[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 162 (Thursday, December 9, 2010)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8701-S8708]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
AIRPORT AND AIRWAY EXTENSION ACT OF 2010--Resumed
Pending:
Reid motion to concur in the amendment of the House to the
amendment of the Senate to the bill, with Reid amendment No.
4727 (to the House amendment to the Senate amendment), to
change the enactment date.
Reid amendment No. 4728 (to amendment No. 4727), of a
perfecting nature.
Reid motion to refer the message of the House on the bill
to the Committee on Finance, with instructions, Reid
amendment No. 4729, to provide for a study.
Reid amendment No. 4730 (the instructions) (to amendment
No. 4729), of a perfecting nature.
Reid amendment No. 4731 (to amendment No. 4730), of a
perfecting nature.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, what is the pending business before the
Senate?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The pending business is the motion to concur--
--
Mr. REID. The message to accompany H.R. 4853.
Mr. President, I move to table my motion and ask for the yeas and
nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second? There appears to
be a sufficient second.
The question is on agreeing to the motion.
The clerk will call the roll.
Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Indiana (Mr. Bayh), the
Senator from Alaska (Mr. Begich), the Senator from California (Mrs.
Boxer), the Senator from Delaware (Mr.
[[Page S8702]]
Coons), the Senator from Connecticut (Mr. Dodd), the Senator from
Wisconsin (Mr. Feingold), the Senator from South Dakota (Mr. Johnson),
the Senator from Florida (Mr. Nelson), the Senator from Montana (Mr.
Tester), the Senator from Virginia (Mr. Warner), and the Senator from
Virginia (Mr. Webb) are necessarily absent.
Mr. KYL. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator
from Kentucky (Mr. Bunning), the Senator from Tennessee (Mr.
Alexander), the Senator from Texas (Mr. Cornyn), the Senator from
Arizona (Mr. Kyl), the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Brownback), the Senator
from Texas (Mrs. Hutchison), the Senator from Oklahoma (Mr. Inhofe),
the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Burr), the Senator from Idaho (Mr.
Crapo), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Graham), the Senator from
New Hampshire (Mr. Gregg), the Senator from Florida (Mr. LeMieux), and
the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter).
Further, if present and voting, the Senator from Kentucky (Mr.
Bunning) would have voted ``yea,'' the Senator from Tennessee (Mr.
Alexander) would have voted ``yea,'' and the Senator from Texas (Mr.
Cornyn) would have voted ``yea.''
The result was announced--yeas 65, nays 11, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 271 Leg.]
YEAS--65
Akaka
Barrasso
Baucus
Bennet
Bennett
Bingaman
Bond
Brown (MA)
Cantwell
Cardin
Carper
Casey
Chambliss
Coburn
Cochran
Collins
Conrad
Corker
Dorgan
Durbin
Enzi
Feinstein
Franken
Gillibrand
Grassley
Hagan
Hatch
Inouye
Isakson
Johanns
Kerry
Kirk
Klobuchar
Kohl
Lautenberg
Leahy
Levin
Lieberman
Lincoln
Lugar
Manchin
McCain
McCaskill
McConnell
Mikulski
Murkowski
Murray
Nelson (NE)
Pryor
Reed
Reid
Risch
Roberts
Rockefeller
Schumer
Sessions
Shaheen
Shelby
Snowe
Specter
Stabenow
Thune
Whitehouse
Wicker
Wyden
NAYS--11
Brown (OH)
DeMint
Ensign
Harkin
Landrieu
Menendez
Merkley
Sanders
Udall (CO)
Udall (NM)
Voinovich
NOT VOTING--24
Alexander
Bayh
Begich
Boxer
Brownback
Bunning
Burr
Coons
Cornyn
Crapo
Dodd
Feingold
Graham
Gregg
Hutchison
Inhofe
Johnson
Kyl
LeMieux
Nelson (FL)
Tester
Vitter
Warner
Webb
The motion was agreed to.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to withdraw my
motion to concur in the House amendment to the Senate amendment to H.R.
4853 with the Reid for Baucus amendment No. 4727.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Merkley). Without objection, it is so
ordered.
Mr. REID. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Motion to Concur with Amendment No. 4753
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I move to concur in the House amendment to
the Senate amendment to H.R. 4853 with the Reid-McConnell amendment No.
4753 and that the amendment be considered read.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
The Senator from Nevada [Mr. Reid] moves to concur in the
House amendment to the Senate amendment No. 4753 to H.R.
4853.
(The amendment is printed in today's Record under ``Text of
Amendments.'')
Mr. REID. I ask for the yeas and nays on that, Mr. President.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There is a sufficient second.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
Amendment No. 4754 to amendment No. 4753
Mr. REID. I have a second-degree amendment at the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
The Senator from Nevada [Mr. Reid] proposes an amendment
numbered 4754 to amendment No. 4753.
Mr. REID. I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment
be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The amendment is as follows:
At the end insert the following: ``The provisions of this
Act shall become effective in 5 days upon enactment.''
Cloture Motion
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I have a cloture motion at the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair directs the
clerk to read the motion.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
Cloture Motion
We, the undersigned Senators, in accordance with the
provisions of rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate,
hereby move to bring to a close debate on the motion to
concur in the House amendment to the Senate amendment to H.R.
4853, the Middle Class Tax Relief Act, with an amendment No.
4753.
Max Baucus, Joseph I. Lieberman, John D. Rockefeller IV,
Byron L. Dorgan, John F. Kerry, Sheldon Whitehouse,
Mark L. Pryor, Robert P. Casey, Jr., Richard J. Durbin,
Mark R. Warner, Jeanne Shaheen, Ben Nelson, Evan Bayh,
Christopher J. Dodd, Kent Conrad, Jim Webb, Bill
Nelson, Amy Klobuchar.
Motion to Refer with Amendment No. 4755
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I move to refer the House message to the
Finance Committee with instructions to report back forthwith, with the
following amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
The Senator from Nevada [Mr. Reid] moves to refer the House
message to the Senate Committee on Finance with instructions
to report back forthwith, with an amendment numbered 4755.
The amendment (No. 4755) is as follows:
At the end, add the following: ``The Senate Finance
Committee is requested to study the impact of any delay in
extending tax cuts to middle income Americans with incomes up
to $250,000.''
Mr. REID. On that I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there sufficient second? There is a
sufficient second.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
Amendment No. 4756
Mr. REID. I have an amendment to my instructions at the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
The Senator from Nevada [Mr. Reid] proposes an amendment
numbered 4756 to the instructions to the motion to refer H.R.
4853.
The amendment is as follows:
At the end, insert the following: ``including specific
information on the impact of the delay in extending the tax
cuts.''
Mr. REID. On that I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second? There is a
sufficient second.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
Amendment No. 4757 to Amendment No. 4756
Mr. REID. I have a second-degree amendment to my instructions.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:
The Senator from Nevada [Mr. Reid] proposes an amendment
numbered 4757 to amendment No. 4756.
The amendment is as follows:
At the end, insert the following: ``and include statistics
which reflect regional differences.''
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the cloture
vote occur on Monday, December 13, at 3 p.m., with the mandatory quorum
being waived.
Before the Chair rules on this, there are some people who need the
ability--anyway, there is no need to go into detail, but for those
people who can't get here on time, if people can't get back until 5:30,
it would be our normal vote. We are not going to cut anyone off at an
unreasonable time. There will be plenty of time for people to vote,
within reason.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Without objection, it is so ordered.
[[Page S8703]]
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont.
Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, as I think almost everyone knows,
President Obama and the Republican leaders have reached an agreement on
taxes. It is, in my view, a bad deal, and I think we can do a lot
better. Tonight, I wish to speak briefly, and I think I will have some
other Senators join me. Tomorrow, I intend to be back to speak a lot
longer about this issue because I think this is an issue the American
people want serious discussion about.
I can tell my colleagues that representing the small State of
Vermont, we have received in the last 3 days thousands--thousands--of
phone calls from my State and from other States, and what I will tell
my colleagues is that 99 percent of those calls were against this
agreement. What I wish to do tonight, briefly, and at greater length
tomorrow, is to tell my colleagues why I vigorously oppose the deal
that has been cut and how we have to move in a very different way if we
are going to save the disappearing middle class of our country.
In my view, the American people are against this agreement. They want
to hear Members of the Senate speak out against this agreement, and
that is what I will do this evening.
Let me explain, very briefly, why I am opposing the agreement reached
by the Republican leadership and President Obama. First, at a time when
our country has a recordbreaking $13.8 trillion national debt and a
collapsing middle class, it is unconscionable to me that we could
support an agreement that drives up our national debt because we have
given huge tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires who don't need
it. Here is an interesting irony: In many cases, they are telling us
they don't even want it. Two of the richest people in the world, Bill
Gates and Warren Buffett, have said: Thank you. We don't need this tax
break.
This country has serious problems. Use the money on those problems,
not giving billionaires a tax break.
In my own State, the founder of Ben & Jerry's ice cream, Ben Cohen,
said: Yes, I would like a tax break, but I don't need it. You know
what.
There are millionaires all over this country who are saying the same
thing.
We have been told that the extension of the tax breaks for the rich
will go on for only 2 years. The Bush tax breaks for the rich will go
on for 2 years. Maybe that is the case, but I personally don't believe
that. I believe that given the political reality that exists in
Washington, my guess is that 2 years from now, when this same debate
happens again, these tax breaks for the rich will once again be
extended. Our Republican colleagues have been very clear they wanted a
10-year extension. It is hard for me to believe that 2 years from now
they are going to say: Oh, 2 years, that is fine. That is enough. We
give up. I don't think so.
The difficulty is, we have a President who campaigned vigorously
against extending these tax breaks for the rich, but those tax breaks
for the rich are in this agreement. So my fear is that if the President
is the Democratic nominee 2 years from now and he says: Trust me, we
are going to stop these tax breaks for the rich, I think his
credibility might not be too high.
So my fear is, in fact, if these Bush tax cuts for the top 2 percent,
many of whom are millionaires and billionaires, are extended over a 10-
year period, we are looking at a $700 billion increase in the national
debt.
Secondly, extending income tax breaks for the top 2 percent is not
the only unfair tax proposal in this agreement. This agreement struck
by the President and the Republican leadership continues the Bush-era
15-percent tax rate on capital gains and dividends, meaning that those
people who make their living off their investments will continue to pay
a substantially lower tax rate than the vast majority of the people in
the middle class--people such as firemen, teachers, and nurses.
On top of all that, this agreement includes a horrendous proposal
regarding the estate tax, a Teddy Roosevelt initiative which was
enacted in 1916. It will be celebrating its 100th birthday in a few
years. Under the agreement we will be debating here, the estate tax
rate, which was 55 percent under President Clinton, will decline to 35
percent under this agreement, with an exemption on the first $5 million
of an individual's estate, $10 million for couples.
I suspect there are people who are watching this evening and they are
saying: Oh, my goodness. I don't want to pay a 55-percent estate tax.
So let me be very clear in saying this, in telling you something the
Republicans do not tell you: that the estate tax applies only to the
top three-tenths of 1 percent, so 99.7 percent of American families do
not pay 5 cents in the estate tax. So this is not just a tax for the
rich; this is a tax for the very rich.
I know many of my Republican colleagues would like to abolish, repeal
the estate tax altogether, and that would cost us $1 trillion over 10
years to our national debt, but they are making significant progress by
lowering the rate to 35 percent.
Does my colleague from Ohio wish to respond?
Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I thank the Senator for yielding. I
hear what the Senator says about the tax burden in this country; that
it falls predominantly on the middle class. When I hear him talk about
the estate tax, couples pay no estate tax on the first $10 million of
their assets after they both die. Considering they shelter a good bit
beyond that, then the tax rate only on the dollars above $10 million
were lowered significantly in this proposal--and then what has happened
with extending the tax cuts.
I was intrigued, I guess it was yesterday, when the Senator offered a
motion on the floor. In light of the fact that a relatively small group
of people are getting huge tax cuts--millionaires and billionaires--
whether it is the estate tax upon their death that their heirs enjoy
this huge tax break or whether it is when earning $1 million or $2
million or $5 million a year and getting a huge tax cut, the motion
yesterday simply said, if I recall, that every Social Security
beneficiary--and that is tens of millions--
Mr. SANDERS. Over 50 million.
Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Fifty million people would get a check for $250
from the government, because, I believe, about $13 billion for 1 year,
it wouldn't have been a long-term deficit issue; it would have been a
one-time cost for people who didn't get a cost-of-living adjustment
this year. So we know the average Social Security beneficiary gets
about $14,000 a year. We know an awful lot of Social Security
beneficiaries live mostly on their Social Security. Most people have a
little bit more than that, but an awful lot have only a little bit more
or nothing more so that is what they live on. They have no cost-of-
living adjustment this year because of this sort of complicated
formula.
But what was pretty amazing to me is how at the same time, every
Republican signed a letter, 42 Republican Senators signed a letter
saying they will do nothing else until they get their tax cuts for the
rich. It is almost like a work stoppage. It is almost like the
Republican Senators are on strike, saying: We are not going to vote or
we are not going to do anything around here. We are not going to work
or vote yes on anything around here until you give my people a tax cut,
my wealthy friends and contributors in my States.
So the contrast of their saying we will not do anything for anybody
else except millionaires and billionaires, we will not--even a $250
check, since there was no cost-of-living adjustment to seniors who are
making about $14,000 a year from Social Security.
What that check would mean to them is--I think that contrast made was
so important to understand. Give us some more about what that contrast
means with those Social Security beneficiaries.
Mr. SANDERS. I thank the Senator for his very strong ethics in trying
to get that $250 emergency check out to senior citizens on Social
Security and disabled vets--over 15 million people.
Mr. BROWN from Ohio. One more point. A majority of Senators voted for
it.
Mr. SANDERS. Yes, 53.
Mr. BROWN of Ohio. It was filibustered again, blocked by a minority
of Senators, right?
Mr. SANDERS. Absolutely. We won 53 to 45, but around here the
majority does not rule. The Republicans filibustered, as they almost
always do on anything of substance, and we could not get the 60 votes
because we did not get one Republican vote.
[[Page S8704]]
The point the Senator was making gets to the heart of this entire
issue, which is that our friends over there are fighting vigorously for
$700 billion in tax breaks for the top 2 percent--$70 billion a year
for the richest people in this country. And when we say to them that
senior citizens and disabled vets who are living on $14,000 or $15,000
a year need a check of $250, oh, we can't afford that. But we can
afford to give a billionaire a $1 million tax break.
Mr. BROWN of Ohio. That $750 billion is $75 billion a year for 10
years for millionaires and billionaires versus $13 billion once for
senior citizens. In essence, that $750 billion--without getting too
much into the weeds on numbers--in essence, we are borrowing that money
from China, charging it to our children and grandchildren, putting it
on their credit cards. They will pay it off who knows when. Then we are
giving that $750 billion to people who are fabulously wealthy already,
right? But they are unwilling to move forward on unemployment benefits
or on your proposal to help a senior with $250 because they really are
on strike.
They say: We are not doing anything until you give tax cuts to the
rich, to my people.
Mr. SANDERS. That is right. Most of us--I am sure Senator Brown has
received a lot of calls from people in Ohio--I know seniors who are
hanging on by their fingernails, trying to pay their bills, heat their
homes, pay prescription drug costs, and take care of their health care
needs. And $250 will not profoundly impact people's lives, but it will
help a little bit. These guys say: Sorry, we can't afford a $250 check
for a senior or a disabled vet because that would cost $13 billion or
$14 billion a year. But we can afford $70 billion a year to go to the
top 2 percent.
Frankly, I think that is what this whole debate is about. That is
what it is about.
What I want to do is continue for a moment on some of the other
objections. Senator Brown made an excellent point in contrasting the
priorities we are seeing in the Senate, especially from our Republican
friends. We didn't get one vote--not one--for a $250 check for seniors
or disabled vets. I want to continue with some of the problems that I
see in this agreement struck by the President and the Republican
leadership.
Some folks may have heard a bit about the so-called payroll tax
holiday. What that would do is cut about $120 billion in Social
Security payroll taxes for workers.
On the surface, this sounds like a great idea. Instead of paying 6.2
percent, they will be paying 4.2 percent. They might think: Hey, that
is great. I am paying less in taxes. My paycheck is a bit bigger. It is
a great idea.
Well, let's stop for a minute and ask: Where did this idea originally
come from? Well, the truth is this payroll tax holiday originated from
conservative Republicans whose ultimate goal is the destruction of
Social Security.
What does that mean? Well, it is not very hard to figure out. If you
are substantially cutting the amount of money that goes into Social
Security by cutting back on the payroll tax, that makes Social Security
less financially viable. Today, Social Security can pay out every
benefit owed to every eligible American for the next 29 years. Those of
us who believe strongly in Social Security--that it has worked
extraordinarily well for the last 75 years--and want to see it work
well for the next 75 years, we want to strengthen it.
I know the occupant of the Chair, the Senator from Oregon, has ideas
about putting increased revenue into the Social Security trust funds.
Those are the ideas we should be looking at, not cutting funding that
goes into that trust fund. Furthermore, while this payroll tax holiday
is a 1-year provision, and this agreement says the money will be
covered, for the very first time, by Federal dollars from the Treasury
going into the Social Security trust fund, which historically has
gotten all of its money from the payroll tax--while the proponents of
this agreement say don't worry about it, it is a 1-year agreement, I
make the same argument on this point that I made on the other. A year
from now, people will be discussing whether we extend that payroll tax
holiday. While those of us will say Social Security needs that money
and you can't expend it, our Republican friends will say you are
raising taxes on workers, and you can't do that. Then what we would be
talking about over a period of years is less money going into Social
Security, making it less financially solvent, which is exactly what
many Republicans want to do. I think that is a bad idea.
I will tell you, the National Committee to Preserve Social Security
and Medicare, which is led by a woman named Barbara Kennelly, who used
to be in the House--I know Barbara very well--says this about that
provision:
Even though Social Security contributed nothing to the
current economic crisis, it has been bartered in a deal that
provides deficit busting tax cuts for the wealthy. Diverting
$120 billion in Social Security contributions for a so-called
``tax holiday'' may sound like a good idea for workers now,
but it is bad business for the program that a majority of
middle-class seniors will rely upon in the future.
Conservatives have long dreamed of a payroll tax holiday
because it fulfills two ideological goals, lower taxes and
weakening Social Security finances. The White House claims
the 2 percent payroll tax cut won't impact Social Security;
however, we disagree.
There's no such thing as a ``temporary'' tax cut.
And the fear right here is that cut will, in fact, go on
indefinitely.
Mr. President, I talked about the payroll tax for a moment. Let me
talk about another aspect of the agreement the President signed with
Republicans; that is, while some of the business tax cuts in this
agreement may work well to create jobs and some may not, economists on
both ends of the political spectrum believe the better way to spur the
economy and create jobs is to spend money rebuilding our crumbling
infrastructure.
With corporate America already sitting on close to $2 trillion in
cash on hand, the problem we are seeing in our economy today is not
that large corporations are taxed too highly, it is that the middle
class doesn't have enough money to purchase their goods. Creating
decent-paying jobs and rebuilding our infrastructure could seriously
address that problem.
What we have right now, as I think you know, Mr. President, is an
infrastructure that is crumbling. There are very credible estimates out
there that we need to invest, in the next 5 years, several trillion
dollars in rebuilding our roads, bridges, water systems, wastewater
plants, our mass transportation, our railroads. China is exploding with
high-speed rail. We do not have any significant high-speed rail in this
country. If we are serious about creating jobs, in my view, the most
effective way to do that is to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure,
which makes our entire country stronger, more competitive and, at the
same time, short term it gives us the best bang we can get for the buck
in terms of job creation. That is another issue.
Tax breaks for businesses may work; maybe they won't. But I don't
think that type of investment is anywhere near as effective in terms of
job creation as investing in the infrastructure.
The fifth point I want to make on why I think this agreement is not a
good one: One of the positive aspects of the agreement--one that I
certainly support, and I know you do, Mr. President--is the need to
extend unemployment benefits for millions of workers today who face the
possibility that within a few weeks those extended unemployment
benefits may end. These are workers who are experiencing
extraordinarily difficult times through no fault of their own, often
caught up in the Wall Street crisis, but they have lost their jobs.
In various parts of this country it is awfully hard to get a job.
More and more people are applying for jobs, and the jobs are not there.
We have the moral responsibility to extend unemployment benefits and
allow those working families the opportunity to pay their bills and
give them at least a modicum of security.
Here is the point I want to make. I strongly, absolutely believe any
agreement has to have an extension of unemployment benefits for at
least 13 months, maybe longer. But when folks who support this
agreement say we want a great compromise, we managed to get an
extension of unemployment benefits there, what I would say is that for
the past 40 years, under both Democratic and Republican
administrations, whenever the unemployment rate has been above 7.2
percent--now we are
[[Page S8705]]
looking at 9.8 percent--unemployment insurance has always been
extended.
So this great compromise is simply doing what we have already been
doing as a matter of costs for the last 40 years, when Republicans ran
the Senate and when Democrats ran the Senate, with Republican
Presidents and Democratic Presidents. There was a consensus that we
cannot leave fellow Americans high and dry when unemployment is high.
Well, unemployment today is very high. In my view, this is not a great
compromise. This is simply doing what this country has done under both
Democrats and Republicans for 40 years.
Mr. President, I have been mentioning my concerns about this
agreement, but let me also say, absolutely, there are positive elements
to this agreement. I don't want to suggest for a moment there are not.
Extending middle-class tax cuts for 98 percent of Americans is
something that must be done, absolutely.
As you know, during the Bush years, median family income declined by
over $2,000. What we are seeing in many parts of this country is that
wages are actually going down, not up. People are working longer hours
for lower wages.
Does the middle class of this country need to continue to have that
tax break? Of course they do. I will fight as hard as I can to make
sure they do. So this proposal is, in fact, an important proposal.
There are other good proposals in it. The earned-income tax credit for
working Americans is very important. The child and college tax credits
are also very important. These proposals will keep millions of
Americans from slipping out of the middle class and into poverty, and
they will allow millions more to send their kids to college.
But when we look at the overall package, we must put it in a broader
context. What will the message of this legislation mean for the future
of our country? And I think one point that has to be made is that if we
pass this agreement as written, it says we are going to continue the
Bush policy of trickle-down economics for at least 2 more years. To my
mind, that is absurd. This is a policy--based on all of the evidence--
that grotesquely failed. After 8 years of Bush-style economics, with
all of these tax breaks for the rich, we ended up losing 500,000
private sector jobs--not a very impressive record. In fact, it is about
the worst record in job creation in modern history.
Here is another concern that I have that I think folks are not
talking about enough. This is what I believe will happen right after
this agreement is passed. And I am going to do everything I can to see
that it is not passed, and I hope very much that it is not passed, but
if it is passed, no one should have any illusions that our Republican
friends will not be back in a month or two saying the following: Gee,
our national debt is getting close to $14 trillion, we have a $1.4
trillion deficit, and, you know what, we are going to have to cut. We
are going to have to cut and cut and cut. Nobody should have any
illusion that in 2 months there will not be ferocious debates on the
floor of the Senate on the part of people who want to cut Social
Security, who want to cut Medicare, who want to cut Medicaid, who want
to cut childcare and education in general and environmental protection.
Tax breaks for billionaires is good, but cutting back on Social
Security, Medicare, and Medicaid is also what they want to do.
I think Senator Sherrod Brown, a moment ago, just crystallized that.
That is what it is about. We can afford to give $70 billion a year to
the top 2 percent, the wealthiest people, but we can't afford to spend
$14 billion a year to make sure senior citizens and disabled vets get a
$250 check. That is what this whole thing is going to be about--tax
breaks for the rich and cutbacks on all of the programs the middle-
class and working families of this country desperately need.
Mr. President, I will be back tomorrow because there is a lot more
that has to be said on this issue, but let me conclude by saying I will
give credit to my Republican colleagues in that they have been pretty
honest and straightforward about what they intend to do. There is
nothing mysterious about it. What they want to do is to take this
country back to the 1920s. They want to take us back to the days where,
when you were old, there was no Social Security and you had to fend for
yourself in the waning years of your life when you couldn't work. They
want to ultimately destroy Medicare.
I would suggest to all of the senior citizens in this country--the
people who are 70, 75, 80; people who are maybe struggling with one
illness or another--good luck in going to a private insurance company
to get help when you are low-income and sick. It ain't gonna happen.
They are not going to be there because they can't make any money off of
you.
Those people are going to be out there on the street all alone
because they are not going to be able to get the help they need if
Medicare is destroyed, and the same thing with Medicaid.
You know, Mr. President, you and I heard in this Chamber the great
debate over the death panels, the famous death panels that were
included, supposedly, in the health care reform bill we passed. Well,
it turns out that death panels are, in fact, now arising in America but
not because of the health care reform passed here in Washington.
In Arizona, right now the Governor there apparently is deciding they
do not have the money in their Medicaid Program to provide transplants
to people who, without those transplants, will die. That is called a
death panel. If you are poor and you need a transplant and you are
living in Arizona, good luck to you.
Let me conclude by simply saying that I believe very strongly that we
can forge a much better agreement than the current one before us. I
believe, in my State of Vermont and all over this country, that the
vast majority of people do not think it makes any sense at all to give
hundreds of billions of dollars in tax breaks to the wealthiest people
in this country so that we can drive up the national debt and have our
kids and grandchildren pay higher taxes in order to pay off that debt.
That doesn't make sense to progressives like me, and it doesn't make
sense to conservatives out there.
So I think the American people are on our side--at least the side
that opposes this agreement. Our job here--I know it is a shocking
idea--is to represent the middle-class and working families, not just
millionaires and billionaires.
With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the
absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Sanders). Without objection, it is so
ordered.
Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, I rise tonight to share some of my
concerns about the package that has been negotiated between the
President and the Republicans and has now been presented here on the
floor of the Senate.
First, I wish to emphasize the size of the decision that is going to
be made in the next couple of days. This deficit spending stimulus
package is a $1 trillion package. Let's turn the clock back to the
debate over the stimulus package we had in 2009. That stimulus was
about $800 billion--only 80 percent of the size of this package. That
stimulus had in it direct construction jobs across America. Every
community, every county benefited from an increase in production. It
also had the making work pay tax deduction. It had a host of small
business tax deductions, and it had direct assistance to our States to
enable them to meet some of the crises they were experiencing in health
care and in education, so we could keep our schools across America open
during this great Bush recession.
I have listened over the last year and a half to tremendous attacks
on that stimulus package. Yet this is a much larger decision. This is a
$1 trillion decision, and it is a package that much less thought has
gone into. We have this package here on the floor, but we haven't
actually gotten the paper in our hands as to what is in it. We have to
rely on newspaper accounts as to what is going to be in it.
Tonight, in offices across this Nation, folks are trying to get it
off the Internet, and they are going to be trying to analyze it and
understand it. We
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know the basic outlines, and the basic outlines raise a significant
number of concerns. I encourage our citizens to look at this package
over the weekend and to share their concerns with their Congressmen and
Congresswomen and certainly with their Senators.
This is a $1 trillion deficit. There has been a lot of talk on the
floor not only about the stimulus last year but about the size of our
national debt. This is a $1 trillion increase in our national debt. I
would think that is something we would be tearing apart and looking at
every part of it and asking if each dollar is being spent to the
maximum effect. We should have amendments that say: Hey, we can create
a lot more jobs if we spend these few million dollars over here rather
than here, so that every dollar makes a maximum impact in putting
America back to work. But not a single amendment is going to be allowed
on this bill, as far as we are aware tonight. I believe that in a
decision of this magnitude, there should be amendments that compare the
effect of spending money here versus there and about what is going to
have the greatest impact in a favorable way for America.
My good colleague from Vermont pointed out that this reduces the flow
of resources into Social Security. I think we should have an extensive
debate about coming to rely on the general fund, which is what the
administration wants to do. They are going to substitute payroll
revenue for general fund revenue. I think we should have a substantial
debate about depending upon general revenue to supply funds to the
Social Security fund.
Let me explain this. The approximately $120 billion that will flow
into Social Security from the general fund under this program comes
from borrowed funds. Those borrowed funds come primarily from China. So
Social Security--a program for Americans in which we save our own money
and invest that money so there can be a very modest steady income in
the retirement years--now is going to rely upon borrowed funds from
China. That is the American retirement plan? We should be debating that
on the floor of the Senate, and it should be an extensive debate, not a
debate in which cloture is going to be rushed on Monday and then have
30 hours split among 100 Members, because we are spending $1 trillion
of deficit money under this plan.
My first main concern is that we are taking a step to greatly
increase the national debt with this plan. My second concern is this
plan 100 percent endorses the Bush tax structure that has so deeply
damaged our Nation. Many of you will recall that when the economy grew
under President Bush II, the living wages of working Americans actually
failed to increase. The economy grew but the wages didn't grow for
working Americans. In addition, we doubled our national debt.
That is what happens when we say we are going to create a plan that
gives away our national treasure to the most affluent. We are going to
do so in a manner that doesn't create living wage jobs, doesn't reward
the productivity of American workers.
I am going to tell you that we made a major decision in about 1974,
about the year I graduated from high school, and that was to adopt
strategies, which failed, to link the productivity of American workers
to their compensation. Up until that point in the postwar era, as our
productivity as a nation grew, the financial success of our working
families grew along with that increase in productivity. But since 1974,
the tremendous, spectacular increase in the productivity and national
wealth of our Nation has not been shared with the workers of our
Nation. Is that the type of America we want, where many work to make
this Nation a success and do not share in the reward? The Bush tax cut
structure is the ultimate embodiment of that philosophy of carving off
the national treasure for the very few.
I do not think our success as a nation should be measured by the
success of our wealthiest families. I applaud them for their
entrepreneurship. I applaud them when the strategies to create
companies succeed. But it is up to us to create a structure that says,
as the work product increases we are going to enable all families to
thrive--not for a few to thrive spectacularly while everyone else stays
on a level plain.
Back in my home community, the community in which I grew up, a
working class community of three-bedroom ranch houses, so many children
now consider it a success if they can simply afford to purchase their
parents' home because it is only their parents' home, with the
assistance from their parents, that they can afford on a working
American family's salary because while the worker's share of the
national income has not increased with productivity, housing prices
have gone up enormously, making it harder and harder for a working
family to afford a home.
Embodied in these Bush breaks that have so deeply damaged our Nation
we have a very interesting feature, and that is that under this plan
President Obama has proposed with the Republicans--it says we are going
to extend breaks not just so the wealthiest can enjoy the same breaks
on their first $1 million that others receive for the money they are
earning up to $1 million, but bonus breaks on top of that.
Let me give you a sense of that. The amount of the tax break that is
given to everyone who earns their first $1 million is about $43,000.
Let's round it off: $40,000. Under this plan, those families earning
over $1 million receive an average of an additional bonus of $100,000
per taxpayer, a $100,000 bonus to the most successful families in the
country. That is pretty generous. That is enormously generous. Are we
going to be generous with our working families? Unfortunately, no.
Under this plan a family earning in the vicinity of $40,000 to $50,000
gets about $1,700. A family that earns $40,000 or less gets somewhere
in the nature of $1,000. So $1,000 for a working family versus $43,000
plus a $100,000 bonus for our wealthiest families in America.
Let's see, $1,000; $143,000. There is very little to those who are
building the success and wealth of our Nation through the productivity
of our workmanship, and a whole lot to those who are spectacularly
wealthy already.
The structure of the capital gains tax under this proposal and the
structure of the estate tax add to the impact of the income tax
brackets I was just describing. If you add it all up, and if you have
been spectacularly successful through this recession, then you can
count on a whole lot of help, generous gifts from Uncle Sam. If you
have been struggling and you are earning near minimum wage, or maybe
you are working 60 hours a week, three jobs, each 20 hours earning a
minimum wage, you get about $1,000 under this plan. That sort of
reinforcement of the fundamental disparity between working families and
those who are best off is not healthy for America. That does not build
the financial foundation so families can afford to give their children
substantial opportunities.
The America in which I grew up, the vision of my father and mother's
generation was that we would have an America with opportunity for every
family. We are leaving that vision behind with this bill.
Let me turn to my next main concern. The $1 trillion package is
designed to be a stimulus. But has it been designed well, to spend
every tax dollar in a smart way? There are many folks in this Chamber
who say they are fiscal conservatives. I am a fiscal conservative
because I believe every dollar needs to be spent in a smart way. Let's
test this.
Parts of this package get an A, and parts of this package get an F.
The part that gets an A is unemployment insurance. This is important
and fundamental to our families. We have always had the philosophy that
when there are no jobs to be had, when people cannot get a job through
no fault of their own, we are going to extend unemployment benefits to
help families through that rough time. We have always done it,
Democrats and Republicans, until this year when our Republicans have
turned their backs on working families and said: Not now. We will not
support extending support unless we take it away from some other
important part of the budget. But, they said, we will support $100,000
bonuses without taking anything away from anyone else.
That unity of support for our working families during hard times
disappeared this year. That is too bad. That is a tragedy.
The fundamental premise has been, by my colleagues across the aisle:
We are going to hold those families hostage to get a $100,000 bonus on
top of a
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very generous basic tax break for the wealthiest, hold working families
hostage for a lot of help for the very few at the very top. Those bonus
tax breaks are rated dead last by the Congressional Budget Office in
creating jobs in this Nation. Unemployment assistance is rated at the
top, the most effective way of creating jobs in this Nation--and it
should be in any package. It should be extended and has been extended
in a bipartisan manner in the past until this year when, unfortunately,
it seems that my colleagues across the aisle became all about the few
and not about helping families when there are no jobs.
There is great irony in this because we don't have jobs in this
Nation because of the great Bush recession created by my friends across
the aisle. First of all, they deregulated the retail mortgages, and
they allowed predatory loans. Those predatory loans meant, according to
the Wall Street Journal, 60 percent of the families in America who
qualified for a basic, amortizing, inexpensive, prime mortgage were
steered into subprime mortgages. Then my good friends said: Let's let
Wall Street do whatever it wants in packaging these mortgages. Let's
end the oversight and let's end the caps on leverage. So they created
securities; that is, packages of mortgages. And they sold the rights to
those packages. Those securities were doomed to blow up when the
predatory features of the mortgages kicked in after 2 years and
interest rates jumped from 4.5 percent to 9 percent.
We have been dealing, since I came into office in the Senate, with
the tremendous economic bomb produced by the Bush policies, the great
Bush recession that created the unemployment so that people cannot get
jobs. Now the same folks who created that disaster are saying: We are
not going to help those who are being hurt by the disaster we created.
It is like setting your house on fire and then cutting off the water to
the fire hose.
If my Republican friends are so determined to adopt the very worst
job-creating strategy, we should take it out of this bill, or at least
have a debate on this floor of the Senate about whether we put it in
the worst strategy or move those funds over here to the best strategy
or to some other good job-creating strategy. Maybe all the features
don't need to be As or A-pluses. But we have the Republican F plan
because it is the worst as rated by the CBO. We have the Democratic A
plan, support for the uninsured--it should be in here.
What about some of the other things? One of the very best ways to get
our country going is low-cost loans to create energy-saving renovations
in homes and buildings. It creates a tremendous number of jobs for
dollars spent because it is a low-cost jobs program, not a grant
program. It is ranked very high in the number of jobs it creates. We
have a construction industry in this country that would love to go to
work, and we have three bills sitting here before the Senate.
We have the HOME Star bill for families to do energy saving
renovations to their home. We have the Building Star bill to allow
commercial buildings, office suites, industrial site buildings to be
improved in energy renovation. The loans are paid back through the
energy savings. So it creates a long-term positive in terms of the
energy strategy of this Nation. It works very well for the families,
very well for the businesses, and puts the construction industry back
to work. That is the type of program we should be weighing against the
F plan--that is from A to F, F for last, F for failure, F in CBO's
analysis for the worst job-creating plan, which is what the Republicans
have forced into this package.
Without amendments to this package, we cannot have that debate. There
is a tradition of saying the Senate is the world's greatest
deliberative body. Don't we have to have amendments to do that? Don't
we have to have a debate on where to put different pieces of this
puzzle to do that? I have been advocating for a guaranteed way to make
sure the minority and the majority get to have amendments on this
floor.
I happen to be a member of the majority right now, but I will be a
member of the minority down the road--if I am here long enough, and I
guess that is a big if--because the pendulum swings back and forth. But
to be accountable before the people of this Nation, amendments have to
be offered and debate has to be held and votes have to be taken and
that is not being done on this bill as far as we know.
I know there is a possibility. I praise leaders of both sides in
advance if they work out a deal that everyone can offer their
amendments, or even a modest number of amendments on both sides.
Because that is the way it should be on the floor. That is what I
have been advocating, that we have regular order that allows
amendments. But I am afraid that Monday will come, that a deal will not
get worked out, and we will not have the ability to have that debate,
will not have the ability to be transparent before the American people
in where we stand.
My good colleague from Vermont has shared a concern I also share;
that is, the payroll tax being cut off, snuffed out as a supply of
Social Security, that our retirement plan that we pay for ourselves is
being changed to a retirement plan financed by China.
So the national debt, $1 trillion--that is a concern. The structure
of the Bush tax breaks that so deeply damaged our Nation over the last
decade being extended into the next decade is a major concern, as is
the poor design of the stimulus where every dollar has not been tested
against its ability to create jobs at a time we desperately need jobs,
and the change in our funding of Social Security, and it is dependent
upon Chinese funds. Those items need to be debated. They are profound
concerns. Maybe there are answers that make sense. I look forward to
hearing such answers, if they exist. I would like to see those answers
tested through amendments offered on this floor.
I have an amendment I would like to see offered on the floor. I have
an amendment that says: Take the $100,000 bonus breaks for the
wealthiest 2 percent and instead dedicate that to Social Security.
Let's make sure our seniors who need basic support in their retirement
are well-secured before handing out $100,000 bonus breaks to the very
few. Well, I do not know if that would pass on this floor. I do not
know where people would stand. But I know people should have to declare
where they stand so the voters can decide if they like it or not, so
the voters can call and say: We would encourage you to vote this way or
that way.
The other thing I like about that particular approach is it says: If
we are going to reduce the payroll tax in the short term to create
jobs, we are going to do something else to make sure our Social
Security does not depend on funds from China. I would like to see that
debate.
I would like to see the energy tax credits debated. They are not in
this package as of now, as far as we know. Energy tax credits pay us
back in a number of ways. The first is that currently we import a
tremendous amount of oil from the Middle East and from Venezuela, from
Nigeria, from places that do not necessarily share our national
outlook. A lot of that money ends up in the hands of terrorist
organizations.
Military security analysts now say this is the first set of wars we
are in right now--the first wars in which we are funding both sides.
And how are we doing that? Through our energy policies which send funds
to countries that then pass on funds to terrorists. That is not smart.
It makes more sense to free our energy here at home.
I will tell you something else. In addition to increasing our
national security and spending those dollars here at home on energy we
create ourselves, red, white, and blue American energy, that keeps
those dollars here in our communities, and when those dollars stay in
our communities, they create jobs in our communities. It means families
get jobs, and they spend the money from those jobs in these
communities. So it cycles through into the retail stores, into the
grocery markets, keeping those dollars here creating jobs rather than
shipping them overseas for oil.
It does another thing as well; that is, it reduces our energy
consumption from abroad, which largely means shifting from oil to clean
sources. And those clean sources will put less carbon dioxide in the
air. That means we do a much better job being good stewards of our
planet.
So energy tax credits encourage clean energy, keep jobs here,
improving our national security and being
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good stewards of the planet. Why don't we have that debate on the floor
of this Senate before we send this bill back to the House?
Another colleague has amendments that say: OK, we are going to vote
on a trillion-dollar stimulus package that creates a trillion-dollar
debt. Shouldn't we tie it to some kind of trigger for fiscal
responsibility that will kick in maybe 24 months out so we do not head
recklessly down a path into extraordinary debt that deeply damages our
Nation even further?
So fiscal responsibility--tie some fiscal responsibility measures to
this package. That is a good idea. I applaud my colleague from Oregon
who has raised that idea, Senator Wyden, who has done a lot of work on
how we can create fiscal responsibility tied to a package going through
now. It will say something to the international financiers that this
short-term deficit spending is going to be marked by substantial fiscal
discipline, and that in itself may serve other things, such as keeping
the interest rate low that we pay, so fewer of our dollars go out in
interest.
These ideas, these amendments deserve a debate on this major decision
facing this body over the next few days.
I will close by saying that I am deeply concerned--deeply concerned--
about the deficit and the debt. I am deeply concerned about the Bush
tax breaks that have done so much damage and are being extended into
the next decade. I am deeply concerned about the poor design of the
stimulus, deeply concerned about Social Security being made dependent
upon borrowing from China, deeply concerned that this package is being
put together and may not have the opportunity to have the debate over
elements that should be debated because if they do not stand up on the
floor of the Senate in debate, they do not belong in this package.
So with that, I say to our friends across the Nation, you have a few
days only to weigh in. Please do weigh in. Let us hear your voice. Let
us consider your views. And let us fully deliberate on this package
before we pass it.
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