November 14, 1979
Page 32282
Mr. MUSKIE. I am glad to hear that ruling by the Chair.
Nevertheless, if what the Senator is interested in is a decent response to the problems of 29 States, 29 colder States, which would benefit from the Boschwitz amendment, he should move in that direction and not in the reverse direction, as the Senator from Kansas proposes.
Mr. President, I have listened very carefully to the argument of the distinguished Senator from Wisconsin, and I do not really quarrel with his basic thesis that we should give consideration to the higher energy costs of the poor, whether those higher energy costs are attributable to heating costs or to other energy costs.
If the Senator from Wisconsin had for our consideration a comprehensive analysis of those costs, so that we could know which are attributable to heating costs, which are attributable to transportation costs, and which are attributable to lighting costs and cooling costs, I would be impressed. I am interested in getting such figures. At this point, I would expect Senators from States where heating is not a problem to give whatever facts are available to make the case as to whether or not higher energy costs for the poor in those States are as urgent or as close to life threatening as the heating costs problem of the poor in the northern States. I know what those costs are, and they have increased by 50 percent since last year.
The average cost of heating a Maine home in 1978 was $616. This year it is $935, based on 85 cents a gallon, which is the current price, and there are indications that the price is going up to a dollar.
These people are served by independent dealers whose working capital for carrying accounts receivable is almost minimal. Most of those dealers, in order to stay in business, especially at these higher prices, have to ask for cash on delivery.
The typical delivery is 200 gallons once a month or twice a month. So these people have to have, potentially, $160 to $200 in cash on hand to pay for heat for the next 2, 3, or 4 weeks, when the delivery truck comes to the door.
We are talking about people who are on social security — social security payments of $180 to $250 to $300 a month.
They must have that kind of cash on delivery. When they pay that cash, whatever is left is what they eat on or go to market with.
We are talking about a life-affecting requirement. I can get along without air conditioning a lot better than I can without heat, in a State where, for the entire month of January, the thermometer does not rise often above zero degrees — 32 degrees below freezing.
Meeting that kind of urgent problem is a little different from cutting down on mileage in an automobile, even for the poor. Many of them would rather walk than be warm — and do.
I am not saying that there are not urgent problems for the poor in other States. I wish we had the figures. But I think the case should be very persuasive before we reduce the minimum requirements of those who are affected by cold and rather arbitrarily assume that the energy costs in noncold States are as large and as urgent. I do not make that assumption until the case is made.
What we are talking about in the Boschwitz amendment is a proposal not that eliminates energy costs generally but that reduces its influence on the distribution — 50 percent of the total to 25 percent. Whether that is better than 50 percent, as the Senator from Wisconsin argues, is debatable if you do not have the basic facts. But I have enough of the basic facts in my State about the cost of heating, and the choice that people are forced to make between heating and eating, to believe that the 25 to 75 percent division is probably more equitable, regardless of the consensus reached in the Committee on Labor and Human Resources and the Committee on Finance.
I was not aware such a consensus was developing. I would have tried to influence it if I had been.
I recall a few years ago when President Ford imposed an import fee on oil coming into this country. Within the week I was in Maine going through a cotton textile plant. We call them minimum-wage plants because the wage level tends to be the minimum wage. A middle-aged man approached me as I was leaving. He said:
Senator, I can afford one tank of gasoline a week. That is just enough to take me from my house to this job and back again. I cannot afford gas for any other purpose. If you let them increase the price of gasoline you are going to make it impossible for me to come to my job.
I did not ask him about what his heating problem was because at that time the cost of fuel oil was 18 cents a gallon — 18 cents, in 1974-75. It is now 85 cents and going to a dollar. With the latest situation in Iran I expect it will go above that. How do we expect a man like that to heat his home?
The people of Maine have conserved in heating since that date. The people of Maine are forced by the current price to reduce their consumption of heating oil by almost 20 percent. Now they are going to be priced out of comfortable homes or barely marginally comfortable homes or livable homes even more by the rise in prices, and we are told that their problem is not any more urgent than other energy costs; cooling, transportation, and so on.
I am perfectly willing to compromise in the direction of whatever urgent needs exist in any State. But I think that the problems of the poor and the cold States, States where I campaigned in January in temperatures of 45 degrees below zero, day after day — I am talking about the middle of the afternoon, not midnight — the problems of those States and those poor have not been adequately addressed by the bill before us. And I do not question the good faith or the motivation of any member of either committee. The Senator from Wisconsin is a man whose compassion is well written in the record. I do not criticize him or his motive or his attempt to compromise. But I just do not believe that this formula in the committee bill, however well motivated, addressed the problems of the cold in this country.
I yield the floor.
Several Senators addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.
Mr. BOSCHWITZ. Mr. President, I certainly concur in the eloquently presented remarks of the Senator from Maine.
I ask unanimous consent to add the names of Senators JEPSEN of Iowa, SIMPSON of Wyoming, GRAVEL of Alaska, and HATCH of Utah as cosponsors of this amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. BOSCHWITZ. Mr. President, to accentuate once again the remarks of the Senator from Maine, let me make a comparison for the benefit of the Senator from Kansas and others who have spoken. What we have done this year and what this formula that is put into S. 1724 if adopted will mean next year is as follows:
In the case of Texas, for instance, this year they are receiving 1.03 percent of the appropriation, or $16.4 million, roughly; next year under S. 1724 and assuming $2 billion is appropriated they would receive 4 percent of the total, approximately $80 million which is an increase of almost 400 percent.
On the other hand, the State of Maine this year will receive a relatively large amount because, as its distinguished Senator points out, there are days upon days in the month of January when the thermometer does not rise above zero and with the windchill factor the temperature is often 50 or 60 degrees below zero. In 1980 Maine is receiving $25.2 million, and on the basis of .91 percent of next year's appropriation of $2 billion it will receive only $18.2 million.
In the case of Florida, this year they are receiving $5.25 million, next year under S. 1724, they will receive $40.8 million, an increase of 700 percent, while the State of Maine goes down 28 percent.
The same happens in Minnesota, which is one of the coldest States, where we would have a decrease of approximately 30 percent next year. This means, of course, that Senators will be back in this Chamber asking for an enormous budget-busting increase in order to insure that the bill will include enough money to heat the homes of the poor, the needy, and the elderly of the Northern States.
We ask for equity. We are not greedy, as has been suggested. We ask for equity and we ask that the original intent of this legislation be adhered to; that is, to prevent people from freezing, and to heat the homes in cold climates. That is why I introduced, together with the distinguished Senator from Maine, the amendment.
But it is an important aspect of the entire bill to realize .that next year the States that are in need are going to have substantially less money than they do this year, with a result that once again we will have to come back to this Chamber and ask for far greater appropriations, appropriations that will cast still further doubt on our ability to balance the budget and reduce the rate of inflation.
This bill must not be allowed to cause those kinds of shifts to occur, and that is why we introduced and support our amendment.
Several Senators addressed the Chair.