[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 46 (Thursday, April 23, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H2299-H2300]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       PUT SOCIAL SECURITY FIRST

  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, I think it is reasonable to carry 
on the discussion of what has happened in the last 5 years. I was 
elected, and my first year in Congress was 1993. In that year we had a 
deficit under the unified budget of $322 billion. In the next, that 
year for the budget for 1994, President Clinton sent us a budget with a 
deficit of $265 billion, a deficit in terms of a unified budget.
  So it was not only on the $265 billion that we were short, it was 
also what we were short borrowing from the Social Security Trust Fund 
and the other trust funds of this country.
  I think, number one, we have got to start being very honest with the 
American people of what has happened. When the Republicans took the 
majority of this House in 1995, we changed the budget and started 
rescissions and started cutting down spending, getting rid of one-third 
of the staff in this Congress, cutting out committees, cutting out up 
to 200 different agencies and departments and divisions to try to reach 
a balanced budget.
  The Republicans really were demagogued in that election that 
eventually followed because we were doing all sorts of budget cuts, 
cutting down on the spending of the Federal Government in order to get 
a balanced budget.
  We ended up winning. We ended up in the spring of 1996 sending a 
reconciliation bill to the President saying the

[[Page H2300]]

operational budget, to keep government open, to keep it operating, is 
not going to go into effect, Mr. President, unless you send Congress a 
balanced budget.
  Finally, the President did send Congress a balanced budget, and now 
we have moved ahead. We have reframed the debate in Washington, D.C. so 
both sides of the aisle are now saying, great, we need a balanced 
budget. Let us be more frugal in our spending.
  We have come a long ways, but we have still got a long ways to go. We 
have got a long ways to go because we are still borrowing the money 
that is coming in surplus from the Social Security Trust Fund to use 
for other government spending, and that has got to stop.
  Here is my proposal of how we stop it. I introduced the only Social 
Security bill that has been introduced in the last session of Congress 
three years ago and again this session that has been scored by the 
Social Security Administration to keep Social Security solvent. So if 
we really want to put Social Security first, let us stop talking about 
it and start doing it.
  Now that we are looking at a surplus in terms of the unified budget 
that is coming in this year, and the estimates are as high now as a $40 
to $50 billion surplus. Let us start taking that surplus money and 
allowing workers in this country to have their own personal retirement 
savings account that will partially offset their fixed benefits and 
Social Security eventually when they are ready to retire.
  But giving these workers some of this surplus money that is coming 
in, which is, after all, overtaxation, allowing them to see the 
creation of wealth, allowing them to see the magic of compounding 
interest where our money can double every 4 or 6, 8 years; and when we 
are ready for retirement at age 65, we are going to see much more money 
in those funds.
  So with even a partial offset, in my bill that I call for using these 
surplus monies to beef up Social Security, to start down the road of 
solvency, I am suggesting that for each $2 these people earn in the 
investment market of limited investments, of so-called safe 
investments, for every $2 they earn there be a $1 offset in their 
Social Security benefits, so there is really a safety net.
  But what we have got to do is make sure that existing retirees 
continue to have the benefits that have been promised to them, but at 
the same time we make provisions that our kids and our grandkids and 
our kids' grandkids and great-grandkids can have an opportunity to have 
even more revenue returns in their retirement years.
  Look, we have got a demographic situation where there are fewer 
workers paying in their FICA taxes to more and more retirees. When we 
started out in 1935 we had an average age life-span of 62 years old. 
That meant most people that paid into Social Security all their working 
life never received any benefits.
  Now the average age of mortality, the life-span today at birth is 74 
years old for a male, 76 years old for a female. But if we live to be 
65 years old, then on the average we are going to live another 20 
years. Let us get at it. Let us really put Social Security first.

                          ____________________