[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 13]
[Senate]
[Pages 18218-18219]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                           THE 90/10 SOLUTION

  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, in order to complete our legislative 
agenda in the 106th Congress, our leadership has put forth a very 
simple concept.
  For the upcoming new fiscal year that begins in about 12 days, lets 
devote 90 percent of the surplus to debt reduction. And the remaining 
10 percent can be used for tax cuts and final spending bills.
  This is a very reasonable and straightforward proposal, and I 
compliment our leadership both in the House and the Senate for making 
the proposal to the President last week.
  I don't quite understand why the White House and some Democrats are 
so negatively excited about this proposal. For some reason, the White 
House and congressional leaders are having a great deal of difficulty 
understanding a very simple proposal.
  Indeed, our distinguished minority leader, even said he ``smelled a 
rat'' in this proposal. Why is it so difficult for the White House and 
congressional Democrats to understand this simple proposal.
  Maybe it is because they are really not serious about their own 
rhetoric about debt reduction. Maybe this is consistent with their 
blocking not once, but six times our efforts to pass the Social 
Security lock box legislation now on the calendar.
  I am hopeful we will do that, with their help perhaps, in a way we 
can all agree upon. But we will do it, and we will do it under this 90-
10 formula.
  For my friends at the White House and across the aisle let me take 
just a minute to explain this proposal.
  We first start with the current CBO estimate of the budget surplus 
for next year--that number today is $268 billion. We are even using the 
Democrats favorite definition of the surplus, a definition that assumes 
that appropriate accounts grow by inflation between 2000 and 2001--the 
so-called ``inflated baseline.'' This is not my preferred definition, 
but it is the most liberal one available from the Congressional Budget 
Office.
  To this $268 billion estimate, we adjust for the net effect of the 
supplemental that became law after CBO made its summer update. Because 
the supplemental shifted some spending around, the surplus next year 
increases slightly to $273 billion.
  Now, we set aside the Social Security and Medicare HI trust fund 
balances--we fully protect Social Security and Medicare as we 
promised--those two

[[Page 18219]]

accounts make up about $197 billion of our debt reduction next year.
  We also set aside $48 billion of the non-Social Security surplus for 
debt reduction.
  So we set the Social Security and the Medicare surplus aside, and 
then we set aside $48 billion more--a rather historic event because 
that is out of the non-Social Security surplus. Forty-eight billion 
dollars of that will go to debt reduction.
  In total, $245 billion of next year's surplus is set aside for debt 
reduction. This represents 90 percent of the total surplus next year--
just do the arithmetic--leaving $28 billion in outlays for the end of 
the session spending and tax legislation. This $28 billion should allow 
us to finish our work expeditiously. It would allow us to finish the 
appropriated bills that are still pending, fund needed priorities for 
hospital and health providers, for health research, aid to States and 
localities that have suffered this summer's fires and droughts, and 
other important and basic needs.
  The $28 billion should also allow us to provide minimal tax relief to 
American small business and families. This will be a smaller package 
than we have done before. We will ask the President of the United 
States whether there is any tax bill that we can send him that he will 
sign. We believe this is a winner, one attached essentially to the 
amendment that cleared the floor when we did our minimum wage bill. It 
was my amendment. I offered it along with Don Nickles and others to 
spread the minimum wage increase over 3 years and to provide small 
business and individuals with the kind of tax relief almost everyone 
agreed we should do.
  This is the least we can do for the taxpayers, as I see it, following 
both a vote of the marriage tax penalty and the death. This will not, 
as assumed by the administration, cause irreparable damage to the 
economy. The Secretary of the Treasury came all the way over here to 
have a press conference because they were terribly concerned about this 
90 percent to debt service and 10 percent to finish our work idea--the 
90-10 button that is being worn around here. I don't understand how it 
will cause any kind of damage.
  How quickly we forget the words of the Federal Reserve Chairman, who 
said the first thing we should do with a budget surplus is retire the 
debt. I can only conclude that the democratic roadblock to this very 
simple proposition must be, first, they do not want to provide tax cuts 
when taxes are at the highest level percentage of the American economy 
since the Second World War; second, they do not want to apply the 
surplus to debt reduction.
  They must have a very large bushel of expenditures they want to make 
at the end of the year that exceed the $28 billion, which is the 
residue of the 90-10 that will be around for tax cuts, for add-ons to 
appropriations, and for those extreme needs we have in the Medicare 
area with reference to nursing homes, HMO plus, and the like. Those 
will fit within the $28 billion because we are speaking of outlays--I 
hope everybody understands that--in the year 2001.
  Maybe this should not come as a surprise to anyone. The President of 
the United States has put forward an expansive and expensive set of 
budget proposals, a budget plan that even the Washington Post called a 
``lopsided budget.'' The Financial Times article called it ``a 
masterpiece of central government planning.''
  Maybe these are the real reasons why my friends across the aisle 
cannot grasp the simple consent: 90 percent of the total surplus going 
to retiring the debt, and 10 percent being available to finish our work 
on appropriations, on the other expenditures, and some tax proposals 
that should clear.
  I am prepared to talk to this issue with anyone, anywhere, and to 
produce the numbers. This is very close to what will happen if we take 
it right, watch our step, do what is needed, but not extravagantly 
spend money. If we try some very simple but needed tax cuts, which 
should challenge even this President in terms of his veto pen--and 
obviously we are all aware of fixing some Medicare needs, whether they 
are nursing homes that need some additional response from the Federal 
Government, whether it be the HMO plus, whether it be the home care, 
whether it be rural hospitals. Essentially, in the first year they do 
not cost that much money. They do a considerable amount over 5, but 
actually we believe they will fit within this $28 billion. That is the 
10 percent of the 90-10 formula.
  I hope everybody will take a look at it. I think it is a good way to 
go.
  I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. SPECTER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Collins). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.

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