[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 167 (Wednesday, December 5, 2001)]
[Senate]
[Pages S12390-S12394]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
COMPREHENSIVE RETIREMENT SECURITY AND PENSION REFORM ACT OF 2001--
Continued
Amendment No. 2170
Mr. NICKLES. Madam President, I make a point of order that the
Daschle amendment No. 2170 violates section 302(f) of the Congressional
Budget Act.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under the previous order, the
Senator from Oklahoma is recognized to raise a point of order.
Under the previous order, the Senator from Montana is recognized to
make a motion to waive the point of order.
Mr. BAUCUS. Madam President, I move to waive the relevant section of
the Budget Act, and I ask for the yeas and nays.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there a sufficient second?
Mr. BAUCUS. I withdraw the request, Madam President.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so
ordered. Under the previous order, there will now be 30 minutes of
debate to be equally divided between the Senator from Montana and the
Senator from Oklahoma or their designees.
The Senator from Oklahoma.
Mr. NICKLES. Madam President, for the information of our colleagues,
it is anticipated we will be voting at 10 o'clock. We may try to
shorten that somewhat. It is anticipated we will have two votes, one on
a motion to waive a Budget Act point of order, as entered by Senator
Baucus, and also on final passage of the Railroad Retirement Act. I
notify our colleagues that probably in the next 20 minutes or so we
will be voting on these two measures, for them to plan accordingly.
I make a budget point of order because we didn't have any funding.
The $15 billion in outlays we are getting ready to pass was not in the
budget. Granted, this bill has a lot of support. It had a lot of
support when we passed the budget, but it was not included. It was not
included in the House budget. It was not included in the Senate budget.
We had a budget. The budget we agreed upon said we were going to have
so much in spending. This was not part of it. So we have to waive the
budget if we are going to pass it, or a budget point of order lies, or
else we are just breaking the budget.
The reason I raise this point is that Congress in the last several
months has
[[Page S12391]]
been, in my opinion, pretty irresponsible. We have had spending grow
dramatically, and yet many people are saying it is not enough. Some
people are saying, because of the disaster on September 11, we need a
lot more money for this and for that. Some of us need to kind of total
it up. I don't think we have totaled it up. Spending is growing
dramatically.
I looked at the amount of money we spent in fiscal year 2000, last
year. It was $584 billion in total discretionary spending. In 2001, the
year we just completed, it was 640. That was a 9.6-percent increase for
domestic spending. For nondefense spending, that was 14-percent growth
over the previous year.
That is a big increase. Nondefense spending last year, the year we
just completed in September, grew at 14 percent.
President Bush's budget said let's have spending grow, total
discretionary spending, up to $679 billion. That was a 6-percent
increase. After the disaster of September 11, we had a bipartisan
agreement to get the budget agreed to of $686 billion. In addition to
that, President Bush agreed to the $40 billion, money for New York, for
Virginia, for defense. That was an additional $40 billion. Add the $40
billion to the $686 billion; that is $726 billion. That is a growth in
outlays of 13.3 percent. And that is still not enough. It doesn't
include the $15.3 billion we are talking about that will be required
outlays for railroad retirement. If you add that together, that is
another 15.6 percent.
Somebody said that doesn't count because we have scorekeeping. We
said we are going to put language in here: don't count it. The fact is,
you are going to have outstanding publicly held debt that is going to
grow by $15.3 billion as a result of this bill. The fact is, we will be
borrowing that $15.3 billion; Treasury will borrow additional money. It
is not coming out of the surplus. It is not even coming out of Social
Security. It is coming out of publicly held debt. We are going to
borrow more money, and we are paying about $1 billion per year every
year, maybe every year forever, to pay for this bill.
The 10-year cost in interest expense is going to be about $10
billion. Our colleagues should know that. The amount of outstanding
publicly held debt as a result of passage of this bill will be growing.
I think people have not looked at that.
Then there are a few other items in the mill. When we take up the DOD
appropriations bill, I understand Senator Byrd has an amendment to add
an additional $15 billion for homeland defense and other things on top
of it. We haven't considered that yet, but that is in the mill.
We have already passed airline assistance. I didn't add that. That
had outlays of about $5 or $6 billion, loan guarantees for up to
another 10. We don't know how that will score. It depends on how many
will default. But there is additional exposure there as well.
We have a stimulus package that was reported out of the Finance
Committee, two-thirds of which was spending, mostly outlays. Some of it
was for unemployment compensation, some of it for cash payments to
people who didn't pay taxes. But the net result of that stimulus bill
that passed out of the Finance Committee and that we considered on the
floor was about an additional $50 billion in outlays.
We have an agriculture bill we will be considering probably later
today. It has additional outlays. And we have a victims compensation
fund that was part of the airline bailout bill that no one knows, no
one in the genius of this body who authorized and passed that
legislation, how much it is going to cost. It could cost billions of
dollars. We don't know how much the insurance companies are going to
pay. We don't know what kinds of rewards are going to be made to the
survivors and to the victims of the September 11 disaster. It could
cost billions. Congress legislated that little package. I was part of
the negotiations in the final hours. No one has a clue how much it is
going to cost. It could be in the multibillions of dollars.
My point is, if you add all these numbers, we may be looking at
spending growth in the 20- or 24-percent range. It is as if there is no
budget whatsoever.
I raise a budget point of order. That is why we have a budget. A
budget doesn't do any good if you are not going to use a point of
order. Unfortunately, in many cases people in the Budget Committee
haven't felt inclined to use it. We waive budgets in cases of national
emergency. I supported the $40 billion that was included. We believed
that was a national emergency. We were attacked. Let's give money for
defense of our country to go after those persons who attacked the
United States. I am all for that. Let's assist people who need the help
in New York and Virginia and Pennsylvania. We supported that. We waived
the budget to do it.
Maybe we will waive the budget to do railroad retirement. I expect we
probably will. The special interest groups have everybody on board this
bill regardless of how much it costs, regardless if it may bankrupt the
fund. The railroad retirees and their own accountants say the trust
fund balance goes down to almost 1 year of payments in several years,
almost bankrupting the fund.
How does it do that? It greatly increases benefits, and it cuts
payroll taxes. It leaves Uncle Sam as still guaranteeing the benefits.
I would be all in favor of the railroads and the employees making
whatever kind of deal they want to make for their benefits. If it is
more generous than any other retirement plan in America, so be it, as
long as they don't ask for taxpayers to guarantee it and pay it.
Unfortunately, they are asking for both. They want one of the most
generous retirement benefits in the country: 100 percent retirement at
age 60, 100 percent survivor benefits. That is great. But they also
want us to pay for it if the fund goes broke, and even their own
projections have it almost going broke. Then to say now, yes, and we
want to waive the budget--the budget doesn't count?
If we are going to have a budget, let's use it. Let's abide by it.
Let's have unanimous votes if we are going to waive it for cases of
national emergency. This is not a national emergency. That is the
reason I made the budget point of order. I urge my colleagues to
support it.
I don't want to see our colleagues on the floor next year, or maybe
even a month from now, saying: Where did the budget surplus go? We are
now in deficits. Where did it go? It must have been those Republicans.
They passed a tax cut. That tax cut, in the first year, was $37
billion.
Let's see, I totaled up $40 billion for emergency spending, $15
billion for airlines, $15 billion for railroads, and $15 billion that
Senator Byrd is trying to pass. No telling how much spending will be in
the so-called stimulus package. When you add it up, there is going to
be much more of a spending problem than a tax cut problem.
My colleagues may say: Wait a minute, did I vote to waive the budget?
Did I vote for that extra spending?
This is deficit spending. We are going to borrow an additional $15
billion. We are going to have to waive the budget to do so. I urge my
colleagues to vote ``no'' on the motion to waive the budget point of
order.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Montana is
recognized.
Mr. BAUCUS. Madam President, I yield such time as the Senator from
Delaware desires.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Delaware is
recognized.
Mr. CARPER. Madam President, I agree with my friend from Oklahoma on
several of the comments he just made. We can ill afford, even in the
environment in which we live today, to forget about fiscal restraint
and the responsibility to manage our finances, not only in the short
term but in the long-term. But it is not just spending that we need to
watch. It is also the nature of the tax cuts that we have adopted and
the ones we are considering adopting as part of the economic stimulus
package.
Let me take a somewhat different approach to the legislation before
us, for which we are now considering the step of waiving the Budget
Act. I thank Senator Baucus for bringing the measure to the floor. I
thank our leader for bringing this measure to the floor. I salute
Senator Hatch and others who have introduced the legislation, which I
have cosponsored. I am not aware of anywhere in the Federal Government
where we have a private sector type of pension plan. The railroad
retirement
[[Page S12392]]
is somewhat difficult to understand. Let me take a minute and
contemplate what it is and what it is not.
The railroad retirement, which provides retirement benefits for
hundreds of thousands of railroaders and their survivors, is a two-tier
plan. Tier 1 deals with Social Security benefits, or reflects and
mirrors Social Security benefits. We are not talking about addressing
or dealing with those. Tier 2 is a pension plan that goes beyond Social
Security benefits. Most people who work in the private sector in this
country realize Social Security benefits. They also have a pension
plan, in many cases, from their own employer. Those employers
contribute to those plans. The employees contribute to their employer's
pension plan established for them. Most employers, private sector
employers and, frankly, most public sector employers around the country
who have pension plans--the moneys that go into those plans are
invested, but they are not invested exclusively in securities issued by
the U.S. Treasury.
Tier 2 of the railroad retirement plan is different because the
moneys that are contributed by the employers--the railroad companies--
and moneys contributed by employees of those railroads to the pension
fund, the trust fund, are invested only in securities issued by the
U.S. Treasury. Many States and local governments have changed the way
they invest their pension moneys. They have invested now in equities,
corporate stocks, and other investment options because the yield there
is greater and they are able to provide better benefits and reduce
their contribution into their pension fund.
The question before us in this bill is, Should we provide the same
kind of flexibility for railroad companies and railroad retirees when
contributing to their tier 2 pension plans? Should we give them the
same flexibility that is enjoyed by other employers throughout the
country? I believe we should. The question also is, In doing that, does
that somehow cause an outlay by the Federal Government? We still work
in the Federal Government under a cash basis of accounting. Most
companies and, in fact, almost all State and local governments use the
accrual form of accounting. If we use an accrual form of accounting, my
guess is we would not be debating whether or not this is actually a $15
billion cash outlay. I think the point would be moot. But we still use
the cash basis, so that is the law under which we operate.
Having said that, we are not talking about the need to spend another
$15 billion to build roads. We are not talking about another $15
billion to provide better health care. We are not talking about another
$15 billion to provide better environmental protection. We are talking
about a step here that says to the folks who oversee tier 2 pension
funds contributed to by employers--the railroad companies--and the
railroad employees: You don't have to just invest the money in your
trust fund in U.S. Treasury obligations. You can invest in other kinds
of investments, such as securities, which would provide a greater
yield, and then that anticipated yield, which has been proven over
history, that greater yield will enable that pension fund to provide
better benefits to railroad retirees and to their survivors.
That anticipated greater yield--again, proven historically --would
enable the railroad companies, the employers, and the employees--
particularly the railroad employers--to reduce their contribution
somewhat. That is what this is all about. And because of an
anachronism, we are forced to go through this procedure of waiving the
budget law and the extraordinary procedure yesterday of directing the
spending.
This is a good measure. When we think it through and we look at the
numbers and the requirement for the railroad companies, the employers,
to increase their contribution, if the tier 2 fund does run out of
money, this is a measure that is responsible. I want to say to those
who brought it to the floor, on behalf of the hundreds of thousands of
railroad employees and pensioners and survivors, thank you for taking
this step for them and the companies for whom they work. I say to the
chairman of the Finance Committee, thank you again for bringing the
measure to the floor and for yielding this time to me today.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Texas is
recognized.
Mr. GRAMM. How much time do we have on our side?
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Six minutes.
Mr. GRAMM. Madam President, let me first congratulate the Senator
from Oklahoma. I think what has happened basically is that we have seen
a very impressive lobbying effort where the railroads have gotten
together with the unions and divided up $15 billion, which is the only
barrier between the taxpayer and massive injection of Federal funds
into the railroad retirement program. And basically this has been
lobbied as some movement toward private investment in railroad
retirement.
The Senator from Oklahoma and I both support private investment, but
the problem is that under the cloak of investing this $15 billion, as
the actuaries of railroad retirement show very clearly, under this
bill, $15 billion plus all the interest earned on all the investments
made will be pillaged over the next 17 years as that money is taken out
and miraculously divided exactly equally between the railroads and the
railroad retirees.
The railroads have lobbied hard for the bill because they say they
cannot pay 16.1-percent payroll taxes. They can't afford it. Yet under
this bill, in 19 years, they are going to be moving toward paying 22-
percent payroll taxes because they will have depleted the trust fund.
Does anybody believe they can or will pay 22-percent payroll taxes in
19 years? Does anybody believe the railroads are not going to be before
the Congress saying they will be driven into bankruptcy, and they will
have to shut down every railroad in America if they are forced to pay a
22-percent payroll tax? But that is what is required to keep this
program solvent, after you pillage $15 billion.
I thank the Senator from Oklahoma. This has been an uphill battle.
Americans love bipartisanship and they love consensus. Those are
wonderful things, but they are very dangerous things. What we have had
is the railroads and the labor unions getting together, each having
their affection attracted because they each get $7.5 billion, but what
we have really seen is a consensus against the taxpayers' interest. The
Senator from Oklahoma has been courageous in standing up and pointing
out that this emperor has no clothing. I congratulate him for that. We
are going to have one final vote before the bill is passed, and that is
a point of order.
The telltale sign of the problem with this bill is not just that $15
billion is divided up between the railroads and the railway unions. It
is that in making the transfer this year, we are going to increase the
deficit by $15.3 billion. We have a budget that gives us some power in
trying to prevent these things from happening. If we were offsetting
the $15.3 billion in some other way, there would be no budget point of
order, but there is a budget point of order because we are violating
the budget.
The final vote we are going to have is the vote on whether or not we
are going to enforce the budget. I have to say, we have already started
to see a partisan debate where many of our colleagues are saying we
have a deficit because of the tax cut. Today on this bill, we are going
to raise the deficit by 40 percent of the impact of the entire tax cut
for this year. In fact, we are approaching the point where we will have
increased spending $100 billion above the budget this year.
If somebody votes to waive the budget point of order and says, we do
not care about the budget, the sky is the limit, we can spend anything
we want to spend and this is a popular thing to spend it on, then I
hope they will not be out arguing that they are very concerned about
the deficit.
You cannot have it both ways. You cannot be for adding $15 billion to
the deficit and be concerned about the deficit. You cannot be for
increasing the deficit on one day and blaming somebody else for it on
the other.
I thank our colleague for his leadership. I intend to vote against
waiving the budget point of order. I hope my colleagues will as well.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Carper). The Senator from Montana.
Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, I will be brief. We have had these
arguments
[[Page S12393]]
and made our points many times. It is important to put all of this in
perspective. There is a lot of arcane budget language discussion here.
A lot of that is very important. There is an important reason for
having budgets.
Cutting through all the technical budget arcane language and green
eyeshade stuff, very simply the situation is this: The railroad
retirement trust fund has built up a large balance. The question is
what we should do about that.
We have decided in this legislation that the balance should be
reduced by lowering the taxes the railroad companies have to pay--and
they are extraordinarily high taxes today--and also increasing survivor
benefits, for example, and the early retirement age which conforms with
current practices in other industries.
The charge is made that the balance will be too low, and that is
going to jeopardize the budget, it is going to jeopardize the trust
fund.
The fact is this legislation provides for many safeguards; there are
actuarial reports, financial statements, and reports to the contrary.
The actuary himself has said at no time, even under this legislation,
will the balance in the trust fund be at such a level that it
jeopardizes the fund or payments to the beneficiaries or cause undue
strain on the railroad companies. That is the actuary's projection. He
makes that projection for the next 75 years.
Those of us in Congress have a hard time trying to predict what the
economic situation is going to be 10 years from now. That is pretty
hard to predict. What we are talking about with this legislation is at
least 20 years from now, because that is when the trust fund is going
to be dipping down to a lower level than is the case today. We have all
kinds of oversight reports required by the legislation to make sure the
trust fund is safe.
The Senator from Oklahoma says we have to borrow $15 billion. That is
technically true, but that is a wash because the trust fund will
receive $15 billion in assets. We have unified accounting in this case,
so as a practical matter, that has virtually no effect on the budget.
Also, with respect to the trust fund, it is a wash, too, because some
of those securities will be private securities as opposed to public
securities.
Altogether, this is a bill that has been worked on for a long time.
Seventy-four Members of the Senate cosponsored this legislation. We
considered the bill last year in the Finance Committee. Over 20
amendments were offered. The House has passed this legislation twice,
both times by very large margins. If this point of order is not waived,
if this technicality is not waived, then there will be no bill passed
and this bill is going to die.
Mr. REID. Will the Senator yield 2 minutes to the Senator from
Nevada?
Mr. BAUCUS. Absolutely.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, this legislation is sponsored by Senators
Baucus and Hatch. If there were ever two people who are fiscally
conservative, it is Senators Baucus and Hatch. I do not need anything
else other than to know they are the ones who are pushing this
legislation to make me very comfortable with every vote I have taken.
I publicly commend and applaud Senators Baucus and Hatch for their
leadership on this issue. We have gone a long way the last few days
under their leadership. Everyone should feel very good about waiving
the Budget Act. Remember, we are being asked to do this by two of the
most fiscally conservative people we have in the Senate--Senators
Baucus and Hatch.
Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.
Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, how much time is remaining?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Fifty-three seconds.
Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, I want to clarify a few points. This $15
billion transfer in the outstanding publicly held debt is not a wash.
That is $15 billion added to the deficit, added to national debt. We
are going to have to borrow about $1 billion a year, maybe forever, to
pay for this. The Senator from Montana said this legislation makes
benefits conform with the norm. It is not the norm in the private
sector pension benefits to get a 100-percent pension benefit at age 60.
That is not the norm. Nor is it the norm to have survivor benefits
equal 100 percent. That is not the norm. They are very generous
benefits.
I do not begrudge them having generous benefits. I just do not want
to have taxpayers pay for them when and if the fund goes broke, and
even under their projections it almost goes broke. Why? Because we
increase benefits and cut the taxes and also we keep the Federal
guarantee, and we have to waive the Budget Act to do it.
We did not put this money in the budget. We should have. I urge my
colleagues not to waive the budget act provisions.
I ask for the yeas and nays on the motion.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana has 4\1/2\ minutes
remaining.
Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, I am not going to use all my time. We have
had a very good debate on this bill. I strongly urge Members to vote to
waive the point of order because this is a very sound, fiscally
responsible bill. I know Senators will be very proud in voting for this
legislation.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator yields back his time.
All time having expired, the question is on agreeing to the motion to
waive section 302(f) of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 in
relation to amendment No. 2170. The yeas and nays have been ordered.
The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk called the roll.
Mr. REID. I announce that the Senate from Connecticut (Mr. Lieberman)
is absent attending a funeral.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber
desiring to vote?
The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 80, nays 19, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 350 Leg.]
YEAS--80
Akaka
Allen
Baucus
Bayh
Biden
Bingaman
Bond
Boxer
Breaux
Brownback
Burns
Byrd
Cantwell
Carnahan
Carper
Chafee
Cleland
Clinton
Collins
Conrad
Corzine
Craig
Crapo
Daschle
Dayton
DeWine
Dodd
Domenici
Dorgan
Durbin
Edwards
Enzi
Feingold
Feinstein
Fitzgerald
Graham
Grassley
Hagel
Harkin
Hatch
Hollings
Hutchinson
Hutchison
Inhofe
Inouye
Jeffords
Johnson
Kennedy
Kerry
Kohl
Landrieu
Leahy
Levin
Lincoln
McCain
Mikulski
Miller
Murkowski
Murray
Nelson (FL)
Nelson (NE)
Reed
Reid
Roberts
Rockefeller
Santorum
Sarbanes
Schumer
Sessions
Shelby
Smith (OR)
Snowe
Specter
Stabenow
Stevens
Torricelli
Voinovich
Warner
Wellstone
Wyden
NAYS--19
Allard
Bennett
Bunning
Campbell
Cochran
Ensign
Frist
Gramm
Gregg
Helms
Kyl
Lott
Lugar
McConnell
Nickles
Smith (NH)
Thomas
Thompson
Thurmond
NOT VOTING--1
Lieberman
The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 80, the nays are
19. Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in
the affirmative, the motion is agreed to. The point of order falls.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
Mr. BAUCUS. I move to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order the amendment No.
2170 is agreed to.
Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. President, I rise today in strong support of
legislation to reform the Railroad Retirement system. Reform
legislation has 75 cosponsors in the Senate and I am proud to be one of
them. Over the past 65 years, Railroad Retirement has provided a safe
guarantee of benefits to railworkers and their families. In order to
keep these benefits secure, both management and labor have endeavored
to come up with an agreement that would strengthen the Railroad
Retirement system, and I believe that this legislation, The Railroad
Retirement and Survivors' Improvement Act has done just that.
[[Page S12394]]
This legislation represents a balanced benefits package that together
with phased-in tax cuts can provide and ensure the financial integrity
of the Railroad Trust fund. This bill introduces sound investment
techniques into the effort to make better use of resources built up by
railway employees many who live in my home State of Oregon.
The legislation relies upon a number of features to ensure the fund
will meet its benefit obligations to retirees:
Fund Reserves. The legislation maintains four to six years
worth of benefits in reserve as a safety margin.
Automatic Tax Adjustment. Tax rates on employers and
employees will be adjusted automatically in an effort to
maintain a fund balance sufficient to pay between four and
six years of benefits.
Asset Management. Assets will be managed much like private
pension funds, providing the opportunity to earn higher rates
of return than the current 6 percent rate of return. Higher
returns will provide additional funds for benefit payments
and reduce the need for high payroll taxes.
I have been particularly worried about the plight of widows and
widowers of retired railroad employees. Under current law, their
monthly checks actually decline by two-thirds when a spouse dies. I
believe this trust fund can do better by these widows and widowers and
am happy that this legislation calls for the surviving spouse to
receive 100 percent of what the retired employee was entitled to.
Almost 50,000 retirees will be affected by this provision.
Further, this legislation allows the industry to reduce the
burdensome payroll tax it now carries to provide benefits. A three
percentage point drop in payroll taxes is phased in over three years.
The payroll tax was a very real disincentive to hiring employees or
replacing retirees and it frees up capital for other expenditures.
I am sure that the relatively swift passage of this reform
legislation is welcome by those in the Railroad industry and urge all
my colleagues, including the 75 cosponsors of this bill in the Senate,
to continue to give it strong backing to ensure these needed
improvements are enacted and beneficiaries see these desperately-needed
changes.
____________________