November 27, 1979
Page 33597
Mr. DOMENICI. The Senator from New York is most welcome.
Mr. President, I wish that the Senator from Maine were present on the floor, but I have read most of his prepared text and listened as attentively as I could to his discussion here tonight, and I regret to say that I have been on the Budget Committee with him for 5 years, and I have generally agreed with the thrust that he has taken as chairman of the Budget Committee, but I must say that
I am totally and absolutely amazed at the argument that he has made here today.
I really cannot believe that the chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, who has been to this floor time after time telling us we ought to tax less and spend less, is here tonight making the kind of statement and the kind of prediction which I believe is a prediction that spells out failure on the part of the budget process. He is predicting its failure here tonight, and I will read the statement that is absolutely amazing to the Senator from New Mexico. I think it summarizes his thesis. He said:
Mr. President, we have mortgaged our future. Without a more productive windfall profits bill, we just cannot make the payments.
I really did not believe that the chairman of the Budget Committee, who has been on this floor year after year telling us that we have got to tighten our belts, we have got to spend less, comes here tonight because of an accident in history, the deregulation of crude oil.
I would ask him, if he were here, what would his prediction for the congressional budget process be if we had not deregulated crude oil? We would not have any of this windfall. He would be down here predicting that kind of future with no money to pay for it.
But today he is telling us, "Make the windfall profit tax productive." I have never even heard of a tax being called productive; but the windfall profit tax is not only going to balance the budget, but, I say to my good friend from Louisiana, it is a productive tax, it is going to get the budget, which we have not been able to balance in spite of our efforts, it is going to balance it, says the chairman of the Budget Committee.
He says, "Make sure it is as big as possible, and make sure it is here for the Government to spend."
Did he say "to produce energy"? No. He said because those red and white lines over there, the ones that might happen, might need this money.
I just cannot believe it. When I thought about our bringing a budget kind of thesis to the floor on the windfall profits tax, I might have expected the Budget Committee to recommend that every penny of the windfall profit tax be refunded to the American taxpayers. That would have been a tremendous budget approach. I thought maybe the Budget Committee would come down and recommend that every penny of it be used to defer social security payments.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
Mr. DOMENICI. Could I finish one thought? Well, I will be pleased to yield.
Mr. MUSKIE. I have to leave the floor and the Senator is quoting my statement, so I just wanted to make one thing clear, if he will yield just a moment.
Mr. DOMENICI. I yield.
Mr. MUSKIE. I did not speak today as the Budget Committee, or as the chairman of the Budget Committee. The Budget Committee has never held a meeting on these charts or on my interpretation of the charts. I have made no recommendations with respect to the pending bill. I might before I am through, but my only effort was to set what I perceived to be the budget context for the next 10 years, within which this or any other revenue-producing measure has to fall. If I have performed a disservice in undertaking to make that analysis, well, I am afraid I will not apologize for it, but at least I would like the Senator, who is my good friend, to understand what it is.
All the revenues may be turned back to the taxpayers; that is a permissible consequence, I suppose, of our deliberations. But as to these budgetary consequences, the Senator knows as well as I, when you are looking into the future you are dealing with uncertainties, whether you are a member of the Budget Committee or not. When I set out to make these projections, of course, I was reflecting uncertainties. But these projections also reflect some certainties, at least as of now. And that is the only function I seek to play here this afternoon.
I wanted to make that clear, because I do have to leave and I want the Senator to know I am not leaving because he is taking issue with me. He and I have disagreed before.
Mr. DOMENICI. I know you would not do that. I have so much to say to you that I am kind of glad you are going to leave, because I am afraid that when you hear what I have to say tonight, it seems that you and I get too excited; but I will address the matter with the same vigor as if you were here, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. MUSKIE. I do not know how the Senator can make up for the excitement of both of us. I suspect he can only carry his part of that burden.
I will read what the Senator says, with great interest. I hope there will be other occasions for the Senator and I to discuss these issues, along with other Senators, and I will be glad to do that independent of the pending legislation.
Mr. DOMENICI. Let me say once again, if I implied that you were here in an official capacity as chairman of the Budget Committee, that was my error. I have a great deal of difficulty, I say to my good friend from Maine, when you bring this kind of budget analysis to the Senate floor, in disassociating you from the number of years you have spent in that capacity.
Mr. MUSKIE. I am glad you have that difficulty.
Mr. DOMENICI. I know you have other capacities, one being that of the senior Senator from Maine, and that we listen to you in whichever capacity you appear; but I truly believe that the impact of your remarks here tonight on the institution of the Senate and on those who will receive your words beyond these halls cannot be disassociated from your expertise and leadership in budgetary matters.
Before you leave, I would also conclude that you might not have made up your official mind as to where you stand on this bill, but I conclude that you really believe that we have mortgaged our future, and that without a more productive windfall profit bill we just cannot make the payments. I believe that is what you said.
Mr. MUSKIE. That is what I said.
Mr. DOMENICI. It was with reference to that remark that I rose tonight to give my version of what we ought to be doing and where we ought to be standing if we are going to have a windfall profit bill.
Mr. MUSKIE. Will the Senator yield for just a moment?
Mr. DOMENICI. I am glad to.
Mr. MUSKIE. The Senator will perform a service by whatever he says, but in addition to whatever he has planned to say or whatever comes to him in the course of his present enthusiasm, I hope he would put in the RECORD his answer to these problems (indicating charts), and I will read it with interest, and may even be persuaded.
I am confronted with what I believe to be the case and we may well have before us the one major revenue bill that has a potential for meeting these problems without doing a couple of other things as alternatives. Alternatives such as cutting back current programs — which includes the 75 percent of uncontrollables, which includes social security, unemployment compensation, medicare, and all the others. If there is a way of doing this, and of restraining our senatorial instincts toward new and attractive spending proposals like the one we adopted earlier of a billion dollar set-aside for railways — and we almost adopted $10 billion — if you can give me some other answer, I will look at it. I have been part of all these answers, trying to hold down spending, controlling new spending, trying to restrain, even allowing for discretionary inflation and all the rest, but if you can give me a better answer, I will look at it.
All I said today was that the only revenue measure I could see in the picture that would accommodate these uncertainties is the windfall profit tax. If there is another one that you foresee, and that will also take care of that social security problem that is coming along, I would like to know what it is. I have not heard it suggested.
I have heard some criticism, not so much of the analysis, but of my implication that this pending bill may be an important part of the answer. That seems to be resented and resisted. I do not object to the resentment or the resistance, but I do and will continue to insist that this problem has to be met somehow. We cannot wait until 1987. We already have a commitment in the name of the distinguished chairman of the Finance Committee to balance this budget in 1981.
What do you think of those prospects now? And the Senator from Wyoming says, "Well, maybe we could get it by 1987." I mean, I looked at those facts and I looked at them independent of the windfall profit tax. What do you do about it? That is all I am saying about those charts to the whole Senate. What do you do about it? What do you want to do about it? If you do not want to do anything about it with respect to the windfall profit tax, what are the options? What options do you want? I am just raising the questions.
Mr. DOMENICI. What time was the Senator's appointment?
Mr. MUSKIE. I am finished.
Mr. DOMENICI. Let me say to the Senator before he leaves, since he has—
Mr. MUSKIE. The Senator might provoke an answer.
Mr. DOMENICI. I will not answer the question the Senator has asked tonight. But I will answer it this way: I think it is an absolute mistake to say to a Federal Government that you and I both know has an insatiable appetite, which is represented by those charts — an insatiable appetite that you and I have been trying to say must be curtailed, that you and I have been saying will be curtailed — it is an absolute mistake to say, "We have a possibility to pay for that vociferous appetite, although we would never have passed a tax increase on the American people to pay for it because they are saying tax less, not more; they are saying less government, not more."
But if I read the message right, we are saying, "Here is the reserve." We are saying to you, Congress, "Curb that appetite. On the other hand, let us take this bill and dangle it up there for you. Because you have such a bad appetite, if you happen to take the bite, we are going to make sure you have the money for it." And I believe that is what you meant when you said—
Mr. MUSKIE. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. DOMENICI. In just a moment.
"Without a more productive windfall profit bill we just cannot make the payments." Now, I cannot read it any differently. Except I am going to say that I would have been much, much more happy about this process if we would not provide the out for that appetite and if we would call this tax a tax. Because a tax is a tax, is a tax. And when you add it up, it is a tax on top of a tax.
I am not a constitutional balanced budget man. I am not one who reads too much into Proposition 13. But I thought we had about concluded around here that the time had come to say no to some programs we cannot afford that do not have any cost-benefit ratio, that are the dreams of people that want to throw a program at an American problem.
Having said that, it appears to me that we should not come down here and take the windfall profit tax and say, "Maximize it. That makes it productive. Maximize it." I do not think we should have come down here and said, "Do not use it, because we might need it for the very thing we have been saying we do not want for the future."
I know what the red and white lines are. I know what they are in the technical terms of the budget and I know what they represent in terms of the appetite of Senators and Congressmen and public servants always promising the American people a new expectation will be fulfilled by us.
All I am saying is, I do not think the windfall profits ought to be used as a reserve valve for those who want to provide more of that self-expectation while the American economy is crying for some productivity relief. I do not see anything in a windfall profits tax as a reserve for future appetites of expenditures that addresses that issue.
I will close. Whatever other remarks I had, I will not make them tonight. I close with this—
Mr. MUSKIE. Not before the Senator yields once more.
Mr. DOMENICI. I will be glad to yield. In fact, I will yield the rest of the evening.
Mr. Chairman, I really believe that under your budget leadership we were coming close to saying, "No more spending" and then we were about to say something else: "and less taxes." We were about to cut taxes for the American people.
I truly believe, but for this accident, we deregulated and we found a windfall. You are darn right. And it is properly named in that context. It is a windfall in the context that you are presenting here tonight.
Mr. MUSKIE. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. DOMENICI. I yield the floor.
Mr. MUSKIE. The Senator did not listen to my presentation. He did not understand this chart or he would not have said what he just said.
First, I have said "no spending" around here for the last 5 years, about as much as any Senator, including my good friend from New Mexico.
Second—
Mr. DOMENICI. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. MUSKIE. I listened to some pretty red rhetoric for the last 5 minutes.
Second, these revenue projections — and I said this as plainly as the English language could make it — assume a $55 billion tax cut in 1982. It assumes tax cuts from 1983 to 1990, in accordance with the Nunn-Chiles-Bellmon amendment to the 1978 tax bill, which reduces taxes as a percentage of GNP to 19½ percent. I made that very clear. And from what you just finished saying, you did not listen. You did not listen.
The whole objective of this exercise is to make it possible for that policy to work. If you do not want that policy to work, then that is one way of eliminating the red. That is one way of eliminating the red. Abandon Nunn-Chiles-Bellmon. That will do the job, or a large part of it. And we will be ready to calculate the effect of it. Or give up the $55 billion tax cut in 1982. That would help.
What we have done here, what you apparently resent because of conclusions to which you have no other answers at the moment, what we have done here is assume what the Congress has already done or is about to do: catastrophic health insurance, welfare reform, Nunn-Chiles-Bellmon, a $55 billion tax cut in 1982, budget spending reflecting only inflation and no new spending programs. We have assumed all of that.
And you stand there and have the nerve to tell me that I represent in this presentation the old way of spending with no restraints, no nays, no tax reductions to get the Government size down as a percentage of the GNP. This is the whole purpose of this exercise. I do not think I have to leave this floor with that impression standing in the RECORD.
Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, let me repeat once again, I do not believe it is fair to propose a way to get a balanced budget, a way to have tax cuts, and then come along and say, "However, we found a windfall, but it happens to be a tax on oil production and so make it as big as you can, hold it in reserve for expenditures that we hope you will not make but we really think you might," and then to come down here and propose the normal budget approaches with all of the inhibitions built in by the institution but somehow or another say to this institution, "Make sure this new tax is as big as possible and available for all of those things."
I cannot read it any other way. I am sorry if the Senator from Maine thinks I do not understand what he said. I believe I do.
I repeat, with those charts in mind one who worried about the expenditures that are contemplated, which might occur, might come to this floor and say, "Every penny of this tax ought to go to selective tax cuts for the American people because we never expected to have it anyway and but for deregulation it would not be here. If it would be used to push the American economy for oil, we do not believe in doing anything for oil, so we will take it away as planned. We certainly believe selective tax cuts have a chance of making the American economy move. We believe it should be used for that rather than as a safety valve, in case we cannot control the appetite. But on the other hand we want to make sure we are telling you we are keeping all of these other things, these cherished new concepts we have built on these charts. We are keeping those intact but for a new $180 billion or $200 billion that we found and want to make sure that is available for future expenditures."
Mr. LONG. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. DOMENICI. I yield.