[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 52 (Tuesday, April 1, 2014)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1893-S1894]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFITS

  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I rise in opposition to the Emergency 
Unemployment Compensation Extension Act of 2014. In my view, this 
legislation is flawed in many respects, and that being the case, I 
intend to vote against it.
  First and foremost, it needs to be said that the fact that we are 
even having a debate about extending unemployment benefits is 
unfortunate. Throughout the Obama administration, our Nation has been 
plagued with lackluster job growth, lower and lower rates of labor 
force participation, and high levels of long-term unemployment. Indeed, 
under this President it has been harder to find a job than at any other 
point in our Nation's recent history.
  But, as has been said before, these are just symptoms of a much 
larger problem. The plight of the long-term unemployed--which this bill 
is supposed to address--is not the major problem facing America today. 
Instead, the major problem is that despite the best efforts of many of 
us in Congress, our government hasn't done enough to foster economic 
growth. In fact, more often than not in recent years government has 
stood in the way. It has been an impediment.
  We are now more than 5 years into this administration, and it is 
becoming increasingly clear that President Obama does not have a plan 
to address these problems. True enough, he has proposals that would 
expand the government and redistribute income but nothing resembling a 
plan to promote growth in the private sector or to actually put people 
back to work. Many of the President's redistribution schemes end up 
costing labor supply and jobs, as the nonpartisan Congressional Budget 
Office has made clear with respect to ObamaCare and the President's 
proposed minimum wage hike.
  Growth is what we should be debating, ideas and proposals that would 
actually grow our economy and help people find jobs. But instead we are 
here once again to debate an extension of the emergency unemployment 
compensation program, or EUC.
  Let's talk about the EUC program for just a few minutes.
  The proponents of this legislation have told us that extending 
``temporary'' unemployment benefits is vital to our economy, but I 
think the facts tell a much different story. Between July 2008 when the 
program started and December 2013 when it expired, we spent roughly 
$265 billion on EUC benefits. That is more than a quarter of a trillion 
dollars on a temporary Federal benefit program. For much of that time 
the program paid up to 73 weeks of Federal benefits, amounting to a 
record total of 99 available weeks of unemployment benefits when you 
add the State and Federal benefits together. All told, we have paid EUC 
benefits for 66 months, which is 2\1/2\ years longer than any similar 
emergency unemployment program in U.S. history.
  In other words, EUC is a program with a long track record, and when 
we look at the record, we see that it hasn't had the positive economic 
impact proponents of the program often claim it has. Indeed, despite 
the hundreds of billions of dollars in benefits we have already paid 
under this program, we have suffered through the worst jobs recovery in 
our Nation's history, and the long-term unemployed have suffered the 
most.
  There is evidence to suggest this program has actually made the 
recovery worse. For example, according to recent research published by 
the National Bureau of Economic Research, ``unemployment benefit 
extensions can account for most of the persistently high unemployment 
after the Great Recession.''
  So while some Democrats have claimed that extending unemployment 
benefits is the best way to create jobs, the facts certainly tell a 
different story.
  I am not going to condemn anyone for wanting to extend a helping hand 
to those who continue to face difficulties under the Obama economy, but 
if we are going to debate yet another extension of Federal unemployment 
benefits, we should at the very least get our facts straight.
  So with all this in mind--the cost of the EUC program and the 
questionable benefits--let's take a look at the legislation before us 
now.
  One thing I would like to point out is that with this legislation we 
have once again abandoned regular order and bypassed the committee 
process entirely. I have remarked on this problem here on the floor 
several times before. When we ignore the traditional role of the Senate 
committees, we short-circuit the legislative process, and more often 
than not we end up with an inferior product. This bill is certainly no 
exception.
  We learned this last month when the National Association of State 
Workforce Agencies, NASWA, sent a letter to the Senate outlining its 
concern with this bill. Chief among these concerns was that it would be 
extremely difficult for States to retroactively pay unemployment 
insurance claims, as this bill would require. Indeed, according to 
NASWA, backdating EUC claims ``would make it nearly impossible'' to 
apply individual State work search requirements, which is a key factor 
in determining eligibility for unemployment insurance. In addition, the 
letter indicated that there would likely be a large increase in new EUC 
overpayments as a result of this retroactivity requirement.
  Due to these concerns and others, NASWA concluded that it would take 
States up to 3 months to implement this legislation, which is 
problematic because although the bill before us is technically for a 5-
month extension, only 2 months of benefits would be paid prospectively. 
In other words, many States would not be ready to implement this 
legislation by the time it expires.
  This is more than a glitch or a bump in the road; it is State 
workforce agencies--the very people who will have to implement this 
legislation on a day-to-day basis--telling the Senate that this bill is 
unworkable. According to the NASWA letter, there are a number of States 
that would consider not participating in the program due to these 
problems and the short time available to address them.
  Labor Secretary Perez sent his own letter in response to NASWA's 
statement, promising to help States address these concerns. Oddly 
enough, however, this letter was very short on actual details as to how 
that assistance would be offered.

[[Page S1894]]

  All of that said, these are the kinds of problems I was talking 
about--problems which can be addressed if committees are given an 
opportunity to operate. Had the committee had an opportunity to vet 
this legislation, we could have also fully examined the offsets my 
colleagues are using to pay for this EUC extension. These are also 
problematic.
  The main pay-for in this bill is the use of what is called pension 
smoothing, which is little more than a budget gimmick but an especially 
pernicious budget gimmick when repeated. It has the potential to do 
real harm to pension plan funding levels, threatening the future 
retirement security of American workers.
  Since the great recession of 2008, pension plans have struggled to 
regain their footing financially. The drastic drop in interest rates 
forced many plans to dramatically increase their pension contributions 
to keep pace. In 2012, at the historic low point for interest rates, 
Congress essentially gave pension plans 4 years of funding relief to 
get through the worst period of low interest rates. Congress did this 
by allowing pensions to fund their plans as if interest rates were 
higher than they really were.
  But we can't indefinitely pretend that interest rates are 
artificially high and contribution levels artificially low. Reality 
still matters. The reality is that, although still low by historical 
standards, interest rates are no longer at rock bottom and pension 
funding needs to gradually adjust to market rates just as current law 
provides.
  Put simply, we should avoid additional pension smoothing because it 
permits lower pension funding, and poor pension funding is bad pension 
policy. Pension funding remains a serious concern, and this is not the 
time to make it easier to underfund pensions. Doing so is worse than 
just kicking a can down the road. This can of pension underfunding will 
explode on American workers in the form of underfunded pensions that 
will somehow have to be rescued either through painful cuts in 
benefits, much higher PBGC premiums, or taxpayer-funded bailouts. There 
is no other way around it.

  The other major offset in this bill is the extension of customs user 
fees. This is also problematic. Traditionally speaking, offsets in the 
trade space are reserved for legislation that actually extends trade 
programs, such as the Generalized System of Preferences or the African 
Growth and Opportunity Act. If we start using these offsets in other 
areas, we won't have anything left over when it comes to extending 
these important programs.
  Both of these offsets--pension smoothing and customs user fees--fall 
under the jurisdiction of the Senate Finance Committee, just like the 
underlying UI extension. Once again, had the committee been given an 
opportunity to consider these issues, it is likely that these offsets 
would not have been used.
  As we can see, there are a number of problems with this bill that 
could have been considered and addressed had the Finance Committee been 
allowed to do its work. And it should have been allowed to do its work. 
Other problems could be addressed if there were a fair and open 
amendment process here on the floor. Sadly, it doesn't appear that we 
are going to get that either as the Senate Democratic leadership 
appears poised to once again try to force a major piece of legislation 
through the Senate without giving the minority an opportunity to offer 
amendments.
  Before our next vote on this legislation, I think we will see a 
number of amendments filed, many of which would likely improve the 
bill. Others would address the more pressing need to stimulate the 
economy and create jobs.
  I personally have amendments that would do both. For example, I have 
an amendment that would repeal the ObamaCare tax on medical devices, 
which enjoys bipartisan support in both the House and the Senate and 
would prevent further job losses in one of our most important U.S. 
industries.
  I have another amendment that would repeal the ObamaCare employer 
mandate. I am sure my colleagues on the other side of the aisle would 
deem this out of bounds, but they shouldn't. After all, the Obama 
administration seems pretty intent on delaying the employer mandate; it 
has already been delayed for 2 years. If the mandate is that harmful to 
implement, why don't we do away with it altogether and ensure that it 
doesn't cost us any more jobs and further requests for unemployment 
benefits?
  One amendment I have would help to ensure that the retroactive EUC 
benefits do not threaten program integrity. Specifically, it would 
require States, as part of their EUC agreements, to certify that paying 
retroactive benefits will not lead to an increase in fraud or 
overpayments.
  These are just some of the amendments I may offer to this bill, and 
all of them, in my opinion, would be improvements. But it doesn't look 
as though we are going to be able to offer amendments in the greatest 
deliberative body in the world--and I am saying that pretty 
sarcastically at this time. I know many of my Republican colleagues 
have amendments they would like to offer as well. Yet my friends on the 
other side of the aisle don't want to have a real debate about these 
issues. Instead, they are content to let the majority leader fill the 
tree and block any and all Republican amendments from coming up for a 
vote. One can only wonder what they are afraid of. Presumably the 
majority has the votes to defeat any amendments the minority wants to 
offer. Where is the harm in having a real debate? Where is the harm in 
having an open amendment process? I can only conclude they are worried 
that some of the votes they would have to take would be difficult 
politically. Indeed, preventing difficult votes seems to be priority 
No. 1 for the current Senate majority.
  At this point, it appears they have the votes to pass the bill. I 
assume we will be through with this process this week. Yet, while the 
Senate debate over unemployment insurance may be coming to an end, I 
can only conclude that the process failures we are seeing in this 
Chamber will continue as we move on to the next item of business, which 
is, in my opinion, very unfortunate.
  This week's debate over EUC is just the latest example of what is 
wrong with the Senate these days. Sadly, it doesn't look as if things 
are going to get better under the current leadership. These are 
important issues. We really need to let the Senate operate the way it 
always has, and let's quit playing these games of power play.
  Madam President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Heitkamp). The Senator from Kansas.
  (The remarks of Mr. Roberts pertaining to the introduction of S. 2191 
are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills 
and Joint Resolutions.'')
  Madam President, I note the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CASEY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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