[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 104 (Tuesday, July 22, 1997)]
[House]
[Pages H5565-H5566]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  2355
               THE BIPARTISAN BUDGET CONTROL ACT OF 1997

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Shimkus). Under a previous order of the 
House, the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Barton] is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, tomorrow we are going to have 
before the floor of the House of Representatives an historic piece of 
legislation, H.R. 2003, which is the Bipartisan Budget Enforcement Act 
of 1997. This piece of legislation is dedicated to the premise that 
whatever the budget agreement ultimately turns out to be, it has to 
have enforcement to actually result in a balanced budget by the year 
2002.
  If we look back 25 years ago to 1975, we can see that the blue area 
in this pie chart shows that well over 55 percent of the Federal budget 
was discretionary. That means that it was controlled by the Congress on 
an annual basis by the appropriators in both the House and Senate. We 
had about 7 percent interest on the debt, which was the red part of 
this pie chart. And then mandatory or entitlement spending was the 
balance, which was about 38 percent.
  If we fast forward to the year that we are in now, fiscal year 1997, 
we can see that 51 percent is entitlement spending, we have 15 percent 
that is interest on the debt, and the discretionary part of the budget 
is now down to around 34 percent. If we go to the last year of the 
budget agreement, which is 5 years from now, fiscal year 2002, the 
picture is even worse. The interest on the debt is up to 14 percent. 
Entitlement spending is at 58 percent. So we are at 74 percent 
uncontrollable spending.
  We cannot have a budget agreement that actually results in a balanced 
budget if three-fourths of the budget is uncontrollable. So what we 
have done on a bipartisan basis is come up with a piece of legislation 
that says let us take the numbers that are agreed to by the President 
and the Congress and enforce them on the spending.
  On the spending side, every program would have a cap. Under current 
law, only discretionary spending has a cap. So we apply the caps to the 
entitlement portion of the budget. On the revenue side, we take the 
revenue numbers that are in the budget for tax revenues and make those 
goals. After the first year of the agreement, in fiscal year 1998, if 
the revenue numbers are not up to what they are supposed to be, under 
the agreement we would delay on a contingent basis next year's tax cut.
  If spending goes beyond caps, we give the President and Congress 
three options. They can vote to waive the cap. They can vote to change 
the program so that it actually comes within the cap. Or if they vote 
to do nothing; instead of the deficit going up, there is sequestration 
by program that brings the spending back under control.
  If you look at the ratio in the current budget agreement, entitlement 
spending, which is the blue bar, versus the tax cuts in the bill, which 
is the red bar, it is a ratio of about 50-to-1. About $900 billion in 
entitlement spending the first year of the agreement, and we have about 
$10 billion in tax cuts. We can see each year the tax cuts get 
marginally larger, $12 million, $15 billion, $20 billion. But the 
entitlement spending continues to go up. So it is over a trillion 
dollars fiscal year 2001.
  So by putting $85 billion over 5 years on a net basis in tax cuts on 
the table, we get entitlement caps on $5 trillion of entitlement 
spending. That is a 50-to-1 trade-off. We think that is a tremendous 
agreement. If we look at what the entitlement programs are, these are 
the top 11 entitlement programs, they have grown at an average of over 
9 percent in the last 6 years. Some of

[[Page H5566]]

them, like the Medicaid program, has grown 16 percent. In the budget 
agreement, they grow at an average of over 7 percent. Medicaid 
continues to grow at over 9 percent.
  So we are letting the entitlement programs grow. We are talking the 
numbers that the President and congressional leadership have agreed but 
we simply say those are caps and you cannot go over those numbers 
unless the Congress votes to waive the cap.
  So I would hope that tomorrow, on a bipartisan basis, with the 
gentleman from Minnesota [Mr. Minge] and the gentleman from Texas [Mr. 
Stenholm] and the gentleman from Tennessee [Mr. Tanner] on the 
Democratic side leading the effort, myself, the gentleman from 
Washington [Mr. Metcalf] and the gentleman from Tennessee [Mr. Wamp] on 
the Republican side, that we would vote to include enforcement in the 
budget agreement that is pending before the House and the Senate.

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