[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 167 (Wednesday, December 5, 2001)]
[House]
[Page H8886]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       U.S. SHOULD PRIORITIZE SPENDING TO AVOID DEFICIT SPENDING

  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, the question I would like to ask 
my colleagues is how much more, how much deeper should we go in debt in 
this country?
  The current authorized debt that we passed several years ago is 
$5,950 billion, and we were actually projecting just a few months ago, 
last May, that we would not have to increase the debt limit. Our 
current debt, the debt limit as passed by law is $5,950 billion. The 
current debt is $5,860 billion. So if we implement what we are talking 
about for next year's budget, if all of the bills that have been passed 
in the House were implemented, then we are going back into deficit 
spending, which means we are going to have to increase the debt of this 
country.
  It seems to me that we should be budgeting in a way that every family 
has to budget, that every business has to budget, and that if something 
comes up that is very important we look at other portions of that 
budget that we might reduce in order to accommodate the higher priority 
spending. In this case, I would suggest, Mr. Speaker, to my colleagues 
that the higher priority spending is to assure security and to do what 
we can to make sure that the economy again comes back strong as quickly 
as possible.
  But if we do that without going into debt like we were some years 
ago, driving the debt of this country up, if you will, driving the 
mortgage that our kids and our grandkids are going to have to pay off 
because of our excessive spending, if we are not to go back into that 
kind of deficit spending, then we are going to have to prioritize.
  How do we prioritize? Is there some spending of this Congress, is 
there some pork spending, is there some spending that is less important 
than driving us deeper into debt? Let me just suggest, as we discuss 
economic stimulus packages, at what point of overspending that is going 
to result in higher interest rates. Overspending means the government 
has to borrow more money. We go into competition with business and 
individuals for that available money supply out there; and, in fact, 
Congress bids up interest rates to get what they want. So at what point 
do we decide that increased interest rates are as much of a downer for 
economic recovery as maybe some stimulus package or some spending that 
some Members say are important to their economy locally? At what point 
does it balance? How much should we go in debt in future spending?
  I would suggest to my colleagues that the gimmick of the lockbox that 
we passed, Democrats and Republicans together, was a good effort, 
suggestion, indication, that we would not go back to spending the 
Social Security surplus. This year, Social Security is going to bring 
in a surplus of about $160 billion. But the way we are going, we are 
going to spend all of that Social Security surplus. I say this is not 
good. I say that belt-tightening is called for, and prioritization of 
spending is called for.
  So I would not only suggest to this Chamber but certainly to the 
Senate, certainly to the President and the administration, to start 
prioritizing spending so that we minimize the amount that we are going 
to drive our kids and our grandkids into indebtedness that sometime, 
someplace, somehow, they are going to have to pay off.
  Last May, let me just tell my colleagues how rapidly things have 
changed. Last May, the Congressional Budget Office, the CBO, estimated 
that our surplus for this 2002 fiscal year would be $304 billion. $304 
billion surplus. Now, with the bills that have passed the House, with 
the bills that have passed the Senate, all of them have not passed the 
Senate, but with all of the appropriation bills and the stimulus 
package, we are actually now deficit spending, spending all of the 
Social Security surplus, spending all of the Medicare-Medicaid surplus 
and going back into debt, which means that sometime our kids are going 
to have to come up with either the increased taxes or the reduced 
living standards from government that we have provided to date.
  Mr. Speaker, in conclusion, let me say that I think there are a lot 
of areas of spending that are of lesser importance, and simply because 
the lockbox has now been, if you will, broken open, is not the excuse 
to spend all kinds of money for all kinds of projects.

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