[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 18 (Tuesday, February 3, 2015)]
[House]
[Pages H743-H749]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
MIDDLE CLASS ECONOMICS
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 6, 2015, the gentleman from California (Mr. Garamendi) is
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
Mr. GARAMENDI. Madam Speaker, and Members, wow. There are actually
people here in the audience and Members.
We have talked a lot about middle class economics, but why? Why is it
important? Why did the President raise this issue in his State of the
Union? What is this all about?
We are going to spend some time here today working our way through
middle class economics, and some of my colleagues may join me, and I
asked the Republicans, if they want to join, they could too.
It is okay, Madam Speaker, that they are not listening. But this is
really an important issue.
So why is middle class economics important?
What is it all about?
It is really about driving the economy. If you want to create jobs in
America, if you want to have economic growth in America, the middle
class of America, the great middle class, the millions upon millions of
men and women that are working families, they need to grow. And so
middle class economics is all about growing the American economy,
because that is where demand is created.
We often talk about the job creators, and businesses really create
product and they create profit. But it is the middle class that
actually creates the growth in the economy by creating the demand. So
if we are able to grow the middle class, grow the paychecks, increase
the vast number of Americans who are in the middle class, we will
create the jobs. So that is why middle class economics is on our
agenda.
{time} 1715
There are other pieces of this. It leads to higher wages. So when you
increase the middle class, you increase the higher wages, creating the
demand.
So that is what this is all about. It is about opportunity. It is
about growing the ability of the working families in America to make
it, to have a shot at education, to have a shot at a home. So that is
what we are going to talk about today in the next 46 minutes, about
middle class economics. The President brought this issue to us. We are
going to spend some time discussing this.
I notice that our fearless whip, Steny Hoyer of Maryland, has joined
us.
Mr. Hoyer, please, let's get into this conversation.
Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
The reason I wanted him to yield is because I want to thank him. I
don't know that there is any Member of this body or, frankly, the other
body who has spent more time talking with the American public to let
them know how focused we are on making sure that Americans can Make It
In America. And the middle class, of course, is critically important.
I will tell the gentleman from California, he and I have both
traveled outside this country--I think I have been to probably 60
nations--and every nation has its rich people, and every nation has its
poor people. America's genius and success was posited, however, on the
broad middle class that we had, that made America. They are the ones
whose work and intellect and creativity and innovative spirit and
entrepreneurial energy made America what it is and what it has been.
I want to congratulate the gentleman from California (Mr. Garamendi)
for the fidelity that he has shown over the years to this critically
important objective of making sure that the middle class, working
Americans have the ability to make it and to increase their standard of
living over that of their parents. That has always been the genius of
our country. It needs to continue to be. And the President, of course,
has offered, as the gentleman points out, an agenda that is focused on
working men and women in this country, making sure that they have the
ability to live quality lives and have their children pursue education
and do even better than their parents; and as they do so, their
country, this great country of ours, will do better as well.
So I wanted to rise to thank the gentleman for his, as I say,
fidelity to this objective, which is, after all, the critical agenda
for our country.
Mr. GARAMENDI. I thank you, Mr. Hoyer. Nobody has been at this longer
than you. You have been working in the Halls of Congress and across
this Nation advocating for the middle class.
Both Democrats and Republicans now agree that the middle class in
America has stalled out. They have not seen the increase in their
paychecks. In fact, in the last couple of years, there has actually
been a decrease on the average middle-American paycheck.
So what we are all about and what the President proposed to us in his
State of the Union was middle class economics. And it is critically
important, if we want to grow the jobs in this Nation, that we have got
to pay attention to the middle class and how they can improve
themselves, how they can have a higher standard of living, have greater
paychecks. In doing so, we will grow this economy. We will be able to
deal with the deficit. There are numerous ways in which this can be
done.
We need to look for higher wages. Infrastructure is critically
important. In the budget that the President just put forth yesterday,
there is a major advancement that he is proposing for infrastructure, a
6-year program, over $600 billion in that 6-year period--$673 billion
building our roads, rebuilding our bridges, our ports, our
communication systems. When you do that, you actually are going to grow
the economy, and it is the middle class that will have those jobs.
So this is all about growing the middle class, otherwise known as
middle class economics. That is what we are going to debate this year.
We are going to spend the next several months as we put together the
budget first and then the appropriations and the various pieces of
legislation--for example, reauthorizing the surface transportation
program. We want to structure that. We, the Democrats, want to
structure that in such a way that the principal benefits flow to the
working families of America so that they can see greater wages, so that
they can see greater opportunities. And there are many, many pieces to
this puzzle that we need to pay attention to. So we want to grow
American jobs.
The gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer) was here just a moment ago.
And he has been talking about this theme of making it in America, which
builds on the Buy America laws which have been in effect for more than
40 years. Our taxpayer money must be spent, should be spent on
American-made equipment. We will come to this in a little more detail,
but these are the fundamental parts of growing American jobs. You make
things in America, whether that happens to be a movie or a new app for
your iPhone or a train or a plane, whatever it happens to be. Make it
in America; and use our taxpayer money to buy American-made equipment.
This one here: a well-educated workforce is fundamental to growing
any economy, whether it be in Bangladesh or in the United States, the
education of the workforce. If you have a well-educated workforce, your
economy will grow.
America used to have the best education system in the world. We are
not there anymore. We have fallen way off that power curve. We have got
to establish America's position as having the best educated workforce
in the entire world.
Now, the President, in his State of the Union and as part of the
middle class economics, spoke to this issue when he talked about
community colleges, all Americans being able to get 2 years of
education at a community college, perhaps to pick up an AA degree or
some skill set, and that it be free. What an important, important
element that is in having a well-educated workforce. There are many,
many other pieces to this educated workforce, and we will, over the
next several weeks and months, be talking about this as we go forward.
Research and development. Well, I am from California, and I represent
a
[[Page H744]]
major research university, the University of California, Davis. You can
just see spreading out from that university new businesses in
biotechnology, biomedical, biopharmaceutical. We are seeing energy
programs and new companies being created from the research at the
universities. This is not just at Davis, California, but certainly
Silicon Valley is a prime example of the skill being used all across
this Nation, and other research institutions around the Nation. These
are the ways in which you grow American jobs.
We talked earlier about infrastructure. We will come back to that.
Trade policies are also critically important. We will be debating the
Trans-Pacific Partnership here and the TTIP, the European trade
agreement. In those trade agreements, it is vitally important that we
don't give away the American jobs. It will be a great debate. Very
important. We have seen what happened with NAFTA and other trade
agreements when we have simply allowed the offshoring of American jobs.
So these are six pieces of how you grow American jobs.
I notice my colleague from Vermont is here.
If you would care to join us in this conversation, I would be
delighted.
Mr. WELCH. Thank you for doing this.
One of the things that we have to recognize in Congress is that
policies really make a difference.
Wages have stagnated; people haven't had a raise in 15 or 20 years;
and there are a lot of reasons for that. Some of it is globalization. A
lot of it has to do with the weakening bargaining power of unions that
were so helpful in improving living standards for everyday Americans,
not just for the members of the union but for others who benefited by
the commitment of unions to good jobs, good wages, and safe working
conditions.
There are pressures with globalization that have reduced bargaining
power. It has made things cheaper to buy but has really helped
contribute to lower wages. The bottom line is that we need policies in
order to focus attention, as you are saying, on the middle class and
improving their purchasing power, giving them what the middle class has
always had: a wage or a salary where, at the end of the month, they can
pay their bills, set aside a little money for college, set aside a
little money for a vacation, set aside a little extra money for
retirement. That is a basic contract that we should be making.
We have got a variety of things where we have created policies and
undercut the capacity of the middle class to sustain itself.
The tax policy is out of control. It is really outrageous when we
have been passing these Bush tax cuts that are skewed very heavily
toward high-end folks with the notion and the assertion that it will
create jobs through trickle-down economics. It hasn't worked.
When we have entered, in some cases, into trade agreements, it didn't
take into account the environmental and labor standards that are so
essential to having a level playing field. American workers are willing
to compete, but it has got to be on a level playing field.
Then basic things that a confident nation always invests in, even in
tough times, like education and the future. We grew up, and those ahead
of us had the GI Bill. They came back from serving their country and
got a free education. But you know what? They paid it back, and then
some, with their productivity.
We established Medicare and Social Security that has provided a
safety net for older people. We are trying to make inroads now into
providing a secure health care system for everybody through the
Affordable Care Act, but we have a big challenge in bringing down those
costs.
We have an opportunity to invest in, as you were saying, not just the
higher education, but job training for people so that they have the
skills that we need to compete in a modern economy.
And the infrastructure that you mentioned, how is it that in this
country, where we have extraordinary engineers, extraordinary needs,
and bipartisan agreement that we have to rebuild our roads and our
bridges, extend broadband throughout the country, including in rural
areas of Vermont and, by the way, rebuild our schools, rebuild our
hospitals, all of these are institutions that are essential to the
well-being of local communities that are where the middle-class people
live, so I really appreciate your focus on this.
What is frustrating, I think, for America and for a lot of us in
Congress is that our focus on policy is how many more tax cuts should
we give to folks who don't need them, how much more should we spend on
things that don't reward investment and hard work, and for how long are
we going to continue this disinvestment in science, in research, in
medical research, in infrastructure, and in education.
I am pretty amazed, as I know you are, that young people getting out
of college, on average, have a $30,000-plus debt. Many have accumulated
debts in the range of $100,000, and a lot of those debts are shared by
their parents who have cosigned. They pay higher interest rates. A lot
of those parents who have finally paid down their house and were
looking forward to maybe taking a 2- or 3-week vacation, maybe a
cruise, suddenly find themselves saddled, along with their kids, with
these very high monthly payments for education.
So there is a bipartisan desire, I think, to help the middle class,
but we are in a debate about what the solutions are. Essentially, one
argument is that no taxes, no regulation, will somehow lift all boats.
I don't think I have seen evidence that that is the case. Another
argument is you have got to make sensible, prudent, disciplined
decisions about how and where to invest in the future of this country.
So, Mr. Garamendi, I salute you for your advocacy here and for
speaking so eloquently on this issue that I think is the issue of our
time.
Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Welch, your representation of the State of Vermont
is unparalleled. You have been at this for some time, and you have so
correctly pointed out all of the various policies that are in law today
that hold back the middle class.
You have talked about the tax policy that basically supports those at
the very, very top--the one-percenters, the 10 percent--and forces,
therefore, the tax burden onto the middle class and the poor. The
President is suggesting a shift in that, and we are going to debate
that here--and we should. But again, that is one more piece of this
middle class economics to grow American jobs. These are all public
policy issues, the Make It In America, the Buy America provisions, the
education.
You raised something that has been very, very much on my mind. I have
kids that have school debt from going to medical school or nursing
school or even just to the 4 years, and I often wonder, the great
majority of the student debt is actually owned by the Federal
Government. I think about 60 percent of the $1 trillion-plus in student
debt is owned by the American public.
{time} 1730
We refinance everything. We refinance our credit cards, and we
refinance our home, seeking a lower interest rate. I just wonder: Why
don't we refinance the student debt?
Mr. WELCH. That is exactly right.
Mr. GARAMENDI. We could borrow money at less than 2 percent now for
10 years, probably 3 or 4 percent for 20 years. Why don't we go out and
borrow at 2 percent, refinance that debt, and let them pay 2\1/2\
rather than 6, 7, 8, and 9 percent?
Mr. WELCH. If I may, Mr. Garamendi, you are so right. One of the
upsides of this really tough economy is that interest rates have gone
down, and a lot of folks have been given a little breathing room by
being able to reduce their interest rates on their mortgage from 7 or 8
percent down to 3\1/2\ percent. That is real money in their pocket.
Mr. GARAMENDI. You bet.
Mr. WELCH. Why not allow students and parents who have cosigned on
students loans that same opportunity to save a few bucks? They will pay
those loans back.
So I salute you.
Mr. GARAMENDI. Refinance your home; refinance your student debt. It
is a bookkeeping procedure at the Federal level. Right now, those
students are paying a very, very high interest rate to the U.S.
Government, and they are held back. This is a major part of the middle
class.
Mr. WELCH. Well, I thank you for your leadership.
[[Page H745]]
Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Welch, thank you for joining us.
Madam Speaker, I am going to carry on here for a few more moments. We
are going to talk about a few other things that go into this. That
previous placard had Make It In America as one of the principal ways of
growing American jobs, and it is really true.
Madam Speaker, I want to give you just two examples of how Make It In
America and Buy America creates American jobs--or not. Two bridges, one
on the west coast, the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, and one on the
east coast--New York, actually--the Tappan Zee Bridge in New York.
This bridge in the San Francisco Bay was supposed to be about a $3
billion project. It turned out to be over $6 billion. Instead of buying
American steel, they went out and bought Chinese steel. It was supposed
to be 10 percent cheaper. It turned out to be far, far more expensive.
It became over budget.
It did create 3,000 jobs in China and serious problems with the
quality of the steel, the welds, and other problems. Anyway, it wound
up almost $4 billion over budget, more than 100 percent more expensive.
That was San Francisco. This is my State. This is a major controversy
and, if you will, a major scandal in California.
In New York, the Tappan Zee Bridge is now under construction. It is
100 percent U.S.-made steel. It is coming in at about $3.9 billion
total, under budget, and there were 7,728 American jobs as a direct
result of the decision made by New York to buy American, to make it in
America.
This is the most clear example that I have been able to find--west
coast, east coast--and the east coast is making the right decision of
buying American, using the American taxpayer dollars in the case of
both the commuters in New York or the commuters in San Francisco Bay,
paying their money to China in the case of San Francisco Bay Bridge, or
to American workers and American steel companies, a prime example of
why Make It In America is so critically important because it is all
about those middle class jobs.
It is about the steelworkers, the ironworkers, and the men and women
that are doing the welding that are in the shops and in the steel mill
harvesting or mining the coal and the iron ore to make the steel.
Keep this in mind, America: when we talk about Make It In America
policies and when we talk about middle class economics, we are talking
about bringing it home, keeping it home, and building our own economy.
China can do what they want to do, but let them do it with somebody
else's money and not with American taxpayer money, so we are going to
push this policy hard.
I want to give you another example, Madam Speaker, and that is that
at this moment Amtrak--we know what Amtrak is. It is just the American
passenger rail system. Amtrak is requesting a waiver from the
Department of Transportation on the Buy America requirements for the
purchase of 28 new high-speed rail train sets for the east coast
corridor.
Amtrak correctly wants to make the trip between Washington, D.C., and
Boston a whole lot faster. To do that, they want to transition to a
whole new type of train--not the Acela, which was the last version of
high speed. They want to go to a real high-speed system here on the
east coast.
However, we are talking about tens of millions of dollars to be spent
on these high-speed train sets, 28 of them. They want to waive the Buy
America requirements--waive the Buy America requirements.
What happened with the Bay Bridge, the San Francisco-Oakland Bay
Bridge when they did that? The jobs went overseas. I am saying: No way,
no how, are you going to waive the Buy America requirements. They say:
Oh, but you don't understand. America doesn't make high-speed trains.
Yes, that is correct because we have never had them in the United
States, and we never will if we waive the Buy America requirements both
for the high-speed rail on the east coast or the high-speed rail on the
west coast.
No way, no how, Madam Speaker, should we allow American taxpayer
money to be spent overseas. Build it in America, make it in America,
and hold on to those Buy America requirements. They are legal. They
have been in law for nearly half a century. Keep them.
Amtrak, I am sorry, but I have talked to the companies that could
manufacture these trains. They say: Of course we can make them in
America. It is going to take a little while. We have got to build the
factory. We can do it. If it is required, we will do it.
I will give you an example of how it actually happened. In the
stimulus bill, the American Recovery Act, there was a provision, some
$700 million for Amtrak to purchase 100 percent American-made
locomotives--these are the electric locomotives that will be operating
on the east coast corridor, 100 percent American made, $700 million,
about 80 different trains, 80 different locomotives.
Siemens looked at that and said: Hmm, 700 million, that is a lot of
money, 80, 90 trains or locomotives, we can do that.
They took their light-rail factory in Sacramento, California, about a
mile from my district, a few miles from my home, expanded it, and began
the process of making it in America. Those new locomotives are 100
percent American made by a German company operating in the United
States.
Don't tell me you can't do it. Don't tell me that you cannot make
aluminum frames for these trains, that you can't make wheels and brake
systems in the United States. This is the United States. We used to
be--and we must be--at the top of the pack. We can be if we bring it
home, if we keep it home, and if we make it in America.
Remember. Remember this fiasco in California. Remember what happens
when you went to China to buy steel, 100 percent over budget, and a lot
of ongoing problems as to the safety of this bridge going forward.
Remember New York. They said they were going to buy American. It
comes in under budget with 7,728 jobs in the United States, built by
Americans. I am not proud of California in this situation.
Madam Speaker, there are a couple of other things that are on my
mind. As I said, why middle class economics? It is about growing the
demands. It is about rebuilding the middle class, giving the purchasing
power to the middle class, and growing their wages.
Grow the paycheck. Grow the paycheck. Grow the jobs. Grow the
paycheck. These are all ways in which we can raise the wage. There is
this little #raisethewage, so when you see that out there on your
Twitter account, you know what it is about. Grow the paycheck, buy
American, education--job training and education.
This is a big one: more than 50 percent of the women in America are
working, and they are working at the same job as a man for about 75
percent of the wage. Do you want to grow the wage? Do you want a bigger
paycheck for American families?
Then pay attention to the law that has been in effect in the United
States since John F. Kennedy signed it in the sixties, and that is
equal pay for equal work.
This one down here at the bottom, the men and women at the bottom at
the minimum wage. We have been calling for a raise in the minimum wage
for months and years here.
If you want to help out the American economy, you raise the minimum
wage--we--excuse me, not you, us--Members of Congress and the Senate--
raise the minimum wage, and we will see greater purchasing power and a
growing economy as a result of that.
You don't lose jobs. The economic studies are clear. You are not
going to lose jobs by raising the minimum wage. It hasn't happened in
California. The minimum wage went up in California a year ago. We have
seen job growth. We didn't see less jobs.
What we are seeing, Madam Speaker, is greater purchasing power by the
families of America, fewer people on food stamps, and fewer people on
welfare. As you raise the minimum wage, that is what happens, so this
is what we call grow the paycheck, raise the wage.
I am going to let education go. We will pick that up later. I want to
pick up one of my current challenges. I think anybody that studies
American history will know that America was the greatest maritime
nation in the world. We would contend with the United Kingdom--
England--as to which was the greatest maritime nation, and we surpassed
England.
We have lost that. We have seen our maritime industry--our mariners
and
[[Page H746]]
our ships--decline. We have very, very few ships flying the American
flag anymore. All of the cruise ships that are advertised even on the
Super Bowl 2 days ago were flagged overseas. They didn't have American
crews on them, although all of their passengers seemed to be American--
or at least many of them.
What we need to do is to find ways to rebuild the American maritime
industry. These are the sailors, the merchant marines, the American
mariners, the captains, the sailors, and the engineers.
It is also the shipbuilding. The great shipyards of America are in
need of business. We do a lot of naval ships. Madam Speaker, this is a
fundamental national security issue. The shipyards in America, the
ability to build ships for the Navy and for our domestic trade is
critical as a security issue. Obviously, it is critical as a jobs
issue. We can do this.
We are in the process of exporting natural gas with liquefied natural
gas. A new terminal by the Cheniere company in Texas will need 100
ships or more just for that one terminal. What I am saying is that if
we are going to ship a strategic national asset--natural gas in the
form of liquefied natural gas--if we are going to export that, then we
ought to use that export to secure a second national security issue,
and that is our merchant marines and our shipyards.
When this tanker, which happened to have been built in Japan, finds
its way to an American port, will it be American sailors? This is a
very dangerous thing. You are talking about millions of gallons of
natural gas in liquefied form. Will it be American sailors? Will this
ship be an American ship?
India wants to buy natural gas from the United States. They have a
tender offer out. That tender offer says: We want to buy X gazillion
cubic meters of natural gas--good--and three of the ships that
transport that must be built in India.
{time} 1745
And I say to India: Great. The other six or seven ships must be built
in the United States. You want our gas, terrific. Then we want to have
the ships built in the United States with American sailors.
This is a fundamental national security issue.
I just noticed that my good friend, the gentleman from New York (Mr.
Tonko), came to join me on the floor, probably because I was praising
New York so profusely with the Tappan Zee Bridge. Mr. Tonko, good for
New York. Shame on California for building a bridge with Chinese steel.
Mr. TONKO. I thank the gentleman from California for leading us on
middle class economics and on infrastructure and on growing the jobs
and growing the economy. That can be--must be--our top priority, making
certain that the dignity of work and the strength of drawing a paycheck
are the American Dream that we want to help individuals and families
across this country tether so they can move forward, utilizing their
skills and talents and passions in order to be able to maintain a
household, raise a family, and provide for the American Dream. It is
always a pleasure to join you when we are speaking on these issues so
forcefully, and to know there is a solution out there. There is a way
to grow this economy, and looking at some of the items mentioned in the
budget is important, and we should pay respect to that.
Certainly infrastructure that you just made mention of, and thank you
for leading us in a recent motion to recommit to make certain that
those who will staff those boats, transporting that cargo of LNG,
create American jobs. We need to be very much disciplined in how we
create a working agenda for America's families, and that is one step in
the process.
But to the greater issue of infrastructure, I would suggest that we
are well beyond that deadline when we should have responded to
America's needs. We have a very deficient infrastructure. There are
many bridges in this country that are rated deficient and weak. There
are a number of situations with the grid system that was designed for a
monopoly setting, and we now know that we transmit, we deliver
electrons not only from region to region, former monopoly region to
monopoly region, but State to State and country to country. It requires
an upgrading in investment in our electric utility grid and certainly
broadband. For our communication's sake, we need to wire neighborhoods
in remote areas in communities across the country to enable us to
strengthen the outcome, the commerce end of it all, to give businesses
those needs that are so important.
Let me just close with this, because I see our friend, the
gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur) has joined us. I believe it is the
Ninth District of Ohio.
I recently held a press conference at home after a week of being on
the floor here, and it was about the child care and dependent child
care credit, tax credit, and it was amazing to hear the real-life
stories of parents who struggle, trying to work. They need two incomes
and are impacted by the high cost of child care, quality child care.
They need that comfort zone to know that as a coparent, in a way, with
the given agency that they are in a secure setting, so that they can be
productive at work and know that their children are well cared for.
And it brings great benefits. There are social and cognitive and
educational skill sets that are introduced into the lives of those
toddlers and children that makes them all the more ready for that pre-K
to K to elementary setting, so it has great benefits. But when you
think about the fact that the average cost is $10,000 per year for
child care, and when toddlers can be as high as $16,000 and a 5-year
old as high as $12,000 per year, that is an immense cost to families.
So as the President addresses this issue in the budget, he triples
that benefit to some $3,000 per child under 5 per family. For families
making as much as $120,000, they can get that full benefit, and there
is a scaled-down benefit for family incomes as high as $210,000.
So there are efforts here to grow the economy through middle class
economics. The middle class has taken it on the chin for far too long.
We have seen the growth of this economy post-recession and all of the
added wealth that has come since that turnaround, that upward movement
that has gone to a relative few in our society. Now it is time to share
the wealth with the great numbers of us in the middle class, and that
is the engine that runs America.
If you give more purchasing power to the middle-income community, you
give it to the working poor, give it to those looking to ascend into
the middle class, that will drive a strong economic recovery, even more
powerful than what we have seen since the President took office in
2009, when we hit the lowest point in March 2009. From that recession
that President Obama inherited, we have done really well. We could have
done much better with infrastructure investments, which would have put
many people in the trades to work and where we would have responded
with a much stronger outcome for purchasing power for the great many of
us in that middle-income community.
So, Mr. Garamendi, it is always a pleasure to join with you and our
colleagues to make certain that we bring to the public's attention
direct assistance that we can provide, items that have been introduced
in bill format or included in a proposed budget from the President that
can make a difference in the fabric of this community called America,
where we can tether that American Dream in more noble and measured
terms, and where we can make certain that we not only grow the climate
for job production but grow the economy.
So it is within our grasp, but we just have to be bold in our attempt
to go forward and to be progressive in our thinking and in our
policies.
Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Tonko, you have been here on the floor with me
many times over the last few years, and we keep beating this drum about
American jobs. We now have a policy from the President, middle class
economics, that has all of the elements, many of which we have
talked about on the floor--the research issue, the education issue, the
job training issue, the infrastructure, all of those things--and it is
all pulled together in middle class economics.
Another piece of that puzzle is trade policy. If we are going to grow
American jobs, as I put this up before--Make
[[Page H747]]
It In America, Buy American, education workforce, research,
infrastructure, and then this one down here, trade policy.
The gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur) has spoken to us on the floor
about this issue many times. She is passionate about it. I think she is
right about it. We have to be really, really careful as to how we do
our international trade programs so that we don't hollow out the great
American manufacturing sector, American jobs, whether they are in
agriculture or manufacturing, or in other parts of our economy.
Ms. Kaptur, we would love to hear from you on this issue. I know that
you are passionate about it and very well informed.
Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I thank Mr. Garamendi for bringing us
together again. He is truly a leader on growing American jobs, all of
the way from California, way out on the west coast, to the gentleman
from New York's community on the east coast. I commend both of you for
your dogged determination to keep expanding the recovery and doing
everything we can to help the American people have increasing paychecks
and fulfilling work and a good family life where they are able to raise
their children and fulfill their dreams, whatever they might be.
I just wanted to come to the floor and talk about America's trade
policies for a brief moment and the records. Statistics don't lie, and
our trade policies have been costing us more jobs than they have been
yielding us for a very long time. The trade policies that have been
enacted have actually caused the United States to cumulate since 1976 a
staggering number--$9.5 trillion--in trade deficits. That means more
imports coming in than our exports going out. Translating that into
lost jobs, foregone jobs, 47.5 million lost jobs in that little over a
quarter century.
The American people say: Why do we have a budget deficit?
Well, I will tell you why. When you lose this much productive wealth
inside your country to other places, our people start to backslide, and
they have been backsliding since the 1980s. Despite our hard work here
to try to make a difference, trade policies have an enormous impact on
the ability of the American people to maintain a standard of living and
to both remain in the middle class or aspire to it and earn their way
forward.
It now takes two in a family to earn enough, whereas when I grew up,
our father worked and that was enough to support our family--until he
became ill, and that is a whole other story. But today, it is so hard
for people to have two people working in the family and hold their
household together. They are scrimping every week as to where they are
going to put their limited incomes.
I just wanted to put this so people start thinking: How did America
get in this deep a hole on trade? I believe before we sign any more
trade agreements, we ought to go back and fix what is wrong with the
current ones. Wouldn't that makes sense?
They promised us with Korea, which is one of the most recent
agreements, that we would be exporting 50,000 automobiles over there.
It hasn't happened. In, fact we have already lost 17,000 additional
jobs because of the Korean agreement not being in balance.
So I think we have to be rigorous and ask ourselves: How do we fix
this for the sake of the future, not just this generation but the next?
I have a long list, and I am going to be coming to the floor many
evenings going through this list, talking about companies that we have
known in this country and where they have relocated. I know that the
workers in those places and the executives who used to run those
companies, I know how hard they worked to create great American
products, and they didn't deserve the fate they were dealt because of
bad trade policies.
Let's look at Huffy Bicycle in Celina, Ohio. Huffy Bicycle used to be
known coast to coast. It was made in western Ohio, and it actually
became and is currently a Wal-Mart supplier. Unfortunately, well over
1,000 people lost their jobs at Huffy Bicycle in Ohio in the late
1990s--1998--and the plant first moved from Ohio to Missouri, and then
it moved from Missouri to Mexico, and then it made its final move from
Mexico to China.
So if you look at Huffy Bicycle today, you will see the paint job is
not the same. You will see the tires aren't the same. The quality of
the metal is not the same. It is not the bicycle that used to be made
in Ohio that lasted a lifetime.
So there has been a knockdown, a decrease in quality, that has come
with that manufactured product, which is then shipped back here to the
United States and sold in different locations. It is kind of sad,
really, what happens.
I love chocolate. I used to really like to buy Hershey bars, and I
still eat Hershey. But Hershey had always been manufactured in
Pennsylvania--in Hershey, Pennsylvania. In fact, when you walked
through Hershey, you could smell the chocolate in the streets. It was
just absolutely captivating. But if you have noticed, Hershey has
changed. The recipe has changed. They will deny it, but a large part of
their production was moved to Mexico. They even had to change the
wrapper to withstand the warmer temperatures, and the recipe changed,
and all of those workers in Hershey, Pennsylvania, in 2011. That
happened in 2011. These are brand-name products that we know in our
country.
Dell--Dell had been located in the Carolinas, and in 2009 they moved
to Mexico, too. So you think about the manufactured products that we
have known, and companies like Bank of America that had offices in
Cincinnati, Ohio, and Independence, Ohio, they moved production to
Mexico too, in 2013. So if people think they are safe in their service
job because they are not in manufacturing, they will be very surprised
to learn that the service jobs will follow.
How many phone calls have you gotten in your home from a call center
located in--and it could be anywhere in the world but here. And I
always ask the person from the call center:
Where are you calling from and how much do you earn?
I find that their earnings are so low they can't buy the very product
that they are selling over the telephone. What kind of world are we
creating?
The markets that exist in other places like Korea, Japan, and China
are closed to us. We are racking up these gigantic trade deficits
because we can't get our products in there, and the people in those
places don't earn enough money to buy some of what we export. So it is
really a rather vicious cycle. I am not going to take up much more time
except to say that I believe where America went wrong was about 30
years ago.
{time} 1800
We should have signed a trade relationship with Europe which shares
our political and legal values. They subscribe to a rule of law: ``We
can do business.'' Though their markets aren't completely open, they
are pretty open, and we could work with them.
Then we should have invited into that structure, which starts with a
belief in democracy and representative government, these other
countries that are aspiring to be better than they are, but without the
political advancement, their economic system will never work for them
without the rights the American people have.
We could have invited in Mexico. We could have invited in the CAFTA
countries. We could have invited in Korea, et cetera, to that union of
democracy-loving republics. We didn't do that.
What worries me over time is, in the end, we might be cashing out our
very liberty because, if you look globally at what is happening, you
will find in those places that the people are not treated well that are
doing this work. Over time, what kind of residue does that leave toward
our country and toward those who are their new overlords?
I have walked through some of these places; I have walked through
some of these companies. I remember walking through with our mother--
God love her--when she was still living, through one company in Mexico.
She said, ``Marcy, look at the women's faces,'' and I did. They were
so afraid. They were afraid of their boss. They were afraid of us. They
were afraid of losing their work because there was no worker
representation. What kind of a world are we contributing to in these
other places that most Americans will never visit?
I thank the gentleman. As I see your title there, ``Grow American
Jobs,'' I
[[Page H748]]
would say, ``Grow American democracy. Grow representative government at
the same time as we do trade.''
I think we really got way out of kilter back in the 1980s when these
agreements began to be imbued with the kind of power they had.
Mr. GARAMENDI. Ms. Kaptur, you are very, very correct about the role
of trade policy and hollowing out the American jobs in almost every
sector--you mentioned several sectors--and in every one of those, we
have seen this happen.
We are going to be engaging in a debate this year about whether we
are going to extend trade policies to what is called the Trans-Pacific
Partnership and, also, very, very soon, whether we will give away our
constitutional obligation to write trade policy, whether we are going
to give that away to the administration.
For me, this is extremely important. We have seen this year after
year, we have seen this problem, and I do not want to see a repeat of
it in the new legislation.
I would like to just move to a couple of other issues. We have got
about 7 minutes left. Perhaps, Mr. Tonko, if you would take a few of
those minutes and wrap up, keeping in mind that this is all in the
context of middle class economics, how the American family that is
struggling to make it in America, how they can do better with a set of
policies that we are proposing to the American public--tax policy,
infrastructure, educational policy, research--all of these things that
are part and parcel of middle class economics.
Mr. TONKO. Thank you, Representative Garamendi.
If I could just associate my comments with the representative from
Ohio, Marcy Kaptur talked about the impoverishment factor around the
world. These negotiated agreements are much more than just trade
barriers and tariffs. They become public policy.
When you lose American jobs, that is only the beginning of the story.
We have made a situation very critically tough here, and we have
resulted in impoverishing workers around the world, so that is an
undoable, unsustainable outcome.
I think back when Ms. Kaptur spoke of the exodus of jobs and the
incremental steps that took them eventually offshore. I think of the
entire passageway of the Erie Canal system that drove a westward
movement, reached Ohio, and then eventually allowed for the development
to the west coast.
You think of that, and many a person, many a worker, tethered the
American Dream to those mill towns that were given birth to by that
Erie Canal system. That was the empowerment of this Nation--and to
think that that whole history has been rejected. A lot of the creative
genius came from the immigrant who was working on those assembly lines.
We need to remember that history. We must have it speak to us.
This whole idea of inserting public policy into these agreements or,
again, circumventing our responsibilities here in the House--people who
we represent at home need to ask us: Where are we on fast track? Do we
want to give up that congressional responsibility and just do thumbs up
or thumbs down on a negotiated agreement?
The other items that I am concerned about are items like the earned
income tax credit. That is part of the budget request made by the
President. I spoke to a number of people in my district who rely on
that and others who aren't even filing for the earned income tax credit
and they qualify.
I want people to understand that this is not a tax loophole, this is
economic and social justice, where we take folks who perhaps might not
even make enough to file a tax return to get an earned income tax
credit.
This is one of the greatest antipoverty agents we have in the budget,
so we need to make certain that that earned income tax credit is
available when the final budget is completed, and we need to make
certain we get the word out.
This is about empowering those who are at the lower strata of income.
We want to make certain that programs like the earned income tax credit
speak to those who are working. It is encouraging people to work, and
it is trying to bring again some economic justice and social justice.
So many of these communities are benefited when we remind people that
these tax opportunities are available for them. It empowers the
regional economy. So many times, there is poverty clustered in some of
our urban cores, and so the social justice that comes with an earned
income tax credit is that millions of dollars are now brought back into
the community.
On those budgets where our lower strata income qualifying folks are,
they are going to spend those dollars, they are not going to bank those
dollars. So an earned income tax credit, dependent child care tax
credit, these are important items--fair trade, infrastructure
improvement, there are a great number of things that we can do to
muscle up the outcome here.
It begins in those hallowed halls of government where you can,
through these efforts in the halls of government, make policy happen.
We need to take heed as to what needs to be done for our middle income
community.
Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Tonko, I thank you so very, very much.
Ms. Kaptur, we are in what we call the rapid fire. You have about 2
minutes, then I will wrap it up with another minute, and we are out of
time. If you would, please.
Ms. KAPTUR. I appreciate your focus on growing the middle class and
helping those who aspire to be in it to be successful in that journey.
There is no question that when you have a robust middle class, it
creates the demand that then buys the products from the corporations
across this country that want to earn dividends, so that they can share
those with their shareholders.
Growing the middle class drives our economy and it creates the jobs,
and the people who do those jobs really create the company, they make
the company work.
It isn't the shareholders who are down there on the lines, although I
believe very much in shareholder equity for workers. I wish I could
encourage more of it. Wouldn't that be great if they could all have a
part of the indexes that the wealthy invest in? Because they certainly
have earned it.
Through good jobs with decent wages, through the transportation and
infrastructure bill I hope we can pass this year, which would be one
action we could take that would help to give a big boost to this
economy from coast to coast, all of that can help lift people's boats
across this Nation.
I join in alliance with my two dear colleagues, Congressman Tonko and
Congressman Garamendi, who are down here all the time. You are such
good Representatives from your respective States, fighting on behalf of
the American people.
Most of the rest of the place has gone home, but you are on the job.
You remind me of members of my family. They always worked overtime.
Mr. GARAMENDI. I want to thank you and Mr. Tonko for joining us, so I
have got Ohio and New York. Mr. Hoyer was here earlier from Maryland
and Mr. Welch from Vermont. We covered a large part of the United
States.
We are all talking about what the President has put forth as a
national policy of middle class economics: how we can grow the American
economy, why it is so important for the middle class to really succeed,
because that creates demand that then America businesses can fulfill in
their many, many ways.
I notice that the esteemed chairman of the Rules Committee is here,
and I suspect he wants to present us with some information. Mr.
Sessions, if you are ready--and I will continue on until you are ready.
In the meantime, the elements of the middle class economics, we know
why it is important. It builds the demand that the businesses can then
fulfill--American business--and so you really create the jobs with that
demand.
It also gives us higher wages. You are strengthening the middle class
with higher wages.
We talk about infrastructure. We will spend a lot of time talking
about infrastructure as we come up to the May deadline where we must
renew the infrastructure law, the surface highway transportation.
All of these are pieces of the puzzle.
We are nearly out of time, but I see the esteemed chairman of the
Rules Committee.
Mr. Chairman, I yield.
Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the gentleman very much, my fellow Eagle Scout
from California.
[[Page H749]]
In fact, I did walk on the floor here, and I noticed that Ms. Kaptur
is here, Mr. Tonko is here, and you are having a vigorous discussion
which is important with the American people.
I am about to be in receipt of a bill that will come down that will
be presented to the floor here in just a minute, so if I keep talking
here for just a minute.
Mr. GARAMENDI. If I may interrupt here for a second?
Thank you for the courtesy that you provided to me in the Rules
Committee when the liquefied natural gas--the LNG bill came up and when
we talked about how we could use that strategic asset to enhance
another strategic asset, the American shipbuilding industry. You were
kind.
We had a wonderful discussion in the committee and then again on the
floor. It is another way in which we can grow the American economy, by
using public policy in this way, and there are many, many other pieces
to it.
I think your staff has just arrived with the papers that you need, so
I will yield to you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. SESSIONS. I would, pending receiving those, which is just about
to happen, say to the gentleman that his ideas that he brought to the
Rules Committee, in fact, were received well, the ideas about shipping
in American ships, building of American ships, the opportunity for
American ships to employ people as they transported American products
around the world.
We will be ready here in half a second, so anybody who is watching
gets high drama.
Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Chairman, I have always looked forward to a
dialogue, a bipartisan dialogue, on important issues, and I didn't
quite know that we would come to that at this moment while we await
your staff bringing down their papers.
In the meantime, I thank my colleagues very much, and I yield back
the balance of my time.
____________________