[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 18]
[Senate]
[Pages 25800-25802]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



            COMPREHENSIVE TAX AND MEDICARE CONFERENCE REPORT

  Mr. ROTH. Mr. President, I would like to address the comprehensive 
tax and Medicare conference report that is pending before the Senate. 
We have worked long and hard on this package, but the result is 
certainly worth the effort. If our objective is to provide legislation 
that promotes an environment conducive to jobs, opportunity and 
growth--security for our families and retirees--and greater access to 
quality health care, then this is a package worthy of praise.
  The numerous provisions in this legislation are too many to address 
in a single floor statement, and they certainly cover a lot of 
important initiatives. But they have a central theme: strengthening 
individuals and famiies--increasing prosperity, building security in 
retirement, promoting access to health care, improving quality of life, 
and assisting small businesses and farmers.
  This legislation offers over 50 provisions to strengthen IRAs and 
pension plans. With broad bipartisan support, it increases IRA 
contributions from $2,000 to $5,000, and allows a $1,500 IRA catch-up 
contribution for those age 50 and above. The increase in the amount an 
individual is allowed to put away will enable IRA participants to earn 
a full $1 million more for retirement, if they save the maximum amount 
each year and begin their program at age 25.
  This is tremendous empowerment, Mr. President, but it is only the 
beginning of what this legislation will do. It also allows individuals 
to increase contribution limits in 401(k), 403(b), and 457 plans from 
$10,500 to $15,000 a year. And it allows employees over the age of 50 
to make additional $5,000 contributions to these plans.
  This is especially important for women, many of whom take time off 
from work to raise children. Now, when they return, they can make 
critical catch-up payments to strengthen their retirement savings. And 
for those individuals who change jobs, this legislation provides easier 
transfers to be made between IRAs and employer plans, and it reduces 
the complexity of plan administration.
  One of the most innovative new tools provided in this legislation is 
the creation of the Roth 401(k). Like the Roth IRA, the Roth 401(k) 
will allow employees to make after-tax contributions to accounts where 
distributions will be tax free at retirement. This allows investment 
income to grow faster, as it is taxed only once--when it is earned. 
Interest build-up and withdrawal--like the Roth IRA--remain free from 
taxation.
  To increase access to quality health care, this legislation includes 
major refinements to the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. These are in 
addition to $27 billion worth of refinements enacted last

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year, as part of the Balanced Budget Refinement Act of 1999. This 
legislation offers improved benefits for Medicare seniors, expanding 
preventative benefits, lowering out-of-pocket outpatient costs, and 
covering several new exams, screening and therapies.
  Going even further, this legislation provides improved access to 
Medigap coverage and protects access to important drugs. It lowers out-
of-pocket hospital costs, strengthens rural, teaching, and critical 
access hospitals, and protects funding for home health services. It 
also increases access to care for nursing home patients. In the area of 
health care, alone, this legislation provides more than $30 billion in 
additional funding over the next five years.
  Retired Americans will also be happy to note that this legislation 
fixes a math mistake made in computing the Social Security cost-of-
living adjustment for last year. The increase should have been 2.5% 
instead of the 2.4% that was actually awarded. The correction we've 
included in this bill means seniors will be receiving more than $5 
billion in additional payments over the next ten years.
  For children, we take an important step to strengthen the State 
Children's Health Insurance Program by establishing policies for the 
retention and redistribution of unspent SCHIP funds. We also include 
measures to begin to protect the financial integrity of the Medicaid 
program. For individuals and families, we provide an above-the-line 
deduction for payment of medical insurance premiums for those who do 
not participate in an employer-sponsored medical plan.
  We also provide an above-the-line deduction for long-term care 
insurance, and we allow individuals who incur long-term care expenses 
providing for relatives an extra tax deduction.
  To help our family farmers and small businesses, this legislation 
offers a 100% deduction for payment of medical insurance for self-
employed individuals. It creates FFARM accounts--tax-deferred savings 
accounts for farmers and fishermen, allowing a deduction of up to 20% 
of the income deposited into a custodial account.
  Going even further to provide tax relief for small businesses, this 
legislation extends the Work Opportunity Tax Credit. It allows small 
businesses to use cash accounting methods without limitation, and 
clarifies and extends a number of expansion provisions and business 
deductions, including the business meal deduction. And these are only a 
few of many other provisions to support America's small businesses, the 
engine behind the historic economic expansion our nation enjoys.
  Again, increasing opportunity and improving the quality of life is 
what this legislation is all about. For this reason, we have also 
included an important provision to help AMTRAK build important 
infrastructure, to improve services, and help answer critical 
transportation needs throughout the country. There are some areas, Mr. 
President, where congestion from auto and air traffic are running at 
maximum levels. The answer is a modernized and efficient rail service--
one that includes high-speed trains, not only to move passengers along 
the Eastern corridor, but all across America.
  As a New York Times editorial correctly observed: ``Eighteen of the 
20 most congested airports nationwide are in cities on designated high-
speed rail corridors. The time has come for Congress and transportation 
officials to promote high-speed rail service as a means alleviating air 
traffic congestion.''
  Strengthening AMTRAK will not only help ease car and air congestion, 
but it will also help revitalize inner cities, encouraging downtown 
redevelopment. It will also promote jobs in construction, engineering, 
manufacturing, and service industries.
  Finally, Mr. President, to strengthen our urban areas and promote 
greater opportunity for individuals and families in our cities, this 
legislation creates 40 new ``renewal communities'' and gives those poor 
areas a number of tax incentives to assist them in building up their 
economic base. Among other things, these communities--located in urban 
and rural areas--would get a zero percent capital gains rate to attract 
much needed investments. This bill also provides incentives to invest 
in low income areas around the country and to clean up brownfields 
anywhere in the U.S. This community renewal package also contains long 
awaited increases in the low income housing tax credit and the private 
activity bond volume cap. Both of these caps have not been adjusted 
since 1986 and have lost over 40 percent of their original value. This 
package also contains a number of measures to help school renovation 
and construction.
  Each of the provisions in this legislation will go far toward 
promoting an environment of opportunity and growth--security for our 
families and retirees--greater access to quality health care, and an 
improved quality of life.
  Mr. President, as we consider this conference report on legislation 
to provide tax relief and to protect and strengthen Medicare and 
Medicaid, there is a lot of talk about the irregular process by which 
the legislation was created. No one is more unhappy than I that regular 
order was not adhered to. I have long labored in trying to reach a 
bipartisan consensus on the many important matters that comes before 
the Finance Committee.
  However, I do not believe it useful for me to dwell on the causes of 
irregular order. Suffice it to say that cooperation must come from both 
sides. When it doesn't, when Senators instead invoke their rights at 
every turn, bipartisanship suffers.
  As to the President's veto threat, it should be remembered that our 
early Presidents believed that the veto was available only to check the 
Congress from going beyond its constitutional authority. Later 
Presidents judged legislation on the whole of its merits: does the bill 
do more harm than good? I find it hard to find in his letter any 
mention of the harm he sees in this legislation. Rather, he says that 
this legislation is different from what he proposed, and therefore, he 
has ``no choice but to veto it.'' I find this assertion somewhat 
remarkable.
  The Congress and the Presidency are comprised of 536 individuals. In 
fashioning legislation as far-reaching as this, no one can expect 
perfection from his own point of view. When I read the President's list 
of disappointments, I did not find it any longer than mine. And my 
reaction is generally shared by my colleagues. We are all pleased by 
some items. We are all disappointed by some other items, or by their 
omission.
  That is because, Mr. President, this legislation is bipartisan in its 
content. Republican Members may be displeased that we included school 
construction bonds or dropped the FUTA tax reduction. Democrats may be 
displeased that we included a tax break for employees to buy their own 
health insurance or that we dropped the low-income savers tax credit. 
But where there are over a hundred provisions, it is not possible to 
write a bill the way each of us might wish.
  It was clearly our intention to put together a package that would be 
signed into law. It was my desire that Senator Moynihan be present 
during House-Senate negotiations, but the House majority objected. So, 
instead, I kept Senator Moynihan informed, sought his counsel, and 
advocated his cause.
  I think he did fairly well. He was successful in garnering increased 
funding for graduate medical education, increased funding for 
hospitals, increased DSH payments in both Medicare and Medicaid, and--
this is very important--a special transition rule for New York with 
respect to the Medicaid upper payment level issue. On the tax side, he 
successfully obtained the AMTRAK provision to build a train station in 
New York City. And, as I recall, he was also an advocate of section 809 
and 815 insurance provisions that have been included in the conference 
report.
  Senator Moynihan also asked, as did others, for the inclusion of 
long-term health care provisions and inclusion of a school-construction 
bond proposal. These were incorporated in a modified form. Perhaps not 
a total victory, but a substantial one nevertheless.
  This progress was not accomplished easily. The chairman of the Ways 
and

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Means Committee has been steadfastly opposed to the creation and 
expansion of tax credits. Thus he fought the inclusion of several tax 
credit proposals, including those for AMTRAK and for school 
construction.
  He was able to block several of them but not these two supported by 
the Senator from New York. And because these provisions were included, 
the chairman of the Ways and Means opposes this conference report.
  Some Members have taken to the floor to try to create a picture that 
a few of us got in a room and wrote a bill entirely our way. But the 
fact is that some in the room lost and some outside the room won. And 
that is because, as a group, we had a paramount objective of 
constructing a balanced bill that would be signed into law.
  I recall my own effort to remove the application of the 
nondiscrimination clause from the catch-up provision of the retirement 
security title. Everyone in the room agreed with my position. But the 
bill is not written that way. My amendment was dropped out of deference 
to the wishes of a Democrat, Congressman Ben Cardin, who had worked on 
this legislation in the House.
  We tried to write a balanced bill that would be signed into law.
  In each of the past four weeks, there was some reason to believe that 
Congress was about to finish its work for the year. So in drafting this 
bill, we had to act quickly. I have given a great deal of thought to 
the process employed. I do not believe that if we had had bipartisan 
meetings with votes on the particular items, the text of the bill would 
be any different. What was lost in the process followed was any 
bipartisan appreciation of why the text is what it is. That is 
unfortunate.
  At this stage, all I can ask is that you look at the text and decide 
if this is a good bill. You owe it to your constituents to do that. Do 
you want to provide Social Security recipients with the increased COLA 
they deserve? Do you want to protect American businesses from European 
Union retaliation against our exports? Do you want to update our tax 
laws to provide for greater retirement security? Do you want to provide 
tax incentives for impoverished communities? Do you want to provide 
more money for hospitals, hospices, home health, and nursing homes? Do 
you want to increase the minimum wage?
  Or do you want to deny all the benefits of this legislation to your 
constituents because of the procedure by which the text was born?
  This bill does not contain everything I'd like to see. It's not 
perfect. But it's a good bill, one that will help a great many 
Americans. It will help individuals and families prepare for greater 
security in retirement. It will help seniors receive improved Medicare 
coverage and a higher cost-of-living adjustment in their Social 
Security checks.
  It will help small businesses and family farmers. It will improve 
education and ease traffic congestion. It will improve inner cities and 
help our hospitals. These are good objectives. They are objectives 
shared on both sides of the aisle.
  And I encourage my colleagues to join me in voting for this 
legislation.

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