[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 158 (Monday, December 12, 2005)]
[Senate]
[Pages S13435-S13437]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




             PENSIONS, RECONCILIATION AND EDUCATION FUNDING

  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, as Congress meets for a final session 
before we adjourn for the holidays, we should be focused on the true 
meaning of Christmas and the special thoughts that Americans of many 
faiths have at this time of year regarding their families, their 
friends and neighbors, and the rest of humanity.
  Christmas is a season of great hope--a time of goodwill and special 
caring for others. That's what we should remember as we celebrate the 
birth of Christ, and the glad tidings of great joy that came to us that 
day.
  There are those in America who urge the return of the word 
``Christmas'' to this holiday season. I believe that Christmas is more 
than a word. It is a belief in a power far greater than ourselves. It 
is a belief in the possibility of lives full of hope and fulfillment. 
It is a belief that each of us has a sacred obligation to care for one 
another and to help those in need--to lend a hand to the least of those 
in our midst.
  But I am sad to report, that is not what we are seeing in Congress 
this week.
  As families across America struggle to make ends meet with higher 
health costs, higher college costs, higher gas prices, higher heating 
costs, and higher housing costs, Congress is about to make things worse 
for them.
  Millionaires will be given tens of thousands of dollars in new tax 
breaks, but Medicaid cuts could mean that 22 million poor Americans 
will face a reduction in help from that lifesaving program and two 
million others may lose their health care entirely.
  Proposed budget cuts would mean that 750,000 poor preschoolers who 
are eligible for Head Start won't be able to get into the program.
  More than a quarter of a million poor Americans could lose their food 
stamps, and could face hunger. These cuts are proposed just as the 
Department of Agriculture reports that 38 million Americans face 
hunger, an increase of 5 million in 5 years.
  Hundreds of thousands of children could lose their child support 
because of Republican proposals to cut enforcement against delinquent 
fathers.
  Three million poor children could be left behind in school. They 
won't get the quality teachers and after-school help and supplemental 
services they need to catch up and succeed.
  Hundreds of thousands of airline workers--the ones who are helping us 
get home for the holidays--could see their pensions hanging in the 
balance, and millions of other Americans could lose their pensions, 
too.
  That is what is at stake in Congress this Christmas. Are these 
actions consistent with the spirit of this holiday season? Rather than 
debate whether the word ``Christmas'' should appear in our stores and 
on our greeting cards, shouldn't we be living out the hope that came 
from the first Christmas and do more for our fellow citizens than 
greater tax breaks for the rich and greater hardship for the poor and 
struggling middle class?
  As Christian leader Reverend Jim Wallis said last week:

       The Bible does not condemn prosperity. It just insists that 
     it be shared.

  So I would hope that those in Congress who seek to lavish more tax 
breaks on the privileged few at the expense of the rest of America will 
reconsider--not only at Christmas, but throughout the year.
  Otherwise, what we face this week is a Republican plan in which 
billions of dollars will go from programs that assist low income 
families and senior citizens into the pockets of the already wealthy.
  The provisions in the House bill that would cut the tax rate on 
capital gains and dividend income are particularly unfair, because more 
than 86 percent of the tax benefits will go to taxpayers with incomes 
above $100,000 a year. Nearly half the benefits--45 percent--will go to 
taxpayers with incomes over $1 million a year. The average millionaire 
will save $32,000 a year from these tax breaks for capital gains and 
dividends. In stark contrast, families with incomes less than $100,000 
would receive an average tax cut of only $29.
  This is by no means the only outrageous provision in the Republican 
plan--just the most costly. There are others. Republicans in the House 
propose a $5 billion tax break for financial services companies doing 
business in foreign countries. This provision actually creates a tax 
incentive for these huge corporations to invest abroad instead of in 
the United States.
  The spirit of Christmas should compel us to take another path. We 
should start investing in the health and well-being of all families. 
The average family is being squeezed unmercifully by stagnant wages and 
ever-increasing costs for the basic necessities of life. The cost of 
health insurance has risen 59 percent in the last five years. Gasoline 
is up 74 percent. College tuition is up 46 percent. Housing is up 44 
percent. The list goes on and on, up and up--and paychecks are buying 
less each year.
  The economic trends are very disturbing for any who are willing to 
look at them objectively. The gap between rich and poor has been 
widening in recent years. Mr. President, 37 million Americans now live 
in poverty, up 19 percent during the Bush Administration. One in six 
American children lives in poverty and 14 million children go to bed 
hungry each night. Long-term unemployment is at historic highs.
  The silent slavery of poverty is not so silent anymore. Katrina 
focused the Nation's attention on the immense hardships that low-income 
Americans face each day, and presented us with an historic and 
challenging opportunity to find better ways to lift up the most 
vulnerable among us.
  This is Christmas. Surely, the American people deserve better.
  In the Senate, we did our best to respond to the needs of average 
Americans by helping to expand access to a college education. We cut 
the fat out of bank profits and put it back where it belongs--helping 
students afford the cost of college. Our bill included a virtually 
unprecedented increase in need-based aid--over $8.25 billion over 5 
years.
  All together, it provides $12 billion in new aid and additional 
benefits for needy children who have the ability to go to schools and 
colleges all across this country--bipartisan, unanimous, out of our 
committee and on the floor of the Senate, all in jeopardy this 
afternoon. Hopefully, our good chairman, Chairman Enzi, will be able to 
fight for those provisions. But that is now in jeopardy from those who 
believe that tax breaks are more important than our children's future. 
Americans know that education is the great equalizer. When young people 
work hard,

[[Page S13436]]

study, play by the rules to be well qualified academically, they should 
be able to attend college. The cost of public college tuition fees has 
skyrocketed 46 percent since 2001. That leaves the lowest income 
students at 4-year public colleges with an average of $5,800 in unmet 
need.
  Too many qualified students, 400,000 each year, do not go to a 4-year 
college. They can't afford it. They have the academic ability to 
succeed in those schools and colleges. They will not do that, and they 
cannot do that because of the finances. Almost 200,000 do not attend 
even a community college.
  This is not acceptable, and we should be able to do better.
  In addition, the Republican plan, as we found in the bill funding 
education and health care, will cut funds for public schools for the 
first time in a decade, leaving 3 million children behind. It provides 
no new funds for afterschool programs. It strips funding for technology 
in our schools.
  The bill covers even less of the cost of meeting the educational 
needs of students with disabilities. Instead of meeting our promise to 
parents and communities to do more, we are doing less.
  Remember when we passed the IDEA program, we said we would establish 
that the Federal Government would get 40 percent to pay for disabled 
children and that we expect the States and local communities to pick up 
the difference. Now we are retreating.
  We have attempted, under the leadership of Senator Harkin, to be able 
to meet that responsibility. And now we are finding that 18 percent is 
slipping and going in the wrong direction rather than helping States, 
local communities and parents, particularly the parents that have 
disabled children.
  It leaves Pell grants frozen in place for the fourth year in a row, 
even as college costs are soaring.
  That is in the Republican proposal.
  The Republican proposal cuts job training, even as the number of good 
jobs is shrinking, and fails to provide adequate increases for programs 
to ensure worker safety.
  We have 161,100 unemployed workers in my State of Massachusetts. Yet 
funds for unemployment insurance offices and to help unemployed workers 
with job-seeking are being cut.
  The proposal cuts job training, even as the number of good jobs is 
shrinking. We have 73,000 jobs that are going, that are vacant by 
employers all over our State. But we are missing is the linkage between 
training these workers so they can get these jobs and so they will be 
taxpayers contributing to their community and making a difference. We 
are cutting back on that program.
  The House bill cuts the child support enforcement program by $5 
billion over 5 years, resulting in a $24 billion reduction in child 
support collections over the next ten years. The House bill will reduce 
child support collections in Massachusetts by $140 million over the 
next five years. This is an enforcement program to make those who have 
an obligation to children take personal responsibility and help their 
children grow and learn. The House bill cuts this necessary and 
successful support program.
  There are currently over 13,500 children in Massachusetts waiting for 
child care. Do you know what? We are cutting back the number of Child 
care subsidies for low income families. Who knows how many more 
thousands of people will not work because they cannot provide and look 
after their children any longer.
  Does that particularly make sense with regard to the child and the 
parent in terms of the family? Clearly, it does not.
  Funding for unemployment insurance has been cut by $141 million, and 
funds for programs to help unemployed workers with job seeking have 
been cut by $89 million, even in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, with 8 
million Americans unemployed.
  We know those within the administration would like to pretend Katrina 
never existed and the devastation that took place in Mississippi and 
New Orleans never happened. Those people should disappear, deny that 
those States are part of the United States of America. We are one 
country. We do have one history. We are one Nation. And now we 
pretending, evidently, that disaster never took place.
  Finally, I want to go into the area of health care. We live in an era 
of medical miracles. This is the life science century. We have had the 
mapping of the human genome, the DNA, the sequencing of the gene. These 
breakthroughs which were unheard of 10, 15, 20, 30 years ago, bringing 
together the latest new technologies in engineering, with the latest in 
terms of the possibility of research--and the possibilities are 
virtually unlimited in our lifetime--to see major breakthroughs for new 
cures for multiple sclerosis, cancer, diabetes, Parkinson's disease, 
and Alzheimer's disease.
  What do we do after the Congress and Senate doubled the NIH budget? 
We see the possibilities, but we are basically cutting back on those 
possibilities and cutting back for giving help and assistance to our 
fellow citizens.
  Finally, I am deeply concerned about what is happening to the 
millions of our fellow citizens who are looking to retirement and 
looking to pensions. We know there is effectively a three-legged stool 
for retirees. If you look at what has happened to their savings, they 
have been effectively eviscerated, wiped out because of the sudden 
increased costs that working families have been affected by. If they 
had been in the 401(k)s, they have had virtual stability and very 
little growth in recent years.
  The last major part is the pensions, and 700 companies have dropped 
their pension plans, and an estimated $8 billion in future benefits has 
been lost to American workers in the period of the last 5 years--$8 
billion that has been paid in by American workers who sacrifice; who 
say: No, we will not take more wages to provide for our family now, we 
want to put something aside for when we require. No, we will not take 
that extra money so we can have a little vacation. We will put it 
aside. We need those resources. We will put it aside for another day. 
No, we will sacrifice in terms of additional time. We will work 
overtime, and we will contribute into the pensions, $8 billion in the 
last 5 years--and those numbers are going to continue unless we pass a 
pension bill.
  We can't get in conference with the House of Representatives. Do you 
want to know why? Because House Leadership is holding a bill 
effectively hostage in the House of Representatives.
  What are you going to tell those airline workers? You talk about 
abuse of power and abuse of authority. It is absolutely outrageous.
  The Senate moved toward a pension bill last month. We passed that 
with two dissenting votes--not everything that Senator Enzi would have 
wanted, not everything that I would have wanted, certainly not what a 
lot of others would have wanted. Our leaders in this, Senators 
Mikulski, Tom Harkin, Jeff Bingaman, and many others, bipartisan in 
nature, Republican and Democrats alike, got together and passed that 
legislation under the leadership of Senator Enzi, and we are being 
effectively stonewalled.
  The House could have engaged in a bi-partisan process. But instead 
they chose to forge ahead with a bill that has no Democratic support 
and that threatens our manufacturing companies, cutting off benefits 
for workers whose plants close; leaves older workers without 
protections when their companies switch to new plans; and leaves 
workers at the mercy of conflicted investment advice. That is why they 
are unable to pass legislation this year.
  I urge members of the House to take a page from the Senate's book. It 
is not too late to reach a consensus on a bill that can be passed 
quickly with Democratic support.
  We are talking about the holiday season. We are talking about the 
Christmas time. Hundreds of thousands of workers, retirees of airline 
companies, see their retirement on the line.
  That includes the retired mechanic, Randy Daly, of Apple Valley, MN, 
who spent 40 years as a mechanic at Northwest Airlines. At 61, he 
thought his best years were ahead of him. But now he has learned, if 
his company's pension plan fails, he stands to lose over 40 percent of 
his retirement benefits. Most of his fellow retirees fear a similar 
fate.
  Our airline companies are under tremendous financial pressure from 
terrorism, the recent catastrophes of Hurricane Rita and Hurricane 
Katrina, and increased jet fuel costs. Some of these

[[Page S13437]]

companies have filed for bankruptcy. The list goes on, as the Senator 
from West Virginia knows.

  The whole challenge is for many manufacturers, the hundreds of 
thousands of workers in companies such as Bethlehem Steel, LTV, many of 
the coal and other companies where workers have paid the price and lost 
their pensions. We should not be waiting more time for the brink of 
failure before we act. This legislation helps nearly millions of 
workers and retirees. We should not at this time turn them down.
  In the pension bill we also included the key reforms to respond to 
the Enron, the WorldComs, and other corporate scandals where employees 
were forced to invest in company stock at a huge risk and then lost it 
all while the employers walked away with huge pension security 
packages.
  Finally, we address the women's retirement security with provisions 
from the Women's Pension Protection Act, which was bipartisan. The 
Senator from Maine, Senator Snowe, myself, and many others, recognized 
the particular challenges women have in terms of the pension issue.
  American workers and their families expect Congress to protect their 
hard-earned pensions. Americans expect Congress to help them send their 
children to college, not make it more expensive at a time when workers 
need more and more skills. Americans expect Congress to increase, not 
cut, education and job training. Americans expect Congress to help 
secure health care, not cut health care assistance. Americans expect 
more from us. Americans deserve better, especially at this 
Christmastime.
  Mr. BYRD. Will the Senator yield?
  Mr. KENNEDY. I am happy to yield.
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I thank the Senator for the speech he made. 
I am glad I stayed and listened to his speech. It is one of his finest 
speeches. It is a speech made in the true spirit of Christmas, too. The 
Senator, once again, stands for the poor, the downtrodden, those who 
cannot be here to speak for themselves.
  I thank the Senator for this speech. He is truly in my book one of 
the great Senators for all time. We have not always agreed. We have not 
even liked each other in long ages ago, times past. But that is in the 
past. I think so highly of this Senator. I am glad I stayed here to 
hear this speech. It was certainly thoughtful. It was needed at this 
time. I congratulate the Senator. Tomorrow, I may speak a little bit on 
the same subject--not as eloquently as he has but certainly along the 
same line.
  I hope I can do that.
  Mr. KENNEDY. I thank the Senator for his kind words and for his 
typical graciousness. I am so glad we had an opportunity to have a 
brief celebration at your recent birthday. It is good to see the 
Senator up, as always, in fighting trim and fighting form.
  I am grateful for the Senator's comments.
  Mr. BYRD. I thank the Senator.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming.

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