[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 22 (Wednesday, February 4, 2009)]
[House]
[Pages H1012-H1013]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




            WE CANNOT SUBSIDIZE OR BORROW OUR WAY TO GROWTH

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Boccieri). Under a previous order of

[[Page H1013]]

the House, the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur) is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, when is the group in charge of the U.S. 
economy here in Washington going to wake up and take notice our trade 
accounts are as out of balance as our mortgage market?
  Congress can't keep tweaking consumer purchasing with stimulus checks 
and then crossing its fingers in hopes that by some miracle it will 
actually lift our economy. More borrowed money simply means more short-
term palliatives.
  Hardworking families in our country do not need a consolation prize. 
They demand a real solution. What they need is a workable path by which 
they can become part of a growing economy. When recovery dollars are 
spent on goods largely imported from somewhere else, the promised bang 
to rescue our economy is received but as a mere whimper.
  Congress must address the greater trade and tax structure problems 
pulling on our purse strings. Take, for example, trade deficits growing 
between our Nation and industrialized economies from other parts of the 
world. Those are just getting worse. Like the outsourcing of U.S. jobs. 
What are we going to do about that? Like global closed markets. Who's 
going to open those up? And, like the value added tax, which creates 
such a damper on U.S. production.
  A trillion dollars more in spending by Congress will miss the real 
mark of healing our economy by adding the important legs of tax reform 
and trade reform. While trade laws and tax laws remain as critical 
components of real long-term recovery, we cannot subsidize or borrow 
our way to growth. We are already paying over $200 billion on borrowed 
money to foreign interests, and those numbers are going to grow. And 
they are more than willing to put America in hock.
  Wake up and take notice. If we want to see the benefits of growth, 
America must produce, not placate its way to prosperity.
  As we approach NAFTA's 15-year anniversary, let's take a look at a 
textbook example of failed promises of prosperity. When NAFTA passed 
Congress by a tiny margin in 1993, proponents like President Clinton 
said that this new trade agreement would bring unprecedented prosperity 
and create millions of jobs across America. It was said the agreement 
would lock in trade surpluses, expand trade gains, and solve many of 
the social and economic ills facing North America, like illegal 
immigration.
  Let's take a look at the record. On its 10th anniversary, the U.S.-
Mexico trade surplus wallowed into an estimated $40 billion deficit.

                              {time}  1715

  And U.S. jobs reported lost? 879,000. And workers' wages? They failed 
to keep pace with productivity gains. We have not seen a single year of 
trade balance with Mexico since 1994, much less a surplus as was 
promised.
  The growing trade deficit with Mexico is just one staggering figure 
in our trade deficit accounts. Wages in Mexico have fallen 
dramatically, and the drug trade has snuggled up against our border and 
yielded murder as well as violent crime that has surged over into our 
country in places like Phoenix. And there is an upheaval churning on 
both sides of the border.
  Fifteen years ago, NAFTA was sold by the Clinton administration as a 
development strategy for Mexico, promising alleviation of poverty and 
inequity, while simultaneously halting illegal border crossings because 
it promised so much opportunity at home for Mexicans. Sound familiar? 
It is no surprise that many of the Wall Street proponents of the 
bailout were the same ones who wrote NAFTA 15 years ago and fought on 
the side of big business, just like today. Take Citigroup, for example, 
or Goldman Sachs. They were in there with both fists.
  Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentlewoman yield?
  Ms. KAPTUR. I will be pleased to yield to the gentleman when I am 
finished.
  A healthy economy will require policy changes, not cough drops. We 
need products on our shelves that are produced by Americans. We need 
real wealth creation here at home. We need trade that is prosperous and 
balanced, in the black, not in the red. And, we must infuse the power 
of our marketplace here at home to produce long term, to spur the 
necessary social and physical infrastructures to restore economic 
strength to our Nation rather than growing weakness. We need free trade 
among free people. America needs balanced trade accounts, not more 
trade deficits and one-sided trade agreements. And America needs 
production, not subsidy.
  Most of all, we need changes in our trade policies and our tax 
policies that create real investment and long-term growth in our Nation 
so we don't have to continue borrowing our way forward and making our 
children and grandchildren debtors into the vast part of this new 
century and millennium.
  Now, the gentleman, who was a chief opponent to my views on NAFTA, 
what does he have to report as he asks for some of this time?
  Mr. DREIER. I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. I wanted to rise 
and congratulate her for making some very good points, and to say that 
I completely concur with her argument in support of free trade among 
free peoples.
  And I believe that if you look at the dramatic changes that have 
taken place, still very serious problems, the gentlewoman is absolutely 
right in focusing on narcotrafficking, which has been one of the most 
serious challenges. And President Felipe Calderon, the relatively new 
president of Mexico, has been very bold and courageous in standing up 
to those narcotraffickers.
  And it is true, much of that has spilled over into the United States. 
But I believe that the fact that we are working together, Mexico and 
the United States, to try and focus on narcotrafficking and to try and 
encourage greater commerce so that we can sell more into Mexico is in 
fact a very good policy for us to pursue. We have the North American 
Free Trade Agreement. It is my hope, Mr. Speaker, that we will be able 
to build on that so that we can address the very correct concerns that 
my colleague has raised. And I thank my friend for yielding.
  Ms. KAPTUR. I thank the gentleman for his comments, and just say I 
just wish that the main product that was being sent here wasn't illegal 
narcotics.

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