[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 43 (Wednesday, March 31, 2004)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3391-S3392]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              THE ECONOMY

  Mr. ALLARD. Mr. President, I thank the Senators from Virginia and 
Mississippi for their comments. I want to talk a little bit about the 
economy.
  First of all, I want to point out this President inherited a bad 
economy. When he inherited this bad economy, he could have taken the 
old solution to all of our problems: You increase taxes and spending 
and somehow the other things are going to be better.
  He took a new approach. The new concept was you need to cut taxes. By 
cutting taxes, you are going to stimulate productivity and the economy 
is going to grow. So the President courageously stepped forward, got 
his tax package passed out of the House and the Senate. The major tax 
packages were in 2001 and 2003. We did some in other years. We did a 
little dribbling and working to reduce taxes. The fact is, by reducing 
taxes during a time when we had taxes at an all-time high, we have 
helped the economy.
  There is a lot of talk on the floor about how bad the economy has 
been, but that reaches back into the bad economy this President 
inherited when he moved into the Presidency.
  The President's tax package is now beginning to work. Look at the 
economic indicators put out by the Joint Economic Committee in February 
of 2004. We talk about the unemployment rate, and that is going down. 
Employment is going up. Wages are going up. We have a chart that shows 
real gross private domestic investment going up. Corporate profits are 
going up. We have another chart here that shows farm income is going 
up. We have sources of personal income. That is going up. Total output, 
income and spending, those are going up. Production and business 
activity is now going up. Common stocks, prices, and yields are all 
going up in response to the President's economic package.
  I went on the Internet this morning to see what was being said there: 
Consumer spending strong, and business investment rebounding. It had a 
chart showing how those factors were coming together. That is this 
morning. Then we see another chart that shows jobless claims continuing 
to trend downward. It shows an increase in the jobless rate at the time 
the President inherited this economy, and now we see, as his tax 
package has had an opportunity to go into effect, the jobless rate is 
going down.
  The President's package for stimulating our economy has worked. It 
would be a shame if we walked away from that and went back to the old 
solutions which were to increase spending and raise taxes. That is the 
wrong solution at the wrong time.
  The right solution is what the President has talked about. We need to 
cut taxes and spending in order that this economy continues to prosper, 
as we have seen in the figures from the last several months.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Nevada.

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