[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 5 (Tuesday, February 3, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H107-H108]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




              LEGISLATION TO KEEP SOCIAL SECURITY SOLVENT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Smith) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. SMITH of Michigan. Mr. Speaker, thank you very much. As you well 
know, Mr. Speaker, the Committee on the Budget for the last 3 hours has 
been meeting, talking to Mr. Raines, the Director of the Office of 
Management and Budget. My concern and what I noted to Mr. Raines was 
the fact that Social Security is in jeopardy.
  I have introduced the only bill in this U.S. House of Representatives 
that has now been scored by the Social Security Administration to keep 
Social Security solvent, so I applauded the President when he suggested 
that we put Social Security first. However, as I said to Mr. Raines, in 
examining the budget that was delivered yesterday, Social Security was 
not put first. Social Security was put ninth, not first.
  And I explained the problem of the expanded spending in this budget, 
where ahead of Social Security was an expanded Medicare program; ahead 
of Social Security was the high cost of this global warming agreement; 
ahead of Social Security was $37 billion expanded role for government 
in education, where Washington is going to decide more of the decisions 
and pass more regulations as they pass through that money back to local 
communities; ahead of Social Security was new penalties for moms who 
stay at home to

[[Page H108]]

take care of their kids with a $21 billion program of government 
getting into the baby-sitting business; expanded welfare programs were 
there; infusing $18 billion into the International Monetary Fund, the 
IMF; the budget created or expanded $39 billion worth of new or 
expanded entitlement programs. Social Security was definitely not put 
first.
  In the budget was roughly $102 billion of increased taxes, another 
$23 billion of increased fees, which one could almost consider taxes 
because eventually they are going to be passed on to the consumer. My 
question to Mr. Raines was, would he consider taking whatever increased 
revenues was projected and not spending it on these new expanded ``make 
government bigger and more powerful'' programs and put all that surplus 
into Social Security? And he reacted that, no, they thought they had 
the correct balance.
  I think, Mr. Speaker, that we should change the definition of what a 
balanced budget is. We are hoodwinking the American people in 
pretending there is a balanced budget, because there is not. If you 
look in this book of part of the budget, the historical tables, on page 
111, we talk about what happens to the national debt of this country, 
the Federal debt of this country. The Federal debt in this budget is 
going up between $100 billion and $200 billion every year for the next 
5 years. I personally think that a reasonable definition for a balanced 
budget is when we stop increasing the national debt.
  And the justification is, and it is not just the President, it has 
been Congress, too, that says, look, we are defining a balanced budget 
as everything that comes into budget. But everybody should understand 
what government is doing is overtaxing workers today because there is 
more money coming in in the Social Security tax than is needed to pay 
out immediately for benefits. And the Federal Government is taking that 
money, not only spending it for other social programs but they are 
taking that money and considering it is balancing the budget.
  That should not be the way, Mr. Speaker. We need to start being more 
honest with the American people. In this budget we should be looking at 
how we reduce the overall size of government and not, as suggested in 
this government, in this budget, that we have another $102 billion of 
taxes, or a total of $129 billion of taxes if you include the fee 
increases that are going to be put on the American people. We should 
not increase those taxes to expand government.
  We should put Social Security first. I agree with the President. Let 
us not expand government at a time that we have these huge challenges 
of saving Social Security and saving Medicare.

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