June 25, 1975
Page 20785
FORMATION OF FOUR AD HOC TASK FORCES TO THE BUDGET COMMITTEE
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, the new Budget Reform Act requires the Budget Committee to recommend to Congress concurrent resolutions establishing "appropriate" fiscal policy – appropriate not only in terms of the next year's spending and revenues, but in terms of the health and future growth of the American economy.
In this time of high unemployment and serious economic dislocation, and at a time when our free enterprise economy is being challenged by the international oil cartel, this is no small undertaking. It requires us to look ahead 5 years or more as we make every decision. It requires that Federal spending and taxing policy be mobilized in a coherent fashion. It requires that Federal fiscal policy support the productive resources of our free enterprise economy – labor, management, and capital – and insure that they are utilized in a way that will accommodate the fundamental changes which energy scarcity, for example, will bring.
Toward these ends, I am today announcing formation of four ad hoc task forces of the Budget Committee. Each will investigate a critical issue which must form part of Congress’ frame of reference in fiscal and economic decision making. Each will report by February 15, 1976. There will be some interim reports before the second concurrent resolution this fall.
The four task forces are as follows:
Energy, FRANK E. MOSS, chairman; ERNEST F. HOLLINGS, JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR., SAM NUNN, J. GLENN BEALL, JR., JAMES A. McCLURE, and PETE DOMENICI
The energy task force will hold a series of seminars for the full Budget Committee during July, emphasizing the interrelationships between our energy options, our economy and fiscal policy. The task force will undertake specific investigations during the period remaining until February 15.
Defense, ERNEST F. HOLLINGS, chairman; WARREN G. MAGNUSON, ALAN CRANSTON, LAWTON CHILES, JAMES ABOUREZK, ROBERT DOLE, and JAMES L. BUCKLEY.
The defense task force will undertake a "mission approach" to defense expenditures which will, the committee hopes, move us toward an evaluation of the defense budget in terms of broad foreign policy and military needs and objectives.
Tax policy and tax expenditures, WALTER F. MONDALE, chairman; FRANK E. MOSS, JAMES ABOUREZK, JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR., ROBERT DOLE, J. GLENN BEALL, JR.,
and PETE DOMENICI.
The Budget Act requires that tax expenditures be treated like spending programs – that is, with full recognition that they result in revenue sacrifices intended to achieve public policy objectives. They must be analyzed with the same perspective as any other spending program. The Budget Committee has a mandate to review these tax expenditures each year. This task force will provide you with the critically important spade work. The use of tax expenditures to encourage capital formation will be an area of major emphasis.
Capital needs, LAWTON CHILES, chairman; WARREN G. MAGNUSON, WALTER F. MONDALE, SAM NUNN, J. GLENN BEALL, JR., JAMES L. BUCKLEY, and JAMES A.
McCLURE.
There are at least two important dimensions of the capital needs problem:
Will the Nation allocate sufficient capital development over the next decade and beyond?
Will the Federal borrowing tend to crowd out private borrowing?
The capital needs task force will report on the latter by September, in time for the second concurrent resolution, and on the broader question of long-term capital needs by next February.
The Senate Budget Committee has studiously avoided involvement with "'line-item" kinds of decisions which are the prerogative of the authorizing and appropriations committees. This policy is consistent with the need to acquire an understanding of the fiscal implications of broad areas of national policy. Our hope is that by melding these four investigations together, we will be able to provide the Senate with a frame of reference and long-term perspective for making responsible budgetary and economic decisions.