[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 29 (Wednesday, March 7, 2001)]
[House]
[Pages H734-H738]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




          SO-CALLED ECONOMIC GROWTH AND TAX RELIEF ACT OF 2001

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Graves). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 3, 2001, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Turner) is 
recognized for 41 minutes.
  Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, it has been a pleasure to hear the gentleman 
from Colorado express his points of view, and I believe there are many 
areas where we find common ground, particularly in the commitment to 
try to hold down the level of government spending. I think we share a 
commitment to reducing the Federal debt, although I think the Blue Dogs 
have a more aggressive debt repayment schedule than does the President 
under his budget plan.
  I notice that the gentleman from Colorado started off his remarks 
tonight talking about fear, and I picked up, during the gentleman from 
Colorado's presentation, a little fear expressed on his part, one that 
I think is shared by many Members of Congress and perhaps drives some 
of the actions that we see taking place here; and that fear that was 
expressed by the gentleman was the fear that we might continue to have 
greater government spending and for that reason we need to pass a tax 
cut before a budget I believe I heard the gentleman say.

                              {time}  2320

  I would simply suggest to the gentleman that under the budget act 
that this Congress is governed by, we have, by law, said that the 
process that we will follow is to pass a concurrent budget resolution 
before we consider taxes and spending programs. So even though it may 
be a fear that if we do not do the tax cut first we will have greater 
spending later, the current law says that we should do it just the 
opposite.
  Now, I also would add that I think it is important for us to 
understand that simply having the fear of greater spending if we do not 
have a tax cut really historically has not proven to be very 
successful. Because during the early 1980s, when the Reagan tax cuts 
went into place, we also found that the Congress and the President 
decided to increase spending, particularly on national defense. And the 
largest deficits occurred during those years when we were both cutting 
taxes and increasing spending on defense. So, unfortunately, though it 
is a worthy objective to say that if we simply cut taxes first we will 
reduce spending, the truth is Congress has not chosen to follow that 
pattern.
  In fact, we accumulated over 30 years a $5.6 trillion national debt, 
because for 30 years straight the Congress and the Presidents that 
served during that time always spent more money every year than they 
took in. So the choice, when we do not have money coming in to the 
Treasury, is twofold: we can cut spending or we can go back in to 
deficit spending. And the pattern has been more the latter than the 
former.
  Mr. McINNIS. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. TURNER. I yield to the gentleman from Colorado.
  Mr. McINNIS. Mr. Speaker, I will let the gentleman finish, but I 
wanted to comment just very briefly because I think there is a little 
confusion here.
  I am not for putting forth the proposition that by giving a tax cut 
would reduce spending. What I am saying is that at least in my tenure 
on this floor, that if we do not allocate those funds for a tax cut, 
those funds will be consumed in the budget negotiations that take place 
here.
  Obviously, I think the President himself has said spending will 
increase at a rate of 4 percent. It may come in a little above that. I 
am saying at this point, if we are really going to have a tax cut, we 
better reserve those dollars. I happen to believe that my colleagues in 
the Blue Dogs would stand by for that tax cut, but there are a number 
of people on both sides of the aisle who would like to expend those 
funds.
  And then I would like to address the other gentleman from Texas. I am 
completely in agreement with him on Social Security. On an actuarial 
basis, they are bankrupt. On a cash-flow basis, there is a lot of 
excess cash coming in. As we know, the reason on an actuarial basis 
that we are bankrupt is because the typical couple pulls out $118,000 
more than they put in. I do not disagree with the gentleman at all in 
that regard.
  I do have questions and issues of debate as to whether or not we have 
a double factor in there and look forward to future discussions. I 
intend to yield back to the gentleman and to not come back to the 
microphone. I thank my colleague for the courtesy.
  Mr. TURNER. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman 
for his remarks, and again we commend him on his presentation. I really 
do hope, however, that we will all at least come to the point where we 
will agree as a House, as a legislative body, that the budget act that 
we are governed by, requiring a concurrent budget resolution before we 
have tax cuts or enact appropriations for spending will be the pattern 
that this Congress will follow.
  Unfortunately, the leadership in this House has chosen to do it 
another way, because tomorrow they will bring to this floor a major tax 
cut before this House has adopted a budget. The Blue Dogs intend 
tomorrow to be heard on that subject because we think it is important 
to have a budget first.
  It is also true, as the gentleman from Colorado stated, that the 
President, in his budget plan, does reduce national debt. Our objection 
simply is that it does not reduce national debt as fast as we think it 
should be reduced. In fact, in an editorial in USA Today, the writer of 
that editorial acknowledged that the President is reducing debt, but he 
says that anyone looking closely at the President's budget will see 
that he does not retire debt as fast as current law would provide. And, 
in fact, the President's debt repayment schedule under his rough 
outline of a budget will reduce less debt than current law to the tune 
of $590 billion over the next 5 years.
  The Blue Dog budget plan reduces the debt at a faster rate than the 
President's budget does. Our plan is very simple. We say take the 
Social Security and the Medicare surpluses that will accumulate over 
the next 10 years and set them aside for Social Security and Medicare 
only. Whatever other surplus there is in the general operations of our 
government, then set aside 50 percent of that on-budget surplus for 
debt repayment. That means that the Blue Dog budget plan reduces debt 
at a faster rate than the President's plan.
  We further say set aside 25 percent of that on-budget surplus, 
outside of Social Security and Medicare, for tax cuts. And the final 25 
percent should be reserved for priority spending needs, to take care 
of increased needs in the area of national defense, education and other 
priorities this Congress and this President may agree upon.

  In our judgment, that is a fiscally responsible approach to the 
forecast of budget estimates that we all know are merely forecasts, 
that may not arrive. In fact, we know that if the estimate of growth in 
Federal spending goes down only one-tenth of 1 percent, about $300 to 
$400 billion of the estimated surplus for 10 years disappears. That is 
how tenuous the estimated surplus figure really is.
  And so Blue Dogs simply say, let us pay down the national debt, let 
us have meaningful tax cuts for the American people, and let us 
preserve Social Security and Medicare for the future. And why do we say 
let us have a budget

[[Page H735]]

first? Because if we have a budget first, we have to address each of 
those issues that I mentioned and take the available Federal revenues 
that we hope will appear over the next 10 years and we have to fairly 
allocate them to those various priorities. To simply say let us bring a 
tax cut to the floor, it is a feel-good vote, let us do it, let us move 
on down the road, it will all work out, is not the way we would run our 
household budgets or our business budgets; and it is certainly not the 
way we should run the people's budget here in Washington.
  So I am hopeful that at the end of the day this Congress will have a 
budget debate. And, after all, just because the President says that 
spending will only go up 4 percent, just because the President says 
that we are going to be able to make all this work out does not mean 
that is the way the law is going to read at the end of the day.
  And when the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. McInnis) says that he 
thinks we ought to pass the tax cut first and then the budget, he is 
expressing a fear, a fear that his own majority party, who controls 
this House, who controls the Senate, and who now controls the White 
House, cannot be fiscally responsible. I submit to my colleagues that 
as long as the Republicans are in charge, they are going to be the ones 
ultimately that determine the size of the spending bill for the Federal 
Government for this next year. And to simply say that there is some 
projection out here of future surpluses that we all hope are going to 
arrive, and to make a decision today to spend all of those surpluses on 
the tax cut the President has proposed, is irresponsible. The truth of 
the matter is, if they do not show up, we will be back in deficit 
spending.
  A fellow in overalls at a town meeting stood up after I had made a 
long-winded presentation about all these Federal budget numbers, and he 
said, ``Congressman, how can you folks in Washington say you have a 
surplus when you have a $5.5 trillion debt?''

                              {time}  2330

  It caught me a little bit off guard, because the point was well made 
and certainly well taken. Only in Washington can you owe $5.5 trillion 
in publicly held debt and in debt owed to the Social Security and 
Medicare and other trust funds of the government that have been taken 
all these many years and spent on other things, only in Washington can 
you also say you have a surplus.
  The debt we owe is real. It is here now. The surplus we are talking 
about has not yet arrived. It may not arrive. What would you do at your 
household if you owed money to the tune of $100,000 and somebody said, 
``Well, we think you're going to have an increase in your pay over the 
next few years.'' Would you ignore the debt and start spending the 
surplus? No. You would try to pay down the debt that you owe. Keep in 
mind, the Blue Dogs do not apologize because the size of our tax cut is 
little bit smaller than the President is talking about. The truth of 
the matter is, if you look at the tax cut proposals on, for example, 
the marginal rate side of the tax cut, sure the President over the long 
term has a little larger tax cut for those in the upper income 
brackets. The Democratic proposal has larger tax cuts for those in the 
middle income brackets. But the truth of the matter at the end of the 
day, the Blue Dog plan is not only to cut taxes but to pay down debt, 
because we know and economists tell us that paying down debt will put 
more money in the back pocket of American families than any of the tax 
cuts that we are talking about today, whether it is the President's, 
the Blue dogs' or any other group in this House or in the Senate. 
Economists say interest rates across the board would go down over the 
next 10 years approximately 2 percent if we pay down the national debt.
  If you are struggling to buy a new home and you have borrowed 
$100,000 at the bank and we can get interest rates down for you 2 
percent, you will save $2,000 a year. Who gets $2,000 a year even under 
the President's tax cut? Well, I guess the very wealthy do. I suppose 
by looking at the numbers, if you are a wealthy lawyer making half a 
million dollars a year under the Bush tax cut, you get $15,000. But 
under the Bush tax cut if you are a waitress making $20,000, you will 
no longer have to pay $200 in taxes. Your taxes will be zero. As I 
think the President has often pointed out, the waitress gets a 100 
percent reduction in her taxes and the rich lawyer only gets a 50 
percent reduction when the truth of the matter is the lawyer gets 
$15,000 and the waitress gets $200. But how can we help the waitress? 
If she is trying to buy a home for her family and we can get interest 
rates down 2 percent so that when she goes into that bank or that 
mortgage lending agency and she applies for that $100,000 loan, the 
interest rate quoted to her will be 2 percent lower and she will save 
$2,000 a year because this Congress decided to be fiscally responsible 
and pay down the national debt and reap the benefits that come from 
that kind of fiscal responsibility. That is what the Blue Dogs are for. 
And at the end of the day, our plan will put more money in the back 
pockets of an average American family than any tax cut that is being 
talked about today.
  I am very hopeful that we can at least have an opportunity to have a 
fair debate on priorities and a fair debate about a budget before we 
have to vote on major tax cuts that may jeopardize our efforts to bring 
fiscal responsibility and restraint and debt repayment to the American 
people.
  I really think that tonight, the debate that we are having, though 
there are only a few Members in the Chamber tonight, is the kind of 
debate that we need to be having in the full daylight with the Members 
of the House here on a budget resolution for this House. I have 
even read in some of the publications here on the Hill that the Budget 
Committee is going to make a special effort this year to have a 
realistic budget, because the truth of the matter is that many times, 
the Congress even after passing their budget has spent more money than 
the budget allowed. This year, the spirit seems to be different in the 
House Budget Committee. I am very hopeful that the House Budget 
Committee will pass a realistic budget, one that this Congress will 
live within, and one that will allow us to have meaningful tax cuts and 
significant debt repayment over the next 10 years. This is our goal. 
This is what we are working for. I think at the end of the day, we can 
find that the American people will benefit from fiscal conservatism.

  It is really unusual to be in a position of having to be the voice of 
fiscal responsibility when for so many years we had support from the 
Republican side of the aisle for the same goals. It turns out that the 
Blue Dog Democrats have now been identified in this body as being the 
strongest deficit hawks, the most fiscally conservative and those 
committed to greater fiscal responsibility than any group in the House. 
I think it is really significant that this message be heard. That is 
why we are here tonight, at 11:35 Eastern Time talking about this issue 
that we all believe so strongly in.
  There have been several good editorials that have been published in 
recent days about this issue. It seems that more and more people across 
this country are beginning to question the path that has been charted 
by the leadership in this House which will lead us tomorrow to a vote 
on a major tax cut before we have a budget. More often than not in my 
conversations with my constituents, I hear the healthy skepticism that 
exists among people all across this country about cutting taxes based 
on a 10-year projection of a surplus. In fact, it was suggested to me 
the other day that perhaps this Congress and this administration could 
be characterized as somewhat arrogant for even suggesting that we cut 
taxes based on a 10-year estimate. Because the truth is, even if the 
estimate, perchance, turned out to be correct, this President and this 
Congress would have passed the last tax cut that could be passed by any 
Congress or signed by any President for the next 10 years. Perhaps that 
alone would suggest that perhaps we should look at a shorter time 
frame. When I served as a member of the Texas legislature, the House 
and the Senate there, I served on the Finance Committee, we met 
biennially, once every 2 years. What we did is project the State 
revenues for the next 2 years, projected our State spending needs, and 
adopted a budget accordingly. And if we had extra money projected for 
the 2-year period, we could pass a tax cut. We did not talk about 10 
years out. Perhaps most legislators understand how foolish it really is 
to

[[Page H736]]

spend money that you do not even have yet. Only in Washington do we 
project for 10 years and then somehow declare that it is engraved in 
stone on a wall and we can spend it today. I think that we as a 
Congress should acknowledge that of the tax cut that we are talking 
about being given to the American people next year, that the surplus is 
so small next year that only 5 percent of the total tax of $1.6 
trillion the President proposed is even being granted next year. And to 
grant more would put us back into deficit spending, because two-thirds 
of this surplus occurs in the second 5 years of this 10-year 
projection. Only one-third occurs in the first 5 years. And in the 
shorter term, very little surplus exists for any tax cut.
  Now I am not belittling the fact that the tax cut proposed gives a 
$56 billion tax cut next year, but $56 billion is only 5 percent of the 
total tax package that is being talked about. It was suggested the 
other day that perhaps what we ought to be doing is simply passing a 
short-term tax cut, coming back in 2 years, taking another look at 
where we are financially, passing another one, giving the next Congress 
after that the good fortune of being able to vote for a tax cut. But, 
no, in Washington the playing field has been defined for us, because 
the Congress in 1992 said that the Congressional Budget Office should 
project the financial estimate for 10 years.

                              {time}  2340

  Once we did that, then I guess we opened the door to start spending 
the money, whether it is by tax cuts or spending or whatever means we 
want to use to dispose of it today, based on an estimate of what might 
occur over the next 10 years.
  So the Blue Dog Democrats are here tonight. We are working hard to 
convey the message of a budget first and we are asking for fiscal 
responsibility.
  Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield to our fellow Blue Dog colleague, 
the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Taylor.).
  Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Turner) for yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, again, I will ask every American who listens to the 
debate tomorrow, listen for this number, $5,735,859,380,573.98. You 
will not hear one proponent of the tax cut admit to the American people 
that that is how far in debt we are, and almost all of that debt has 
occurred since 1980.
  I will give you another number you will not hear. You will not hear 
about the $1,070,000,000,000 that this Nation owes to the people who 
pay into the Social Security trust fund. You will not hear about the 
$229,200,000,000 that this Nation owes to the Medicare Trust Fund. You 
will not hear about the $163.5 billion that we owe to the military 
retirees, and you will not hear about the $501.7 billion that we owe to 
the public employees retirement system.
  I have to be a little bit disturbed about what my friend, the 
gentleman from Colorado (Mr. McInnis), said tonight. His statement was 
that we have to cut taxes because they cannot stop spending.
  Now I admire many of my Republican colleagues, but they asked for the 
opportunity to govern and they promised the American people if they 
were given the opportunity to govern they would stop wasteful spending. 
So what he is saying, I guess, is that that promise was not true; that 
they cannot control spending.
  Let me make a point to the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. McInnis). 
Cutting revenues has never stopped spending. It only increased the 
amount of money that was borrowed.
  When Ronald Reagan made the same pitch in the early 1980s to cut 
revenues because it would stop spending, the debt was less than a 
trillion dollars. It is now $5.7 trillion.
  Let us remember that Ronald Reagan's veto was worth two-thirds of the 
House and two-thirds of the Senate; just as George Bush's veto will now 
be worth two-thirds of the House and two-thirds of the Senate.
  If President Bush sees some wasteful spending, I encourage him to 
veto the bill, and I will work with him to prevent the override of that 
veto. Do not tell me that you have to increase the national debt, 
pretending there is an imaginary surplus, so you can give your 
contributors a $1.6 trillion tax break, because it is not there. We do 
not have a surplus until we pay back what we owe to Social Security, 
which is a trillion dollars; until we pay back what we owe to Medicare, 
which is $229 billion; pay back to those people who served our Nation 
for 20 years or more and our Reservists who served our Nation for 20 
years or more, the $163 billion. We do not have a surplus until we pay 
back to our civil servants the $501.7 billion that has been taken out 
of their paychecks. You do not have a surplus to give away in tax 
breaks.
  I know these are astronomical numbers, and I know the typical 
American has just got to be dumbfounded with them, and I think 
skepticism is a good thing. So let me say where you can look to see 
this, because these are all straight out of the monthly statement of 
Treasury Securities.

  Just a month ago, that was known as a monthly statement of public 
debt but the Bush administration, in order to disguise the true nature 
of the debt, changed the title of that from public debt to Treasury 
Securities; but it is the same thing.
  So I would encourage you to go to www.publicdebt.treas.gov. I 
encourage you to go to table 1, page 1, monthly statement of Treasury 
Securities of the United States, February 28, 2001; go to table 4 page 
10; go to table 3, pages 7 and 8.
  That is where these numbers come from. I am dealing in reality. The 
Blue Dogs are dealing in reality. The people who are for these tax cuts 
are dealing in projections, and we are $5.7 billion in debt because of 
rosy projections, not people dealing in reality.
  Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, I would ask the gentleman from Mississippi 
(Mr. Taylor) does he happen to know how much interest we are paying on 
this national debt?
  Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. I am so glad the gentleman asked that. We 
constantly hear people say, stop the wasteful spending. Doggoneit, you 
all can balance the budget if you just cut out the wasteful spending. 
Some people say it is food stamps to the tune of about $30 billion a 
year. Some people say it is foreign aid to the tune of about $13 
billion a year.
  I guess everyone has something they think we ought to do away with. 
National Endowment for the Arts I voted against, $100 million a year.
  The most wasteful thing this Nation does is to squander $1 billion a 
day each and every day on interest on the national debt. We did it 
yesterday. We did it the day before that, the day before that. We will 
do it tomorrow and we will do it every day for the rest of our lives if 
we do not retire this debt.
  That is what the interest payment is. It is more money than we spend 
on defense. It is more money than we spend on Social Security. It is 
more money than we spend on veterans health care. It is more money than 
we spend on anything.
  It is squandered. It does not educate a child. It does not build a 
highway. It does not defend our Nation. It is squandered. It tends to 
go to the wealthiest Americans, the very people who will get the 
biggest benefit of this tax break.
  Mr. TURNER. I had heard a few months ago that the interest payment on 
the national debt was the third largest category of Federal 
expenditures. Is that correct? I think Social Security and perhaps 
national defense might have been a little bit ahead of payment of 
interest on the debt.
  Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. For the record, for the fiscal year 2001, 
the Treasury has already spent $144 billion on interest on the national 
debt. That is the first 5 months of this year. Contrast that with 
fiscal year 2000, the Treasury spent $362 billion on interest. That is 
almost a billion a day. That is 20 percent of every dollar that was 
spent.
  By comparison, the military outlays total $281 billion, $81 billion 
less than we pay on the interest. Medicare outlays were $218 billion, 
$144 billion less than we spent on interest on the national debt.
  Again, Mr. Speaker, again Senate Majority Leader, Mr. President, 
please come tell me that there is a surplus, because you are dealing 
with projections and I am dealing with reality. The people of America 
are now $5.7 trillion in debt from rosy projections. The debt is real. 
The interest payments on

[[Page H737]]

the debt are real. What we owe to Social Security, what we owe to 
Medicare, what we owe to the military retirees, what we owe to our own 
civil servants is real.
  Let us pay our bills first before we start making new promises.
  Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, I would say to the gentleman from 
Mississippi (Mr. Taylor), in addition to the absolute waste that is 
represented by a billion dollars a day that we pay in interest on this 
huge $5.7 trillion national debt, there is going to come a point in 
time, is there not, where those debts are going to have to be repaid, 
those IOUs the gentleman talked about earlier this evening that 
represents the lockbox trust funds, that those monies are going to have 
to be paid? I mean, in Social Security, for example, is there not going 
to be a requirement, an absolute requirement, that some day those funds 
be repaid to that trust fund?
  Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. In the 1980s, the Reagan administration, 
with a Democratic House, Republican Senate, increased by 15 percent 
payroll tax on working Americans toward Social Security and Medicare, 
because they realized, because of the demographic change, with fewer 
and fewer working people, more and more retired people taking money 
out, fewer people putting money in, that by 2014 the money that was 
being paid in on an annual basis to Social Security would no longer pay 
the money that is being taken out.
  So with Alan Greenspan as the Chair of a commission, they 
recommended, it passed through Congress, an increase on payroll taxes 
with the idea being that the money would be collected now while we have 
a relatively large workforce, set aside to pay those benefits then for 
Social Security, for Medicare, for military retirees, for civil service 
retirement.
  The problem is that money was spent, every penny of it. What we are 
trying to change and what we will have an opportunity to change 
tomorrow, I hope, if the Committee on Rules makes it in order, is to 
say that the provisions of this tax bill tomorrow only take place in 
years where we fully fund our annual obligation to Social Security, to 
Medicare, to military retirement and civil servants.

                              {time}  2350

  If that does not happen, then the tax increase does not take place. I 
happen to think that is totally in keeping with the President's vow and 
promise that he made to Congress. He mentioned Social Security by name, 
he mentioned Medicare by name. He did not mention our military 
retirees, he did not mention our civil servants, but I am sure he would 
want to protect their funds as well.
  Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, so the gentleman says 
that 13 years from now, in 2014, we start paying more Social Security 
benefits than we have income into the Social Security Trust Fund and 
payroll taxes, and at that point in time is when we need to have that 
debt paid down so that the money will be available for the Social 
Security recipients.
  Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, 
the promise made during the Reagan years was that that $1 trillion 
would be set aside. That promise was never kept in the Reagan years, it 
was never kept in the Bush presidency, it was never kept in the Clinton 
presidency. The question is now whether this President will honor that 
promise made almost 20 years ago. The promise was never kept for the 
Medicare trust fund. The question is whether or not this President will 
honor it. The promise was never kept to our military retirees. The 
question is whether or not President Bush will help us keep that 
promise. The promise was never kept to the civil service retirees. The 
question is whether or not President Bush will help us keep that 
promise.
  Now, my promise to President Bush is, I will help him keep that 
promise. I think keeping our word to all of these groups is more 
important than making new promises to other Americans, because a great 
Nation is only as good as its word. That is why last year we worked so 
hard to get our health care benefits that were promised to military 
retirees, and I thank my colleagues for helping on that. It is now time 
to keep our word on these matters.
  Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, let me ask this question of the gentleman. 
After 2014, 13 years from now, when the Social Security system begins 
to experience the retirement of those of us who are in that baby boomer 
category, what happens, as I understand it, is not only do we see in 
2014 more money coming out of Social Security and benefits than goes in 
and Social Security payroll taxes, but that is just the tip of the 
iceberg. Because I read the other day that the Social Security service 
has already estimated, based on the number of folks that will be 
retiring in the years ahead, that 50 years from now, that the drain on 
the Social Security Trust Fund will be so great, that to have enough 
money going into the system 50 years from now to pay the benefits, to 
which people who will then retire will be entitled, will require a 
payroll tax of 50 percent of payroll.
  Now, the gentleman knows and I know and everybody here knows that we 
are never going to have a 50 percent payroll tax. Nobody could stay in 
business if they had to pay a 50 percent payroll tax. But to pay 
benefits that will be due by current law to the beneficiaries that will 
be retired 50 years from now, a lot of our children in that category, 
we need a payroll tax of 50 percent? I think what it says to me is that 
the talk about a surplus over the next 10 years really hides the true 
financial picture of the Federal Government, because not only does 
Social Security face a crisis in the years ahead, but Medicare does 
too. Is it fair, I ask the gentleman, to say we have a surplus when, in 
fact, if we look at a longer period of time, we probably have a deficit 
again because the demands on the Social Security system and on the 
Medicare system are so tremendous?
  Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I would say to the gentleman, 
I pointed out that this is the debt right now. We have heard our 
colleagues say that CBO projections say that we are going to have a lot 
of money left over. Let me tell my colleagues the real CBO projections.
  Today we owe the Social Security Trust Fund $1 trillion. The CBO 
projection is that 10 years from today, even without the Bush tax 
breaks, which will deprive about $1.6 trillion out of revenue, we will 
owe Social Security $3 trillion, 65 billion. I told the gentleman how 
we owed money to Medicare, to military retirees, to civil service 
retirees. It projects, the CBO, even without the tax breaks, that we 
will owe them $2.2 trillion 265 billion, and contrary to what our 
colleague from Colorado said, even without the Bush tax breaks, if we 
do not start getting serious about cutting spending, living within our 
means, that 10 years from now, our Nation will be $6 trillion, 721 
billion in debt.
  Mr. Speaker, there is no person on earth who can convince me, who can 
convince my colleague, that there is a surplus now or that there will 
be a surplus then, when we are $5.7 trillion in debt now, and the CBO 
projections that they keep talking about predict that our Nation will 
be $6 trillion, 700 billion in debt then.

  Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, it seems to me that this debate comes right 
back down to where the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Tanner) said we 
were in his remarks earlier this evening. The question that must weigh 
on the minds, I hope, of every Member of this Congress is, are we going 
to leave this country in better shape for our children than we found 
it? And it seems to me, I say to the gentleman, that in order to do 
that, we are going to have to exercise some significant fiscal 
discipline over the years ahead.
  I really commend the gentleman on the presentation he has made. As I 
said to the gentleman earlier, he exposed, once again, the best kept 
secret in town up here, and that is that there is really no trust fund. 
And when we lock box the trust fund, all we have lock boxed is an IOU 
that some day is going to have to be paid by the taxpayers of this 
country, back into those trust funds so that the recipients of Social 
Security in the years ahead and the beneficiaries of the Medicare 
program in the years ahead will be able to have the commitment that we 
made to them honored and made good, and that is going to take a 
tremendous amount of effort on the part of this Congress and future 
Congresses. I hope that we have the wisdom to begin now to prepare for 
those very, very dire days when the baby boomers retire and the demands 
on Social Security and Medicare could literally overwhelm this 
government.

[[Page H738]]

  Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I think the first place we 
have to start is with the legislation I introduced last week, with a 
constitutional amendment that honors the promise that was made to 
Americans, a constitutional amendment that protects the Social Security 
Trust Fund, a constitutional amendment that protects the Medicare trust 
fund, a constitutional amendment that protects our public employees' 
retirement system, a constitutional amendment that protects our 
military retirement system. I introduced it last week. I would invite 
the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Turner) and every Member of Congress to 
coauthor it. I would invite every American to demand that their 
Congress keep the promises that were made to them, and start with a 
constitutional amendment that says from this day forward, we will stop 
stealing from Social Security and we will stop stealing from Medicare 
and we will stop stealing from military retirement, we will stop 
stealing from the civilian retirement, and our highest priority is 
going to be to pay back those funds that have already been taken.
  Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, it sounds like to me if the gentleman's 
constitutional amendment had been the law in the Federal Government, 
that the trust funds of the Federal Government would be just like the 
trust funds that I am familiar with from my service in the Texas 
legislature. Because at the State level, and I suspect in every State 
in the union, when they set up the State employees' retirement trust 
fund and the teacher retirement system trust fund, the legislature 
actually puts dollars into those funds that are truly locked away and 
invested over time in real assets that are earning interest and 
increasing the value, the cash asset value of those trust funds. But 
because in Washington, we created trust funds that we allowed the 
government, the Congresses of years past to borrow from to do other 
things, what we are left with in Washington is trust funds with no 
cash, with no investment value, other than the fact that they hold an 
IOU, a Treasury obligation that does earn interest, but ultimately can 
only be paid through the taxing power of the Federal Government, 
because there is really no money there to pay the benefits that are 
guaranteed to the Social Security recipients, to the Medicare 
recipients, to the Federal employees who retire, to the military 
retirees. It is the taxing power of the future that will have to be 
used to honor those commitments.

                          ____________________