[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 15 (Wednesday, February 16, 2000)]
[House]
[Page H461]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                ACTION NEEDED NOW ON PRESCRIPTION DRUGS

  (Mr. TIERNEY asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. TIERNEY. Mr. Speaker, today we have heard all stories from our 
constituents who have to choose between medication and food or rent. We 
all know that by paying higher prices than individuals anywhere else in 
the world, Americans are subsidizing the drugs that benefit others. We 
know that private prescription drug expenditures have been growing at a 
rate of 17 percent a year.
  We do not deny the drug manufacturers, who enjoy the highest profits 
of any industry profits of any industry, engage in important, sometimes 
life-saving research that should be encouraged. But the burden should 
not be on the elderly and those least able to afford it.
  Let us clear up one misconception now: H.R. 664 does not mandate 
price controls, but uses market forces such as volume buying.
  The United States makes large public commitments to drug research 
already, through taxes and the National Institutes of Health research 
money. While companies in the United States generally face an effective 
taxation rate of about 27 percent, drug companies, through generous tax 
credits and benefits, were effectively taxed at roughly 16 percent. 
Financial encouragement of research should not be eliminated and would 
not be under the legislation we seek to bring to the floor.
  During the 1984 Waxman-Hatch Act effort and the 1990 Medicaid debate, 
drug companies complained they would have to cut research, yet they 
subsequently contradicted themselves by expanding it instead. We merely 
seek to strike some balance. With the many public benefits received by 
the drug companies also comes some social responsibility.

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