September 17, 1975
Page 29097
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, will the Senator yield so I may respond?
Mr. McCLELLAN: I yield.
Mr. MUSKIE. As far as I know, the only communication we sent to the subcommittee on Labor-HEW Appropriations was a letter dated September 8, 1975, in which we undertook to answer a
question put to us by the Appropriations Labor-HEW Subcommittee as to the status of H.R. 8069 as it came from the House.
I ask unanimous consent that that letter be printed in the RECORD. I think it speaks for itself.
There being no objection, the letter was ordered to be printed in the RECORD, as follows:
U.S. SENATE,
COMMITTEE ON THE BUDGET,
Washington, D.C.,
September 8,1975.
Hon. WARREN G. MAGNUSON,
Chairman, Subcommittee on Labor-HEW Appropriations,
Committee on Appropriations,
U.S. Senate
DEAR MAGGIE. I understand that the staff of your Subcommittee on Labor/HEW Appropriations has asked the Congressional Budget Office whether the House passed Labor/HEW appropriation bill (H.R. 8069) fits within the budget targets contained in the statement of managers accompanying the Conference Report on our First Concurrent Resolution on the Budget (H. Con. Res. 218). I also understand that CBO felt unable to give a definitive answer, citing the fact that the statement of managers did not provide information on the relation of the targets to individual appropriation bills.
It is true that the proceedings leading to the First Concurrent Resolution on the Budget this year did not address specific programs in a manner that would yield an answer to the question posed by your staff. Nor do I believe should the Budget Committee deal with line items in most cases.
As you know, the job of dividing up the budget resolution totals distributed to appropriation bills is the responsibility of the Appropriations Committee after adoption of the budget resolution under the terms of the Congressional Budget Act. Under the Act, the Budget Committees are to stipulate to the Appropriations Committees the total, by function, available within the budget resolution for all appropriation bills. The Appropriations Committees are to report back to their respective houses how they have divided the total by subcommittee. That report forms the basis for subsequent comparison of individual appropriation bills with the budget resolution targets. In this initial year of activity, we did not attempt to apportion the targets to the various committees that provide spending authority, and the Appropriations Committee has therefore not been able to provide the Senate with the split by individual bill.
Recognizing, however, your immediate need for information on this year’s Labor/HEW bill, we have attempted to compare the bill as passed by the House with the budget resolution targets. This can only be a rough approximation because, as I have said, the deliberations in the Senate and in Conference on the budget resolution were not intended to reach the degree of detail necessary for a definitive comparison. Leaving aside the mandatory or uncontrollable programs in the Labor/HEW bill such as SSI or Medicaid — which must be funded at whatever level is now determined by law either now or in a later supplemental — we believe the discretionary or controllable portion of the bill as passed by the House is about $70 million below the levels assumed for these programs in the budget resolution.
Although the Budget Committees did not make line item decisions, the staff has arrived at the $70 million estimate based on the general policies the Committees followed in setting the spending targets by budget function. For income security programs, the Committees rejected the President’s proposed legislative changes, reestimated the costs for certain mandatory spending programs, and assumed continuation of current law. For the Health function, we assumed continuation of all health programs at a minimum of their 1975 funding level; rejected the President’s proposed legislative changes to medicare and medicaid, and left some room for legislative initiative. The Education, manpower, and Social Services function was increased approximately $5.3 billion in budget authority over the President’s budget request to bring ongoing programs up to their FY1975 level and to permit some increases ($3 billion) and to provide additional funds for public service employment ($2.3 billion).
I would close with one note of caution. The deliberations on the budget resolution last April and May have to be considered in the light of subsequent events. Since that time, the pressures on the budget have increased, due to higher requirements in several mandatory programs over which we have no control, passage of new legislation, and other factors. A glance at the latest Senate Budget Scorekeeping Report clearly shows this.
I am attaching a table which shows where we are currently on each budget function affected by the HEW-Labor bill. The table shows how the House passed bill changes outlays in each of these functions.
In the deliberations on the Second Concurrent Resolution on the Budget, which will commence shortly, we will need to reassess what we did last spring in light of these changed conditions. The budget reconciliation process may require us to make the difficult choice between accepting a higher deficit or further paring down program budgets. I cannot at this time predict what will occur. But I know you are aware of the difficult trade-offs we will be facing.
With belt wishes, I am
Sincerely;
EDMUND S. MUSKIE.
Mr. MUSKIE. The letter states that as a matter of rough judgment by the Budget Committee staff, the bill passed by the House was $70 million below the levels assumed for these programs in the budget resolution.
That statement has to be taken in the context of the fact that the functional targets do not relate directly to program totals. In this letter, we were simply trying to give the best guidance we could to the subcommittee.
Mr. MAGNUSON. I have the letter which the Senator has had printed in the RECORD.
I do not have as much time to be in the Budget Committee because I am also responsible for this important bill. The major problem, as I view it, is that the Budget Committee talks about functions. Appropriations bills deal with specific programs. Unfortunately, we do not have a system for crosswalking, or reconciling the two.
If we took the education bill enacted last week and this bill together, then we are about $800 million under the ceiling.
Then we run into another thing that the Budget Committee has never taken up: we are appropriating for many programs on a 2-year basis. Unemployment insurance, public service jobs, and some of the defense appropriations which involve building a ship are good examples. You cannot do that between July 1 and June 30.
The main problem, again, is that the Budget Committee embraced this functional approach without following up with a reconciliation.
Now we are getting into a real problem. I do not know how we can operate by functions too well. Maybe, we can, though I do not know how.
Mr. MUSKIE. I can only say to the Senator that the functional breakdowns have existed for years. We did not create them. They are part of the executive budget.
Mr McCLELLAN. I believe I have the floor, Mr. President.
Mr MUSKIE. Will the Senator yield?
Mr McCLELLAN. I yield.
Mr. MUSKIE. Let me make a second point. We do not go into the program detail that the Appropriations Committee does. If we were to do the actual allocation by appropriation bill, we would be doing the Appropriations Committee work. That is not our responsibility or desire.
Mr.MAGNUSON. After what I am getting into today, the Senator from Maine can have it. Does he want it?
Mr. McCLELLAN. Mr. President, I believe I have the floor. I would like to make this observation. I believe what has come out of this colloquy is a clear demonstration of the chaos that is developing in this situation. It is very important, I believe that we try to get these budget categories coordinated so one of us will not be talking about apples and somebody else talking about oranges. Then we can come to a determination of what we are doing, whether we are over, under, or what the situation is. As it is now, there is the statement that the chairman of the Labor-HEW Subcommittee prepared for the RECORD which indicates there are three different interpretations of the current situation. He then concludes by saying:
The Congressional Office of the Budget frankly and honestly states that it just does not know where we are.
That is the state of confusion I am talking about and which I am trying to emphasize today, hopefully so that we can find some way to make the budget process more coordinated.
Mr. MUSKIE. Will the Senator tell me what he was quoting? If it is something out of the Budget Committee, I would like to know what it is.
Mr. McCLELLAN. I am quoting from the statement that the subcommittee chairman has prepared and which he read into the RECORD. He read that part I just repeated.
Mr. MUSKIE. But is that from the Senate Committee on the Budget?
Mr. McCLELLAN. I do not know. He says, "The Senate Budget Committee, on which I serve as its ranking Democrat, would put the figure at nearer $220 million over" — meaning over the level in the concurrent budget resolution. I was taking these figures, I may say to my friend, from the material that is here on the desk of the chairman of the Labor-HEW Subcommittee. If I am not mistaken, I heard Senator MUSKIE say in his opening statement that this bill was over the budget and that the situation might be resolved in conference. If it was not, then we would have the opportunity later to do what we have done in other conferences, to send it back.
Mr. MUSKIE. I said in my opening statement, if I may try to summarize–
Mr. McCLELLAN. I think that is what the Senator stated.
Mr. MUSKIE. My statement was that this year the only method for reviewing any appropriation bill is to look at the individual functions within it. H.R. 8069 has six functions for which ceilings were set in the Budget Committee report. For the outlay targets of those six functions, if this bill is passed, we are over the budget target for three functions: income security, health, and veterans benefits and services.
I cannot be any more precise than that. This bill, as such, was not identified in the budget resolution. I cannot tell the Senators what the target for this bill was, as such, combining the six functions. I can only tell the Senators what the impact of this bill is on the functions for which targets were set. The detail within those are the responsibilities of the Appropriations Committee.
Mr. MAGNUSON. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. MUSKIE. The Senator from Arkansas has the floor.
Mr. MAGNUSON. When we started to mark up this bill, which was before the recess, it is true that we could not get from the Budget Committee a precise figure on this particular bill.
Mr. MUSKIE. That is right. And I cannot give one now.
Mr. MAGNUSON. That is my point. I still think we have to sit down and figure out some way to coordinate between what the Budget Committee calls functions and direct appropriations.
All I know is I sit downstairs and have to listen to all these people speak on human needs, and I cannot easily think of these needs in terms of budget functions. On the other hand, I am gravely concerned over total spending.
Mr. MUSKIE. May I say something else to the Senator? Next year, when Congress sets the functional targets, then it is my responsibility, as Chairman of the Budget Committee, to tell the Appropriations Committee what part of the totals are subject to appropriation; then you take that appropriation figure and you will break it down among your subcommittees. The Budget Committee will not do it; the budget resolution will not do it; you will do it. Then you will have established your own crosswalk between the original targets that you set, and the final result that shows up in appropriations bills. That is how it will work.
I think that will be the most difficult job of all.
Mr. McCLELLAN. Mr. President, I yield one-half minute to the Senator from South Carolina, without losing my right to the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arkansas has the floor.
[Unrelated intervening activity omitted]
DEPARTMENTS OF LABOR AND HEALTH, EDUCATION, AND WELFARE APPROPRIATION ACT, 1976
The Senate continued with the consideration of the bill (H.R. 8069) making appropriations for the Departments of Labor, and Health, Education, and Welfare, and related agencies, for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1976, and the period ending September 30, 1976, and for other purposes.
Mr. BROOKE. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
Mr. McCLELLAN. I am glad to yield the floor. The only thing I want to do here is demonstrate the chaos and confusion that now prevails: We cannot get an accurate determination of whether this bill exceeds the budget or does not.
If this happens or that happens we are told the bill will do so and so, but in total we cannot get a determination here today of whether or not the bill exceeds the congressional budget or does not exceed the budget.
If we cannot get this information after the bill is reported, I do not know how the Appropriations Committee can know these facts while it is considering the measure and before it is reported.
Mr. BROOKE. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. McCLELLAN. I am glad to yield to the Senator from Massachusetts.
Mr: BROOKE: Mr. President, I certainly support the Budget Committee and what its chairman has been attempting to do, but it does make it very difficult for us on the Appropriations Committee to move if we do not know what the budget ceiling is, when we are trying to stay below that budget ceiling
One thing further: even if we stay below the budget ceiling, when you have your functional categories, is it the intent of the Budget Committee that if we are actually below the budget ceiling overall, but we are over, say, in health, for example, does the Budget Committee intend to go that far, to get then, into the various categories? If we are under the overall ceiling for the Labor-HEW appropriations bill, but if we exceed the ceiling on health, would the Budget Committee therefore be opposed to that?
Mr. MUSKIE. Health is a separate function, and is so identified in the budget resolution. But the education function includes manpower and social services, and not just education.
Mr. BROOKE. But the Budget Committee is working with one group, and we are working with another; we do not have the same categories.
Mr. MUSKIE. I understand. But what I am trying to make clear is that the Budget Committee did not create these functions. They have been part of the executive budget process for years, and by some miracle it was possible for Congress to work with them all of those years.
Let me make this clear: This year is a trial run year. This is a complicated process, because the whole executive budget process from which it was drafted was complicated to begin with.
Anyone who tries to persuade me that prior to the enactment of the Budget Reform Act budgeting was a simple exercise for either the executive or Congress is just talking through his hat. It was so complicated that we assumed that because the Appropriations Committee cut the Presidents requests for appropriations, we were being fiscally responsible, when, as a matter of fact, because of uncontrollable items in the budget, the deficit grew larger and larger, year after year.
Now we are focusing on those uncontrollable portions of the budget. We know that problem is not the controllable programs, which the Appropriations Committee has demonstrated they have had well in hand over the years, but the uncontrollables.
Now, I hope that the Budget Committee position is clear. To ask us, the Budget Committee, to produce simplicity during the dry run year of our existence, when nothing like simplicity existed before is to ask for miracles.
We are in an evolutionary process. I personally think that we have made some important progress. I hope that it will continue, and that with patience, cooperation, and accommodation we can make this process work. But if we are about to throw up our hands at the first moment there is a disagreement about this complexity of the facts and say, "Oh, we will never control the budget, we should go back to the old chaos."
You can say our old chaos was better than the new chaos; however, I do not think so.
Mr. BROOKE. At what point in the appropriations process would the Appropriations Committee be informed and have knowledge of what the Budget Committee has established as a ceiling?
Mr. MUSKIE: Next year when the process is fully implemented, on March 15, all committees, including the Appropriations Committee, are required to report to us their view of the budget situation under their jurisdiction for the coming fiscal year, with recommendations as to priorities, and estimates for spending.
The committees did that this year, and did it very well. I am sure they will do even better next year, as they become more familiar with the process.
On March 15. We are required to take their reports into account as we establish our targets.
We do not make spending totals; we make priorities judgments. We bring that to the floor, and on the floor, 50 hours of debate is required, and that debate is designed to give the Senate, as a whole, an opportunity to try to relate these overall figures to particular States, or particular groups in our population. This will be the budget priorities debate as well as the economic debate, because it relates to the overall totals. But it is a program priorities debate as well: Defense versus school lunches, health versus education, and all the rest.
When that debate is resolved, and the House and the Senate are in agreement, we then have an overall spending limit and the 17 functional targets. Then we have to sort out that part of each function that relates to appropriations, and we send that overall figure to the Appropriations Committee. We do not tell them how to spend it; we just say, "This is the amount of money that is allowed in the budget resolution and each function." Then the Appropriations Committee allocates that money among its subcommittees and its appropriation bills. They do that. We do not. For us to do it would be to assume their prerogatives.
That happens right after May 15, after the first concurrent resolution on the budget has passed both Houses.
Mr. BROOKE. But it has been your policy, as I recall, to oppose any particular appropriations bill if it is over the congressional ceiling.
Mr. MUSKIE. No, that is not true. I raised two major issues. One was the school lunch program, which is an entitlement program and which has the effect of triggering spending upon enactment. The Senator knows there was no means for reserving that decision until later. That took effect immediately upon enactment and had to be dealt with.
Mr. BROOKE. As I recall that was true for the military procurement also?
Mr. MUSKIE. With respect to military procurement, this was one function; it was not many as in the Labor-HEW appropriation bill. The effect of military procurement bills in the past has been in effect to nail in place the programs covered by it. Not all authorising bills have that effect, but that one does.
So we took it on a pragmatic basis in an attempt to test the new process. It was clear that the defense function was going over the target, under the pressures from all sources, and we felt we better signal the danger.
But with respect to other appropriations bills, I have taken the position as I have here on this one.
It is our judgment that the health function is $100 million over. This may be counterbalanced somewhere down the road in a supplemental appropriation bill or in conference. A give and take in conference with the House of Representatives may eliminate the $100 million overage in outlays in Health.
I do not see that I should intervene at every stage of the process, because with the regular appropriation bill we have three points at which to reconcile spending with the targets: First, the bill itself; second, the conference report; and third, the final reconciliation process.
So there are three points at which we can endeavor to come to grips.
If there were a massive overage at the first step of the bill, I might point this out. But when the Senator is talking about $10 million, more or less, or $50 million, I am inclined to be silent. I have not tried to comment on every item. In the first place, the budget resolution does not identify particular items; and in the second place, I think there has to be some flexibility in the appropriations process.
Mr. BROOKE. The Senator takes into consideration, then, where we will overspend in one category and we will underspend in another category.
Mr. MUSKIE. That is right.
As I said a moment ago, the Committee on Appropriations has that record, and I think that is a good record on which to rely.
I ant not taking any initiative on this bill with respect to that health function. I am simply giving the Senate the facts.
Mr. BROOKE. It is my understanding the Senator was taking the initiative on the health function.
Mr. MUSKIE. No, I am not.
Mr. BROOKE. The Senator is not.
Mr. MUSKIE. I am not.
Mr: BROOKE. That is not the purpose or intent of the Senator to take that initiative.
Mr. MUSKIE. If there is an amendment to cut it, I may vote for it simply as an individual Senator, but I am not recommending.
Mr. BROOKE. Not as chairman of the Committee on the Budget.
Mr. MUSKIE. I am not for the reason that I think the conference committee has the right to look at spending and the functional targets and balance them.
Second, the Committee on Appropriations has some right to consider its overall priorities.
However, if spending was over the target by a substantial amount, I might take a different view.
But I do not want to be an annoyance in the Senate Chamber. My job as chairman of the Budget Committee is to highlight what I think are the significant issues in order to keep us within the functional targets. I am not going to try to pick up every nickel and dime that I take issue with. I think that would be disruptive of the whole process.
Mr. BROOKE. I certainly understand the Senator’s desire to see that all appropriations hopefully are under the congressional budget. If the Senator were to come in at every step of the way, every function, and every category, we would never finish the appropriations.
Mr. MUSKIE. We would never finish the process. I agree with the Senator.
Mr. BROOKE. I thank the Senator.
Mr. McCLELLAN. Mr. President, I say to the Senator and I observe that this colloquy today has thoroughly demonstrated the need for a cooperative effort by rules or regulations, or something, to clarify this issue so that when we get the ceiling of the Senator from the Budget Committee we know what is within these ceilings. Then we can probably try to meet the ceilings in our bills. But when we come in the Chamber this way, it is very difficult to know where our bills stand. There is a state of confusion and a complex and difficult procedural situation here that needs to be alleviated some way.
That is all I am trying to say today.
Mr. MUSKIE. I certainly agree with the Senator. I promise him my cooperation. We could. work with better understanding if we more fully understand our respective roles. We are not the Committee on Appropriations, we do not make recommendations on particular accounts in an appropriation bill. We cannot tell the Senator whether a particular item is covered under the budget resolution.
Mr. McCLELLAN. What I am saying and the point I am making is the Senator deals with functions, does he not? The Appropriations Committee deals with other budget categories.
Mr. MUSKIE. I understand.
Mr. McCLELLAN. The two committees ought to deal with the same budget structure. I am not saying whether it should be by functions or whether it should be by appropriations bill. If we could ever get to the same structure and have our analysis and decisions directed to the same issues and to the same appropriations, then we would eliminate a lot of this confusion.
As it is now, it is confusing, and it is difficult for a subcommittee or the Committee on Appropriations to know whether bills are within or without the budget.
That is why I asked the questions today. I do not know and I could not determine definitely from the Senator whether the bill before us is over or above, or what. We need to alter the procedures where we do not have that confusion, and where we can all agree on what the facts are, what the situation is. Then I think we would all be willing to work cooperatively to the end to make the budget process function and be of real service.
Mr. MUSKIE. I will certainly be happy to work with the Senator to that end.
Mr. McCLELLAN. I am not talking specifically about me. I am not talking about the Senator from Maine. I am talking about the whole process.
Mr. MUSKIE. I am willing to work with all committees, but I would like to comment that the Senator might feel assured to know that BROCK ADAMS, as chairman of the House Committee, and I met earlier this year with Alice Rivlin, who is director of the Congressional Budget Office, to discuss this specific problem. We are in contact with OMB. Senator BELLMON, the ranking Republican on the Committee on the Budget, and a member of the Committee on Appropriations is working with me on this. It is one of his foremost projects, and he has my wholehearted support.
I hope that we can clarify the procedures. It is a sticky problem, I agree with the Senator. It is frustrating to us.
Mr. McCLELLAN. Yes.
Mr. MUSKIE. We want to be able to give specific answers when the Senator asks for them.
Mr. McCLELLAN. The point I am making here is that in order to make the new budget process work we must first get these things coordinated so we will be talking about the same thing, then we will all understand and there will be less misunderstanding. We can have our different points of view as to an item, whether it is too much or too little, or should not have it at all, but we ought to have the process coordinated so that when we talk about something, we are talking about the same thing and not one of us talking about apples and the other about oranges. That is what we need.
Mr. MUSKIE. I would like to make one other point. Let us take the education function. If this bill is passed, we are under the target for budget authority by $1.2 billion, and outlays by $.7 billion.
But if the Senator is to ask me how are we over or under the budget even on that I would have to add the following—
Mr. McCLELLAN. I prefaced my question, I say to the Senator, primarily on what I understood him to say and on the basis of the information here on the desk of the subcommittee chairman to the effect that the bill was over before the concurrent budget resolution.
Mr. MUSKIE. That $220 million figure is nothing I recall using, so I know nothing about that. I am not trying to get at that point. I am trying to get at this point, because we do not deal with appropriation bills. When we are asked how a particular appropriations bill relates to the budget targets, we have to take a number of things into consideration.
If we pass H.R. 8069, in the education, manpower and social services function we are under the target for outlays by $.7 billion, but there are now pending before the Committee on Appropriations a bill for temporary public service employment which would cost $2 billion, another bill for education for the handicapped that will cost $500 million, and another bill, the Development Disabilities Act, that will cost $100 million.
If all three of those are passed, amounting to $2.8 billion if fully funded, the $.7 billion slack in that function is not going to be enough, and I think it is the function of the Budget Committee to point that out.
So when the Senator asks me whether we are over the budget, I offer him additional information, I am trying to be honest with the Senator.
Mr. McCL ELLAN. Mr. President, I had not intended to talk so long. We have this problem, and it is going to be a continuing problem until we find some way of coordinating efforts on these committees and presenting appropriations bills in a way that both committees deal with them alike. Then the Budget Committee sends down its concurrent resolution or when it sends targets we will know what it is talking about and can then try to come within that target ceiling.
I am not trying to suggest that we report bills over the target ceiling. I am simply trying to find a way to make this process work, and am willing to cooperate in any ways we can. Today, it is confusing, and it is very difficult for the appropriations committees to know how to work within this situation.