[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 131 (Tuesday, October 8, 2002)]
[House]
[Page H7174]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     SOCIAL SECURITY PRIVATIZATION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the order of the House of 
January 23, 2002, the gentleman from California (Mr. Matsui) is 
recognized during morning hour debates for 5 minutes.
  Mr. MATSUI. Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the gentlewoman from 
Texas for her comments and certainly the gentleman from Missouri, the 
Democratic leader, for helping put this together this morning.
  This is not a theoretical debate. The whole issue of Social Security 
privatization is a real discussion, something that really will, in 
fact, occur in 2003.
  The gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Tom Davis), the Chair of the 
Republican Campaign Committee, said in the month of August that 
privatization will be a 2003 issue, they intend to bring it up. Paul 
O'Neill, the Secretary of the Treasury, has said that he intends to 
have the President bring up privatization of Social Security in 2003 
after the November 5 election.
  The reason this is a theoretical debate is because this is hard to 
believe, but my Republican colleagues have five real plans to privatize 
Social Security. We have President Bush who convened a 14-member 
commission of experts that essentially came up with three plans to 
privatize Social Security. The gentleman from Florida (Mr. Shaw), the 
chairman of the Subcommittee on Social Security of the Committee on 
Ways and Means, has drafted a privatization of Social Security plan; 
and the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Armey), the majority leader, has come 
up with a plan to privatize Social Security as well.
  So we have five plans, one of which will undoubtedly be the plan that 
will be brought up and attempted to be adopted by the President in the 
year 2003. I thought it would be important for us to talk about this 
because obviously, if this comes up, the American public should know 
exactly what we are talking about before the November election.
  My Republican colleagues will say, well, the gentleman from 
California (Mr. Matsui), the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt), 
the gentlewoman form Texas (Ms. Eddie Bernice Johnson) are just trying 
to scare seniors; but by explaining these plans, we hope we are not 
attempting to scare seniors, but what we are trying to do is explain to 
the American public exactly what these plans are, because it will be 
coming up in the year 2003.
  For example, the Shaw plan, which is a privatization plan, the 
gentleman from Florida (Mr. Shaw) has not explained to us that within 
30 years, by privatizing Social Security, it will require $6.9 trillion 
or approximately $7 trillion of general fund moneys. We know that those 
general fund moneys do not exist so we wonder where this general fund 
money is going to come from, and the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Shaw) 
also in his plan is basically an arbitrage plan. They borrow the $6.9 
trillion and then invest it in the stock market and hope the rate of 
return will be better and higher than the rate of loss in borrowing 
that money; and so if, in fact, the market drops, it will result in a 
cut in benefits.
  The same thing with the gentleman from Texas' (Mr. Armey) and the 
gentleman from South Carolina's (Mr. DeMint) plan. In a 30-year period, 
they are going to have to borrow $10 trillion; and that basically would 
mean tripling, tripling the national debt of this country, to put that 
in perspective. It would triple the national debt of this country.
  Then we have, of course, the President's three plans, some of which, 
$3.3 trillion, that would require up to a 54 percent cut in benefits 
not only for seniors but also for the disabled and survivor's benefits 
for families with minor children and a surviving spouse. So we are 
talking about plans that will either cost trillions of dollars by 
tripling the national debt; or we are talking about a combination of 
those, plus massive cuts in benefits for the American public.
  I have to just say, Mr. Speaker, that my colleagues on the other side 
of the aisle have tried to obscure this issue by saying that personal 
savings accounts are not privatization. Personal savings accounts are, 
in fact, privatization. They were talking about, let us not really 
bring this issue up this year because we do not want to alarm the 
American public. But then why have they introduced five pieces of 
legislation and why has the Secretary of the Treasury talked about 
bringing this issue up in the year 2003?
  This is an issue that the American public should be aware of today 
because it will be massive cuts in benefits, particularly given the 
fact that the market has collapsed at this time and given the fact that 
that is the only defined benefit that most Americans have.

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