[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 149 (Tuesday, November 27, 2012)]
[House]
[Pages H6452-H6458]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   THE UNITED STATES ECONOMY AND JOBS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 5, 2011, the gentleman from California (Mr. Garamendi) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman from Texas would like to 
finish his statement, I would be happy to yield him 5 minutes.
  Mr. HALL. I thank the gentleman--and you are a gentleman. You are my 
friend and I appreciate you.
  I just think we need to get together and remember the most important 
part of all of us is our children and our children's futures. That's 
why we all get together, and that's the reason for us to change some of 
the positions we've taken in the past--to try to work something out 
that the American people expect us to.
  You're a gentleman to offer me that. Maybe I've used part of that 5 
minutes. Thank you very much.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. You had a lot of people speaking to your extraordinary 
career here, and I didn't want to cut it short. Your advice is sound 
and, hopefully, taken by all of us.
  Mr. HALL. My mother always told me to be silent and be thought a fool 
rather than to open my mouth and remove all doubt. So I don't want to 
get to talking too much. It's been too good

[[Page H6453]]

tonight. All these people have said things, and I care for them. I care 
for this institution. I care for the people on both sides of this 
aisle. I'm honored to get to be a part of this.
  Thank you. God bless this country.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. Thank you, Mr. Hall.
  Apparently, a lot of people would agree given your extraordinary 
career and the work that you've done here in Congress over these many, 
many years and decades.
  Part of what you've spent a good deal of your career working on, Mr. 
Hall, has been the improvement of the American economy. Tonight, I'd 
like to join a couple of my colleagues on the Democratic side to talk 
about the economy and to talk specifically about jobs and the things 
that we can do here in the waning days of this Congress to create some 
job opportunities.
  We've got some very heavy lifting here in Congress in the next month 
and a half. Everybody wants to talk about the fiscal cliff. Some talk 
about an austerity bomb. Others talk about what needs to be done to 
lift the debt limit. All of these issues are before us--tax increases 
or not. Underlying all of that, foundational to all of that, is putting 
Americans back to work, getting Americans back into their jobs. If we 
do that, we will clearly increase employment. When you increase 
employment, you also increase tax revenue to the Federal Government, to 
State governments, and to local governments.
  So our principal task, as I see it--and I think I'm joined by many of 
my colleagues, both Democrat and Republican--is to get the American 
economy going, to put it back in gear, and there are many reasons 
beyond just employment and the opportunities that families have to make 
it.
  One of the critical elements in all of this is to protect Americans. 
We recently saw superstorm Sandy smash into New Jersey and New York. It 
had devastating results: loss of life, an incredible loss of property--
both public and private--and a very, very big cleanup bill. Joining me 
in a little while will be some of our Representatives from the State of 
New York, and they'll talk about that in detail. But before Sandy ever 
hit the coast, there was a need here in America to protect Americans 
from storms and floods. We know what happens when the protection isn't 
there--devastating results.
  In the news today, in northern California, there was in the headlines 
a series of storms coming to northern California--into my district, 
where my home is. The word is to get ready for serious flooding. I 
mean, this is very early in the season; although, Californians with any 
memory at all will know that there are a series of infamous Christmas 
floods in northern California. Now, this is really a Thanksgiving flood 
potential, but nonetheless, it's there.
  I will tell you clearly that the Sacramento region, which is the 
second most risky region in the Nation for flooding and flood damage, 
is right at the center of this storm. So that's the city of Sacramento. 
Perhaps 100,000 or more people are in serious jeopardy. Should a levee 
break in that region--and those levees are not up to 200-year 
standards--people would have less than 20 minutes to find high ground, 
to get out. It's an impossible situation. So we need serious 
infrastructure improvement--and that's Sacramento. The rest of my new 
district goes further north into Marysville and Yuba City, along the 
Sacramento River further north, and along the Feather and Yuba River--
again, communities at high risk. Serious infrastructure needs to be 
developed. Levees need to be improved, upgraded, enhanced; otherwise, 
citizens are at risk, just as they were on Staten Island.
  This is our responsibility. This is not only a local responsibility 
and a State responsibility--this is a national responsibility. This is 
when we become a national community, looking out for each other--in 
providing the basic infrastructure to protect us. We also have 
infrastructure that is necessary for commerce: our roads, our highways, 
our Internet systems, our rail transportation systems. All of these 
infrastructure items are critical to the economic well-being of America 
in addition to the human and commerce safety of this Nation. We're 
going to talk about that tonight.
  Joining me is my colleague from New York. He has been working on this 
issue for some time. He has a project and a program that he is 
proposing, one that caught my attention. I've asked him to come and 
join us.
  In being from the State of New York, we are talking about something 
that's very, very real for you. Please tell us what this is all about.
  Mr. HIGGINS. I want to thank my colleague from California for his 
leadership on the infrastructure issue.
  I think the problem that we see here in Washington is that the 
discussion is focused on the wrong thing. When you have a recession--an 
economic contraction--what your objective needs to be in terms of 
public policy is growth, growth in the economy. What we are 
experiencing now is anemic growth. For example, our growth rate is 
about 2 percent or less. That current rate of growth is not enough to 
sustain the current level of employment. In other words, if we don't 
grow this economy, our unemployment rate will necessarily go up.
  We talk about debt and deficit in this Chamber, but if we remember, 
less than 12 years ago, we had a budgetary surplus of $258 billion, 
meaning that we were taking in $258 billion more in each year than we 
were spending. How was that possible?

                              {time}  2030

  It was made possible by having created 22 million private sector jobs 
in the previous 8 years. What was the policy then? The policy was to 
invest in the American economy, to invest in the American people, in 
education, scientific research and infrastructure. So I think the 
lessons from our most recent past are very instructive today as to what 
we should be doing in Washington to promote growth.
  The gentleman from California spoke of a plan that I was working on, 
and that is a $1.2 trillion investment in rebuilding the roads and 
bridges of America. That plan, advanced by the New America Foundation, 
would create 27 million private sector jobs in 5 years. The first year 
alone, over 5 million jobs which would reduce the current unemployment 
rate from where it is today to 6.4 percent and in the second year, 5.2 
percent.
  Now, public infrastructure as we know is a public responsibility. 
It's never a question as to whether or not we're going to rebuild our 
roads and bridges. The question is when does it make most sense to 
undertake that responsibility. And I would submit to you, the time to 
do it is now. Money is cheaper than it is ever going to be. Equipment 
is cheaper because it is idling, and labor is cheap because of the high 
unemployment rate.
  We need to do nation-building right here at home. And when you 
consider we just spent as a nation $89 billion rebuilding the roads and 
bridges of Afghanistan, we just spent $67 billion rebuilding the roads 
and bridges of Iraq, nations of 30 million and 26 million respectively. 
And for this Nation, for America, a population of over 300 million 
people, and the American Society of Civil Engineers puts the quality of 
our infrastructure at a D, when the World Economic Forum rates us 24th 
in overall quality when in 2001 we were number two, we are going to 
spend less than $53 billion. That's not only weak; it's pathetically 
weak.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Higgins, thank you so very, very much for bringing 
this issue in very stark terms to our attention. You caught my 
attention earlier when we were talking about this; but here on the 
floor, this is a $1.2 trillion program that could create 27 million 
jobs in the next 5 years, and those are economic analyses that have 
been done by the New America Foundation.
  Mr. HIGGINS. That's correct.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. How do we pay for this again?
  Mr. HIGGINS. Well, you pay for it as you pay for transportation 
improvements at the local, State, and Federal level. You issue debt to 
finance the life of the project.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. The same way we build and own our homes. We borrow the 
money to build that personal infrastructure, our home.
  Mr. HIGGINS. That's right.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. Now, the borrowing rate for the Federal Government on 
a 10-year note is a little over 1 percent or hovering around 1 percent 
now?

[[Page H6454]]

  Mr. HIGGINS. A little over 1 percent for a 5-year Treasury note. It's 
one-half of 1 percent.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. That's virtually free money.
  Mr. HIGGINS. It's virtually free money.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. Now, it does run up the debt; but we are using that 
money to create infrastructure, a necessary investment for the economy 
to grow and to protect ourselves.
  Mr. HIGGINS. That's right. And according to Transportation for 
America, there are 69,000 structurally deficient bridges in the United 
States. There are over 2,000 structurally deficient bridges in New York 
State. There are 99 structurally deficient bridges in my community of 
western New York. Every second of every day, seven cars drive on a 
bridge in this Nation that is structurally deficient.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. Well, we saw what collapse can do with the Minnesota 
bridge and the loss of life. We saw what inadequate infrastructure 
protecting New Jersey and New York can do with extraordinary loss of 
public investment as well as private investment--and lives.
  Joining us for this discussion on jobs and creating jobs is part of 
what we like to call the east coast-west coast team. Congressman Paul 
Tonko, you and I are often here on the floor to talk about how we can 
grow the American economy in a bipartisan way. This infrastructure 
notion that Mr. Higgins has brought to us I think has considerable 
merit and fits, I think, very easily with what President Obama has 
recommended in his American Jobs Act, which was an immediate $50 
billion enhancement of the $60 billion that we would otherwise spend, 
bringing the total to over $100 billion in the coming year. Again, 
enormous infrastructure.
  Mr. Tonko, I know you are up on this issue. We have spent time 
talking about it in the past. Why don't you share with us your 
thoughts.
  Mr. TONKO. Sure. And, Representative Garamendi, thank you for 
bringing us together for an hour of discussion on what is very 
important: growing jobs, strengthening our economy and strengthening 
the fabric of our communities by addressing public safety via 
investment in infrastructure, a very sound investment. It is always a 
pleasure to join you. It is an honor to serve in the New York 
delegation with Representative Higgins, Brian Higgins, who served with 
me, or I with him, perhaps better stated, in the New York State 
Assembly where I sat on the Transportation Committee. And I was seated 
on that committee right in 1987, in the shadow of the collapse of a New 
York State thruway bridge where 10 people perished. We recently 
commemorated the 25th anniversary of that event. It was very tragic, 
and it was in the heart of my home county, a small county of 50,000 
people, Montgomery County, New York. And the impact economically that 
that devastating occurrence brought to bear was incalculable.

  So when you talk about, and I listened with interest to the exchange 
that you and Representative Higgins had about how do you pay for it, 
one way you don't want to pay for it is through an impact on the 
economy of your local region. The commerce hit that was taken was 
severe. The loss of dollars to the community was just incomprehensible, 
and of course the loss of lives which surpasses anything in importance. 
And interestingly, many of the individuals who were on that victims 
list were not from the region. So we're all impacted by weak 
infrastructure no matter in which State that might be because you never 
know when you're traveling over a situation that is unsafe.
  So I think it is a wise investment to go forward and put to work tens 
of millions of skilled laborers who can make a difference in public 
safety in our communities, making certain that the soundness of 
investment and improvement, absolutely essential for our quality of 
life, for our public safety, for the strengthening of our commerce. And 
we know that infrastructure improvements--you and I have talked in the 
past about the infrastructure bank bill. We have talked about ways of 
leveraging dollars to weaken the impact on the public sector, on the 
taxpayer. There are ways to do that in very strident terms that allow 
us to go forward with the commitment and with the investment that is 
required.
  But certainly with the aged infrastructure in this country, and to 
the earlier point made by Representative Higgins, if we can build other 
nations, and thank goodness that we have helped people strengthen their 
situation for their own people, but, my gosh, we should take advice, 
our own advice here, and understand that there is a strong bit of 
economic growth that occurs when you strengthen your infrastructure--
from traditional roads and bridges to rail to communications, wiring 
our communities, and to the grid.
  The grid system has had several tests--designed to run in a monopoly 
situation, and now being used to wield electrons from region to region, 
State to State, country to country. So there is a huge, vast 
involvement of infrastructure there that begs our investment. And I 
think for sound reasons, for public safety reasons, and for economic 
recovery purposes, it makes sense; and let's put the people to work, 
and let's build a stronger community.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. It is all about jobs. Thank you very much, Mr. Tonko. 
Your personal experience in the New York Legislature and in your own 
community brings this issue into focus here on the floor of this House.

                              {time}  2040

  As we build this infrastructure, if we add one additional element to 
the creation of the infrastructure, something that, again, we've talked 
about here many times, and that is that we use our money, our taxpayer 
money, whether it's borrowed or directly paid, that we use that money 
to buy American-made equipment, so that the steel that goes into the 
bridges is American-made, the cement made in America, manufactured in 
America, that we use that American money on American-made equipment.
  In other words, make it in America, so we not only are doing the 
infrastructure and the jobs that come with it, but we also use that to 
revitalize our manufacturing sector. This is a very powerful way in 
which we can more rapidly expand the American economy.
  I just happen to have two bills that would do that, one for the clean 
energy industry. If we're going to use our taxpayer money to subsidize 
the clean energy industry, wonderful. We need to do that for all kinds 
of reasons, but buy American-made clean energy products, whether it's a 
solar system or a wind turbine.
  And similarly, with regard to transportation, the trains, the buses, 
the steel, let's buy that in America, American manufacturing.
  I noticed a lovely lady joining us from the State of Ohio. It would 
be Marcy Kaptur. You've talked about these issues many times. Thank you 
very much for joining us this evening.
  Ms. KAPTUR. Congressman Garamendi, I want to say I'm just so 
privileged to join three such dedicated Members whose States have been 
wise enough to send them here to Washington. Obviously Congressman 
Garamendi from northern California and Congressman Tonko from the State 
of New York, the great State of New York, and Congressman Brian 
Higgins, also of the State of New York, a little bit upstate.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. I thought he was associated with Ohio as much as he is 
with New York. Isn't he on the border out there somewhere?
  Ms. KAPTUR. Well, you know, there's the St. Lawrence Seaway that kind 
of connects it all as it flows into the Atlantic Ocean.
  But I wanted say, you know, many of us, all of us have come through 
very difficult campaigns in this political year of 2012. But what is 
wonderful about serving with the three of you is you keep the focus on 
jobs in this country, and the importance of making goods in America, 
and where wealth is really created, how we do that as a country, and 
what it takes to build a great country.
  I look at the St. Lawrence Seaway, and I think about Dwight 
Eisenhower, a great general, led our forces in Europe, and came home 
and decided that America needed to create the St. Lawrence Seaway so 
that we would unlock the potential of the Upper Great Lakes and the 
Lower Great Lakes.
  And you say to yourself, today, with some of the limited thinking 
that some exhibit--of course, no one in this Chamber would ever be 
accused of that,

[[Page H6455]]

right?--but could we do the St. Lawrence Seaway again?
  I've had the great privilege of traveling out West--I think I've 
probably been in every State and almost every congressional district at 
one point in my career--and to look at the Hoover Dam. And as I admired 
the dam, I thought to myself, America has it in her to land a man on 
the moon and to create NASA, but here at home, our public works, do we 
have the vision?
  Do we have a vision big enough today, in the 21st century, to match 
what those who came before us gave to us that put this continent 
together?
  And as I travel, I see water systems in disrepair. In fact, in my 
hometown of Toledo, they're trying to find $45 million to put a roof on 
the water treatment plant, which really needs $500 million to fix.

  I go to the new parts of the Ninth District, in the city of 
Cleveland, and I look at the need for infrastructure repair and, in the 
same city, so many unemployed people who could be put to work fixing 
the heart and soul of Cleveland.
  Or Lorain, Ohio, the number of brownfields that are there where we're 
waiting to clear property so that we can clean it up, move the sewage 
treatment plant, move other assets that are there and create a much 
greater port on Lake Erie. And I say, do we have it in us?
  I know I have it in me to want to do this. But I look back at what 
our heritage really is, the interstate highway system itself, when, 
again, during the 1950s, if we think about what was done, there was a 
time when this country, if you moved from--well, you couldn't move from 
Ohio to California on roads that intersected. People think that just 
happened, but it didn't. It took real vision to do that.
  All the statistics show that when we invest in infrastructure, that 
is the most job-rich program that this country could ever promote. And 
to create efficiencies and intermodal connections--Congressman Tonko 
talked about fiber optics and about telecommunications and all of the 
new ways of connecting our country.
  I've had the privilege in my career of representing many rural areas 
that are short, not just on doctors, but on telecommunications 
capabilities. It isn't just in the heart of Ukraine where people can't 
communicate; it's in rural America as well.
  So I just came down here, I heard you speaking, and I thought, I 
identify with your cause. Thank you for talking about jobs inside the 
Congress of the United States. Thank you, Congressman Garamendi, 
Congressman Higgins, Congressman Tonko.
  Now you all come from what is regarded as the coast, right? But I'm 
from a coast too, the north coast along Lake Erie, and it's actually 
quite a long coast when you take a look at it, you unwind it in all the 
various lakes. So we're coastal America too, and I identify with your 
cause.
  And believe me, the people that sent me here identify with the cause 
of jobs and economic growth and infrastructure investment in our 
country to push us far beyond where perhaps Roosevelt and Eisenhower 
and Kennedy dreamed.
  Thank you so very much for this Special Order tonight.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. How correct you are to look back to those heroes of 
the past that laid down the infrastructure. You can actually go back a 
little bit further. George Washington, in his first year as President 
of the United States, instructed Alexander Hamilton to develop an 
industrial policy. One part of that industrial policy was the 
development of the infrastructure for America's commerce. And it was 
canals and it was ports and it was roads.
  Mr. Higgins, so, how are we going to make this happen? You've got 
$1.2 trillion you want to put out there.
  Mr. HIGGINS. Well, I think you made a very good point, particularly 
with your leadership on the Make It in America initiative. Keep in 
mind, when you invest in American infrastructure you're buying labor 
from American businesses. You're buying supplies and material from 
American businesses. You're buying engineering and design services from 
American businesses.
  And we also forgot a very important element of our economy. It's the 
thousands of returning veterans who've been serving our country in Iraq 
and Afghanistan. The unemployment rate today for those returning 
veterans under the age of 24 is 19 percent.
  There was a program started by the Department of Defense, it's now a 
not-for-profit called Helmets to Hardhats, and what it basically does, 
it identifies 60,000 American businesses and some of the trade unions. 
They collaborate to get together to identify veterans who have already 
had extraordinary training and discipline and leadership and teamwork, 
and it accelerates their apprenticeship program. So these individuals 
could be making 60, $70,000 a year, if there was work to be had here.
  So it's an investment in America. It's an investment in American 
businesses, and it says to our returning veterans in a real sincere and 
genuine way, thank you for your service.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. You said earlier that the American Society of 
Engineers--I think that was the name--said that we have a D rating for 
infrastructure, and that we need over $2 trillion.
  I don't know anybody in my district, where we may have a serious 
flood in the next 3 days, that says the infrastructure is adequate. 
They're looking at those levees, and they're watching the water rise, 
and they're going, this isn't sufficient to protect us. So in a very 
real sense of just safety, infrastructure is needed. But also, it's 
needed for employment.
  You correctly raised the issue of the veterans coming back, $2 
trillion--there's no doubt about the need. America knows there's a 
need. As the four of us have discussed here, there is a need, even a 
crying need, and a human safety need right now, not tomorrow, not 10 
years from now, but immediately.

                              {time}  2050

  The question is: How do we go about making that happen? And here 435 
of us and 100 Senators on the other side of this building have the 
ability to answer the crying need of Americans to build our 
infrastructure, to give us the jobs to provide the foundation for 
economic growth, and to protect us. We have that power.
  Let's continue our discussion.
  Mr. Tonko.
  Mr. TONKO. Representative Kaptur made an interesting point that there 
was a sense of vision when they pursued the efforts with the St. 
Lawrence Seaway. There was a sense of vision in my district as a donor 
area and in Representative Higgins' when Governor DeWitt Clinton 
perceived this Erie Canal as a way to transport goods and to open up 
the westward movement to spark an industrial revolution. That gave 
birth not only to a port called New York City, but birth to a necklace 
of communities called mill towns that became the epicenters of 
invention and innovation.
  So it's that spark of vision that is the first step. And we're going 
to denounce any of these creative opportunities to invest in nation-
building by denouncing it as socialism? Was President Eisenhower a 
Socialist? Were all those who preceded him or followed him that came up 
with these great visions--a space program that gave us an unleashing of 
technology? No, they were thinkers. They were visionaries. They were 
leaders. That's the first step. And then we develop policy from that 
vision. We tether it into real terms, and then we invest in the 
implementation of that policy. That's America at her finest.
  If we look back at the Erie Canal history, when they did that, it 
wasn't easy times. They were tough times. They were tough economic 
times. And so they stepped up to the plate and said, We're going to do 
this. It's not easy to launch, but we're going to do it because it's 
the way through the tough times.
  We have tough times now, chronically high unemployment that, for 
many, preceded the recession. They need opportunity. Our economy grows 
when we invest in those workers of whom Representative Higgins spoke, 
in those materials and goods that allow for our Nation's businesses to 
prosper, add jobs, become part of a recovery. So that is all very 
critical.
  I talked earlier about the bridge collapse that spans the Schoharie 
Creek in upstate New York that you can walk across in the summertime. 
It was flowing equal to the efforts, the CFS, of Niagara Falls. So 
there are some economic impacts coming from Mother Nature that are 
driven by global warming and climate change. So when we do some of 
these visionary things, incorporate all of the policies so that 
environmental concerns as policy formats

[[Page H6456]]

with economic recovery terms, with energy terms, with transportation 
can all be woven together and you solve some of our ills where we're 
being impacted by Mother Nature with natural disasters that are 
draining our infrastructure, as we witnessed with Sandy all along the 
east coast, where now tens of billions of dollars of recovery are 
required.
  Let's add the policy dimensions that allow us to reduce the threats 
from Mother Nature, build our economy by adding jobs and providing for 
public safety, and creating a state-of-the-art economy driven by 
transportation, communication, energy transformation with renewables 
and the like that will cut down on the emission of particles and 
dangerous substances that are toxic on the ozone layer. That's America 
at her finest.
  And if we do that simple thing of providing vision, followed with 
policy, followed with resource advocacy, we will have achieved, and 
brightest, best days lie ahead, not denouncing that thinking as 
Socialist.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. There's a critical moment now. Right now. That moment 
is seen in the deliberations that are going on here in this Hall, in 
the Capitol, about the fiscal cliff, about the deficit. And there are 
those who would suggest that the only way to deal with it is with an 
austerity program, reduce government expenditures at every level.
  There's some evidence cited by Mr. Higgins earlier that there's 
another way of dealing with this, and that is to put people to work, to 
use the power of government to put people to work, even if that means 
borrowing money at 1 percent. Putting it into an infrastructure bank to 
finance projects that have a cash flow, such as your sanitation 
facility in Toledo, Ohio, or a toll road or the St. Lawrence Seaway, 
all of which have a cash flow. You could maybe charge a percent and a 
half. You borrow at 1 percent, you charge a percent and a half, and we 
build. We put people to work.
  Ms. Kaptur, why don't you pick this up, and then Mr. Higgins, and 
we'll carry on our conversation
  Ms. KAPTUR. I thank you, Congressman Garamendi. I am really listening 
carefully to what Congressman Tonko and Congressman Higgins have been 
saying this evening and thinking about what's going on in Ohio, the 
northern band of Ohio, from Toledo through Cleveland, and the 
importance of manufacturing and thinking about how hard our businesses 
and our workers have to compete in a very unlevel global playing field. 
And I've seen this directly in the automotive industry, where to this 
day one of the reasons that our automotive industry had difficulty and 
why it required the Nation to not let it fail and to pay back what was 
borrowed was because we are in competition with state-managed 
economies.
  For example, I'm a member of the China Commission. And several 
economists testified before our committee a few years ago that what you 
really have in operation is market Leninism. I said, Describe to me 
what you're seeing. Because I've had companies in my district that have 
business deals in China that have lost billions of dollars. They have 
paid for goods that have never been received. Now, in a transparent 
legal system like our own, that could never happen. You have a court 
system. You have a way of getting your money back. But when you're 
dealing with a state-managed economy under a market Leninist approach, 
you have powerful political people pulling the strings that isn't truly 
a free market.
  And so whether you have a closed market in Japan that's still largely 
closed to automotive products or you have a state-managed economy as in 
China, then you ask our automotive producers or any company to compete 
in that kind of environment, you end up harming our domestic 
production. And one of the reasons we are so elated that our automotive 
industry is recovering, you see it all over our region, the power of 
industry to lift people into the middle class and beyond. You can see 
it everywhere: in suppliers, in restaurants, in theaters, and places 
where people are going. Even grocery stores, frankly, where people are 
able to buy more because of the recovery of this powerful, powerful 
industry.

  And I just want to end with one image, which is really hard to 
capture in words, but one of our companies in Cleveland has the only 
50,000-ton press in the United States of America--Alcoa. It is seven 
stories in magnitude. I feel very privileged as a Representative to 
have been invited into the company to see this literally mammoth, 
magnificent machine be able to take parts and form them for industry as 
well as our defense systems. And it's seven stories high. Three layers 
on three stories at the bottom just dealing with the hydraulics.
  The engineering and the brain power it takes to manufacture high-end 
goods is incredible. We are so proud of that company and other 
companies that are able to make it in America, despite all of the 
unfair global playing fields on which they are asked to play. And we 
see the components going into the automotive industry, into our defense 
systems. And we thank the corporate leadership and the workers, those 
who work very, very hard jobs that help us build the strongest country 
in the world.
  So I just had to say that tonight because you get as excited as I do 
about actually making things and seeing this genius that takes ideas 
and engineers them into products that affect all of us and allows 
America to be the strongest Republic in the world. So I wanted to place 
that on the record. And thank you for giving me the time to do it.

                              {time}  2100

  Mr. GARAMENDI. As you were talking so enthusiastically, I was 
thinking of some of Carl Sandburg's incredible poetry on the power of 
America and all that was done there.
  Mr. Higgins, you brought this to how we can finance our 
infrastructure, how we can Make It in America, create jobs. Why don't 
you carry on with that discussion--or take that anywhere that you would 
like to.
  Mr. HIGGINS. Well, I would just say, back to the power of America, 
you hear in this Chamber a lot of tough talk about China. The best way 
to respond to China is to stand up to them, to compete with them. They 
cheat on their currency, they treat their workers poorly, they destroy 
their environment. But whining about China is not going to resolve this 
problem; investing in America and the American people will.
  You also mentioned the issue of austerity, and I think it's important 
to bring up. Historically in this Nation, the economy went into 
recession. We had the Great Depression in the early thirties. The 
American economy was starting to show signs of anemic growth right 
after the Great Depression in late 1936. Congress and the President 
pulled back with austerity measures; the economy went into recession 
again.
  In Japan, in the 1990s, they were experiencing financial problems. 
They imposed comprehensive austerity measures. That economy remains in 
a recessionary mode and has been for the last decade. You see what's 
going on in Europe today; austerity doesn't work. Again, I go back to 
our recent history. The year 2000, budgetary surplus in this Nation of 
$258 billion made possible by having created 22 million private sector 
jobs by investing in infrastructure, scientific research, and 
education.
  The best tax policy is not right or left; it's bringing lost 
taxpayers back to productivity. That's the best, quickest way to do it, 
and you're helping American businesses in the process.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Tonko.
  Mr. TONKO. Representative Garamendi, again, thank you for bringing us 
together again.
  You talked about that austerity budget that some would advance. I 
have to tell you another disaster last year, Irene and Lee, that hit as 
a hurricane and tropical storm, impacted the several counties I 
represent, from Schoharie in upstate New York, to Montgomery, 
Schenectady, Rensselaer, Albany. These counties were severely impacted. 
To talk to the people directly devastated--I mean devastated, lost 
their homes, everything for which they ever worked--and to tell them 
we're going to change the rules in the middle of the game on disaster 
aid, it took fights galore to win that argument on this floor. That 
austerity approach didn't cut it with folks who might have believed it 
before the disaster, but certainly not in the midst of.
  So we need to be there for situations, not only disastrous 
situations, but the investment that occurs so that we can

[[Page H6457]]

effectively compete. We know in our heart, we know in our minds that 
there are ways to do this.
  I know, just listening to the magnanimous description of the 
situation in the auto industry that Representative Kaptur defined for 
us, on a much smaller scale, but equally significant, I watched some of 
the businesses in my district retrofit and do that through research in 
incubator programs and providing for our advanced manufacturing which 
allows them to add that competitive muscle that enables them to compete 
in that global marketplace. That made a total difference.
  Folks like Kintz Plastics in Schoharie County, New York, where they 
were engaged in an incubator program with Rensselaer Polytechnic 
Institute. Some very smart science and tech minds came up with ways to 
automate what they were doing and trained through the community college 
their workers to pick up on this new phase of activity within their 
assembly line process. Today they are successful, but it took 
investment, investment of capital infrastructure, physical 
infrastructure, and human structure, training the worker and providing 
for those relationships to prosper. Everyone wins in that situation.
  So we know we have it within us to make this all possible. It talks 
to investment. It speaks to investment. It speaks to the opportunity 
that we can provide so that people can have that American Dream 
tethered in reality, so that it can be within their grasp, so that they 
can continue to build upon this Nation's significance.
  A great nation stays great if it continues to stretch itself. It's 
about the churning and the turning and becoming more mighty through 
investment of research, development, retrofitting our manufacturing 
base. We can win this by doing it smarter. We don't necessarily have to 
do it cheaper. Do it smarter and you win those contracts that then 
equate to jobs. Research equals jobs. I see it all the time. It gives 
birth to new ideas, new product lines, better efficiencies. It drives 
an economy.
  You can't walk away from this tough moment and talk about austere 
responses. You need creative responses--not just throwing money at a 
situation, but thinking it through, thoughtful, analytical, economic 
approaches that then provide for the best policy formats.
  The President has offered several ideas that were not taken up in 
this House. We could grow that economic recovery, which has been slow 
and steady with 32 consecutive months of private sector job growth. We 
can expand upon that, and we can create much stronger numbers if we do 
it wisely.
  So I think the American people have spoken. They've spoken to an 
investment in the middle class, the investment in the American Dream, 
the investment in ideas and research. We know--we've all talked about 
it on this floor--where research occurs, that's where manufacturing 
will network. It will migrate toward that research element. So we are 
wise to invest in research and to invest in the human infrastructure, 
the worker. The important significant part of the equation: having that 
trained, skilled, educated workforce that can make it all happen.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. Earlier today I was asked by a reporter from San 
Francisco about the effect of sequestration and the austerity budget 
proposals on research in that area. The San Francisco Bay area is one 
of the great research centers in the world, with the University of 
California, the laboratory at Berkeley and Lawrence Livermore, Stanford 
and other institutions in the area. The austerity program that is being 
proposed will devastate the research.
  Years ago--actually, in the mid-eighties, when I was in the 
California Legislature, we were talking about how to keep the 
California economy going, and I developed a plan, a program. There were 
five pieces to it. We've talked about all of those five today. Every 
one of those five were critical investments that the economy, the 
society would make.
  The first was the best education system in the world. Now, America 
has an enormous challenge here and we're not measuring up as we should, 
and that should be a discussion we should have here on the floor 
perhaps at another day.
  The second was the best research. The austerity budget that's out 
there, the sequestration and other proposals that have been put 
forward, slash the research budgets of the United States in health 
care, in energy, in transportation, in manufacturing, in those areas 
and in those areas that create opportunity.
  The third is manufacturing, making things that come from that 
research and enhancing the current manufacturing technologies using, as 
you suggested a moment ago, Mr. Tonko, the advanced manufacturing 
technologies which come from research, and the engineering that goes 
with it that Ms. Kaptur discussed a few moments ago.
  The fourth was infrastructure. You have to have the foundation for 
economic growth. Mr. Higgins brought to our attention the potential for 
26-27 million jobs within the next 5 years by really going full on into 
building the American infrastructure, repairing what we have and 
building for the next generations.
  The fifth was change. You have to accept change. That means that we 
have to learn from past experiences here in Congress. Mr. Higgins very 
correctly pointed out the economic history when a recession was about 
to recede because of government policies but austerity was implanted 
and a new recession commenced. We ought to take cognizance of that.

                              {time}  2110

  So we have to change and grow and learn. Those are the five things I 
often talk about.
  Let's carry on this discussion. We have about another 10 minutes. And 
maybe if each one of us takes 2\1/2\ or so minutes, we can wrap up in 
time. I think I started with Mr. Higgins and then Ms. Kaptur, Mr. 
Tonko, and then I will say good night to all.
  Mr. Higgins.
  Mr. HIGGINS. Again, I want to thank you for your leadership on these 
issues and for bringing us together tonight to discuss this important 
issue. Hopefully it will be the first of many or a continuation of this 
discussion.
  But even groups like the United States Chamber of Commerce, they put 
out a report stating that we will lose $336 billion over the next 5 
years because of bottlenecks, because of inefficiency in our 
infrastructure. You can't identify the problem without supporting a 
solution.
  My point is that Democrats and Republicans in this Nation should come 
together to support a robust nation-building program right here in 
America. It benefits American small businesses; it benefits returning 
veterans; and it has a measurable influence on improving this economy.
  The New America Foundation, as I mentioned previously, has a report, 
``The Way Forward.'' It's not a right or a left group. It's a centrist 
group that is very prestigious and basically says, a $1.2 trillion 
investment in infrastructure--roads and bridges, sewer systems, water 
systems, the electricity grid--will create 27 million jobs in a 5-year 
period. It will create 5.2 million in the first year alone. That's 
433,000 jobs every month for the first year.
  Can you imagine what the stock market would do if the jobs report 
came out next month and said that we created 433,000 jobs? Our economy 
is consumer confidence. We are all economic actors. When we're 
confident, we move; when we're not, we don't.
  So I just think it's very clear that what's worked in the past is 
what will work in creating the kind of economy that everybody in this 
Nation wants very desperately.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. Ms. Kaptur.
  Ms. KAPTUR. Thank you.
  I wanted to tie together Congressman Higgins' ideas on the Helmets to 
Hardhats, a program that I have supported, and commend him for his 
leadership on that, and also Congressman Tonko for the efforts that 
he's made in suggesting to us that we have to be visionary, and we have 
to promote new research, new research and development.
  One area we have not focused on during these discussions tonight as 
much as I would hope is housing. Every recovery America has had since 
World War II has been led by housing, and housing has been in the 
dumpster for several years now. And one of the ways we do that is think 
about ways in

[[Page H6458]]

which programs like Helmets to Hardhats could identify sectors in 
communities that were depleted by the Wall Street crisis. And think 
about how to modernize the manner in which energy is provided to them, 
for example. So we're not just rebuilding to the past but building the 
future.
  In my home community, we have something called Advanced Energy 
Utility that the Port Authority has established where they can loan 
funds that are then paid back through the bond offerings they do. And 
right now it's in its early stages. But one could see where a 
neighborhood could be identified and new technologies in the building 
sector brought to bear to create the new neighborhoods of tomorrow.
  One company--Owens Corning--in our region has established a new 
manufacturing plant near Milan, Ohio, building a seven-layer roofing 
and the most incredible equipment. I defy any Member of Congress to 
build what they have built there and to bring off these big roles and 
be able to apply this roofing that I think is going to lead the 
industry. They could build four new factories depending on sales in the 
northern environments of the United States and Canada. And I see this 
and I think, all we have to do is put the parts together to build the 
residential neighborhoods of a 21st century America.
  So I am just proud to join my colleagues tonight. And thank you, 
Congressman Garamendi, for bringing us together, as you so often do, to 
keep the focus here in the Congress on jobs and economic growth, which 
is what the American people sent us here to do.
  Mr. TONKO. Again, thank you, Representative Garamendi. It's great to 
join with our colleagues here this evening to share thoughts about how 
we move from a very trying, difficult time into perhaps America's glory 
days.

  I think it's important for us to first acknowledge that every Member 
elected to serve in this wonderful Chamber of the House of 
Representatives and those down the road here at the United States 
Senate, each of us is challenged, required, and responsible to polish 
that American Dream and make it within the grasp, provide it to be 
within the grasp of America's working families and those who will grow 
into the middle class and those who are being further empowered by 
work, the dignity of work, and stronger outcomes with correct policy 
formats.
  I think that this journey that we've asked to embark upon, by putting 
our names on the ballot, begins with us: being a people of vision, 
being a House that provides a vision for America. That tells me we only 
need to look to our history--recent and some not so recent. But that 
will instruct us. Our history will instruct us.
  We have built a strong Nation. We have provided for growth around the 
world. We know the secret to the success. We know how we built a 
Nation. And it took a vision, a New Deal that provided for housing, for 
manufacturing, for a strong defense, for the opportunity for us, as a 
Nation, to respect its labor force and insert a value-added connotation 
for that workforce. That was us in our glory days. And we're going to 
be even more gloried because of investments that we can make by sound 
thinking.
  The research that we need to provide will enable us to compete. We 
will create products not yet on the radar screen. And if we think all 
the products ever needed by society have been conceived and designed 
and manufactured, then the story's over. But we know better than that. 
Product lines are coming up as we speak that allow us to use our 
resources much more wisely.
  We are a Nation of abundance. But that means we can't be wasteful. We 
need to be resourceful. That challenge is out there to us. And as we 
become resourceful, we become more efficient, and we become more 
profitable by sound policy. We can do it. We have ways to invest in our 
infrastructure, invest in research, invest in workforce development, 
invest in housing, invest in communities. And that investment will earn 
lucrative dividends. It's not spending. It's investing with the 
expectation--the rightful expectation, mind you--that we will get that 
just return.
  And so tonight I feel hope for our Nation, driven by a sense of 
ideals carved by the richness of our history.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Tonko, thank you very much. Ms. Kaptur, Mr. 
Higgins, thank you very much.
  As I was listening to the three of you and thinking my own thoughts, 
I'm excited. I'm excited for the prospect of America. I can see the 
opportunities that are there. I can see the policies coming together. 
And each of the three of you described specific policies that we could 
put in place.
  I don't know if we can get 27 million jobs from infrastructure. But I 
do know that we can get millions of jobs from an infrastructure program 
and, in so doing, lay the foundation for safety, from floods, fires, 
from other catastrophes that could occur. I know that in doing so, we 
can rebuild our manufacturing sector by using American-made products in 
that infrastructure program. I know that we can provide the jobs that 
Americans desperately want today--not just cheap jobs but real middle 
class jobs, as all three of you have described.
  I am excited. I am excited about the prospect of building America, 
coming home from the wars and building America, as happened when my 
father came back from World War II. America went after building. Ms. 
Kaptur, you talked about the St. Lawrence Seaway. You talked about the 
interstate highway, that system that President Eisenhower talked about.
  We are on the cusp of a new building in America. We have the 
wherewithal. We can finance it with really cheap money now. And we can 
use these projects to repay that money. It's a very exciting time. And 
it's our responsibility, as Representatives of the 300-plus million 
Americans, to enunciate that vision, to put in place those programs. 
And when we do, we'll make it in America. And Americans will make it.
  Thank you so very, very much for joining us.
  I yield back the balance of my time.

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