuts of $440 billion. In order to accommodate the tax cut 
and move toward a balanced budget, how big would those domestic 
discretionary cuts have to be to accommodate a $550 billion tax cut?
  The same question can be raised about Medicare. Medicare, they 
proposed reducing $270 billion. I know some say, well, it is not a cut. 
Well, how did they save $270 billion if it is not a cut? How did they 
save $270 billion if they didn't cut anything? Of course, they cut 
something. They cut from what current law provides. Why? Because they 
needed to accommodate their $245 billion tax cut and move toward a 
balanced budget. How big would the Medicare cuts have to be if you are 
going to have a $550 billion tax cut instead of a $245 billion tax cut? 
Obviously, something has to give here. Either the cuts have to be much 
deeper, or the Dole plan is actually going to add to the deficit, add 
to the debt. That would be a profound mistake, in my judgment.
  Senator Dole has said Social Security is off the table. Is it really? 
Is it really off the table? I showed the chart that indicated in his 
plan he is counting on using $525 billion of Social Security surpluses 
in the next 6 years in order to help move toward balance. Very 
interesting. Madam President, $525 billion out of Social Security 
surpluses and a $550 billion tax cut. Does that make any sense? Does it 
make sense to take every penny of Social Security surplus and turn 
right around and give it out in terms of a tax cut--a tax cut that 
disproportionately goes to the wealthiest among us?
  You know, we hear that claim made. What is the evidence? So I had 
this chart prepared. The Dole tax cuts--who benefits? Who are the big 
winners? This looks at all of his tax cut plans put together. If you 
are in the under $10,000 a year category of income, and 19 percent of 
American families are in that category, you get $5 on average. If you 
are in the $10,000 to $20,000 a year category, that is 21 percent of 
the American people, you get $120 a year, $10 a month, on average. If 
you are in the $20,000 to $30,000 category, about 16 percent of the 
American people, you get $400 a year, about $30 a month, on average. 
Look at the top end here. The top 1 percent of the American people. 
Those earning over $200,000 a year. What do they get? Well, they get 
the cake. They get, on average, $25,000 a year of tax reduction. Madam 
President, $25,000 a year of tax reduction.

  So if you are in the 50 percent of the American people that have less 
than $30,000 a year of income, you are going to get anywhere from $5 a 
year to $30 a month, on average, at the top end of that scale. But if 
you are up here and you earn over $200,000 a year, you are going to get 
a $25,000 reduction, on average. Is that fair? Does that make any 
sense? Does it make any sense to add to the debt, add to the deficits, 
so we can give a $25,000 a year tax break to the top 1 percent, who 
earn over $200,000 a year? Is that what we ought to do in this country? 
Does that make sense?
  Does it make sense to take $525 billion of Social Security 
surpluses--money we are going to need to get ready for when the baby 
boom generation retires, and give it all out in a tax cut, the vast 
majority of which goes to people earning over $200,000 a year? Does 
that make any sense? Does it make any sense to propose a plan that has 
$900 billion in spending cuts, when you need at least $1.1 trillion of 
spending cuts to accommodate Senator Dole's tax cut and not add to the 
debt? And you would need $1.6 trillion of spending cuts not to raid the 
Social Security trust fund. And he only comes up with $900 billion of 
cuts. The cuts he has come up with come out of nondefense discretionary 
spending. He is cutting that category 30 percent, even though his plan 
doesn't add up. The part that he is really hammering is education, 
roads, bridges, airports, law enforcement, jail construction. Does that 
make any sense for America's future?
  Madam President, when one looks at where the money is going over the 
next 6 years, it is very interesting. Defense spending $1.7 trillion. 
Social Security $2.1 trillion. Interest on the debt $2 trillion. 
Medicare $1.6 trillion. Medicaid just under $1 trillion. This is where 
the money is going. Other entitlements--that is child nutrition, 
student loans, that is food stamps, and nondefense discretionary, $1.7 
trillion, as I have said. That is education, roads, bridges, airports, 
law enforcement.
  I just think we have to ask ourselves: What works? What do we know 
works? We know, based on the evidence I provided earlier, that the 
Clinton economic plan that we passed in 1993 has worked. It is 
undeniable. Four years in a row of deficit reduction. Let us go back to 
the chart that we began with. I think it is a good place to end. We 
know what works. The plan that we passed in 1993 reduced the deficit 
every year for 4 years in a row. More than a 60 percent reduction. We 
need to stay on that course, because we face the demographic time bomb 
of the baby boom generation. When they retire, the demands on Federal 
programs are going to explode. That is why we need to stay on this 
course of deficit reduction. It is one reason that this course of 
deficit reduction that is paid off so handsomely. Not only have we 
reduced the deficit but unemployment got reduced.
  All of the things that you would like to see going up are going up. 
Jobs are going up. Income is going up. Business investment is going up. 
The things you would like to see going down are going down. Poverty is 
going down. Unemployment is going down. The deficit is going down.
  This is a plan that has worked. And I believe it would be a profound 
mistake to go in this direction--this radical direction--that Senator 
Dole has prescribed that clearly doesn't add up. Either he is going to 
have much bigger cuts in things like education, Medicare, Medicaid, 
roads, or bridges that he has already outlined--and he has already 
outlined massive cuts in those areas--or he is going to absolutely 
explode this deficit. And that would be a profound mistake for this 
country's future.
  I hope over the coming weeks that we in this country will have a 
serious national debate about these issues because this is critical to 
America's future. We have a chance to stay on course. We have an 
opportunity to keep moving this country in the right direction. I very 
much hope that, as we go through these last 5 weeks of the political 
campaign, that the American people will keep in mind the progress that 
has been made. We have made important progress--strengthening our 
national economy. We cannot go back to a failed policy that put this 
country in the ditch once before, that exploded the deficits, that 
exploded the debt, and that weakened America; that put us in a 
condition of economic decline against our competitors. That would be a 
tragedy.
  Hopefully, we have learned from our failures of the past and the more 
recent

[[Page S11828]]

successes that we have enjoyed since the Clinton economic plan was 
passed.
  I thank the Chair.
  I yield the floor.
  I note the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak in 
morning business for 10 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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