March 25, 1980
Page 6470
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maine.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, may I say to my good friend from Florida that I have to leave to attend a funeral very shortly and I wanted to present at least the merits of my amendment.
Mr. STONE. Mr. President, I certainly defer to the chairman.
Mr. MUSKIE. I thank my good friend from Florida.
Mr. President, I have listened to my good friend from Delaware (Mr. ROTH) and if I might pull a few quotes out of what he has had to say, I think he merits my response.
He refers to my amendment as a smokescreen amendment. He says we will be told today we cannot cut Federal spending. I do not know who is going to tell the Senator that.
I have a 6-year record, and I think a credible one, of proposing cuts in Federal spending. The Senator from Delaware undertakes to color the debate on my amendment by suggesting that it is being offered by people who are going to tell the Senate that we cannot cut Federal spending.
The truth is, Mr. President, that if we are to reduce spending by the extent urged by the Senator from Delaware, he will have to include in his cuts the cuts we will have to make to achieve the objective of the Muskie amendment. So if the Muskie amendment depends on smokescreen cuts, so does the Roth amendment. He cannot have it both ways.
I have listened to argument by distortion here for the last hour.
It is also argued by the Senator from Delaware and his associates that we do not propose to cut spending at all; that we are going to increase taxes in order to balance the budget. That simply is not true.
When I get to my prepared statement, I will point out that we can balance the budget as of May 15 without any increase in taxes above current law, except that which is attributable to inflation, inflation that pushes people up into higher tax brackets and inflation which increases tax revenues without pushing people into higher tax brackets The same inflation that pushes up social security benefits, the same inflation that pushes up defense spending, the same inflation that pushes up spending all across the board.
To listen to the Senator from Delaware, one would conclude that inflation affects only the revenue side of the budget; that it does not affect the spending side of the budget; that the spending side of the budget reflects only the spendthrift tendencies of the Members of Congress.
Well, I say to the Senator from Delaware that if he will examine the supplementals that are before the Appropriations Committee, $11 billion of those supplementals are attributable to inflation without an additional penny being voted by Congress. For anyone proposing the Roth amendment or the Muskie amendment to ignore the effect of inflation on Federal spending is irresponsible, in my judgment.
If the Senator is right in that unspoken assumption, what he ought to advocate is the Federal budget of the size that it was in 1974. He and the Senator from New Mexico are the ones who keep telling us and reminding us about the massive jumps in Federal spending, largely attributable to the impact of higher energy costs and inflation.
Well, if the Senator thinks those should be disregarded, if he thinks we should make no compensation at all for the impact of inflation on the spending side, then why does he not offer an amendment that wipes out all of the inflationary aspects of the Federal budget going back to 1974? Then he could roll back these hundreds of billions of dollars of increased spending.
Why does the Senator not do it? Because to do it would be to squeeze people unconscionably. The Senator says we need strong leadership. Forty-three of his cosponsors within the last month voted to breach the 1981 budget that we put in last year's budget resolution. That is strong leadership?
That vote was over my objection, and there were 13 Senators who voted with me. And the Senator from Delaware argues that I do not represent strong leadership in cutting the budget, but that the 43 do?
If we would get rid of this exaggerated rhetoric of distortion, we might be able to focus the country's attention on the facts. And that is what I am about to try to do, if I may.
Mr. President, the Senate Budget Committee will report a balanced budget recommendation for fiscal 1981. That result will not be easy to achieve. On the contrary, it will demand an unprecedented degree of sacrifice and discipline.
Indeed, a few months ago it was widely believed that Congress was incapable of such restraint. But now that we are about to start marking up that balanced budget resolution, there are those who say that we should produce a surplus of as much as $41 billion by limiting fiscal 1981 outlays to $584 billion.
Incidentally, with respect to all these proposals to gear Federal spending to GNP, do Senators understand how many different computations of GNP one might use?
For example, Chase Econometrics, I think it is, projects that the GNP in fiscal year 1981 will be $2,766,000,000,000.
Now, 21 percent of the revised GNP, according to Chase Econometrics, will be $575 billion, requiring us to cut $854 billion.
What we have used is CBO's. Twenty-one percent of CBO's revised GNP would take us to $584 billion, $9 billion higher.
How does one know in advance, may I ask the cosponsors of the Roth amendment, which estimate of GNP is correct? Those who want to spend more would use the more optimistic forecast; those who want to spend less would use the more pessimistic forecast.
And how would you know on May 15? If you use the more optimistic one and the pessimistic one materialized, then how, in October, would you make the additional cuts to get down to 21 percent of GNP? Then, if you get into March of the fiscal year, as we are now, with a $17 billion overage in the 1980 budget and you find that GNP turns out to be an even more pessimistic figure than assumed, then how do you make the additional cuts to get down to your 21 percent?
With the potential volatility of the gross national product, Mr. President, to tie spending by an arbitrary percentage point is to tie your spending to a cloud. You do not know whether your cloud is going to be a cirrus cloud or a thunderhead close to the Earth.
So your deficit is going to go up and down, depending on the flow of the clouds.
Well, I do not like that cloud-like thinking. I think you have to deal with facts.
Mr. President, let me make it clear that I believe we must achieve a substantial reduction of the Federal share of GNP, uncertain as that test is.
In the Tax Reduction Act of 1978, Congress has already adopted the goal of a 19.5 percent Federal share of GNP by fiscal year 1983. As a matter of fact, that act set as a goal for fiscal 1981 not Mr. ROTH's 21 percent, but 20.5 percent, which would require another $17.5 billion in cuts.
Why did not Senator ROTH use that one, which is already on the books? Well, that would not impress anybody. And besides the $17 billion in additional cuts probably intimidated even those who have sponsored the Roth amendment.
Mr. President, it simply would not be reasonable or responsible to try to cut the budget to 21 percent of GNP this Year. It would require that we reach an outlay limit of $584 billion, using a midrange GNP estimate.
Let me present the numbers. They speak very clearly for themselves.
The first table is entitled "Outlays in the President's Budget." Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that this table be printed in the RECORD at this point.
There being no objection, the table was ordered to be printed in the RECORD, as follows:
[Table omitted]
Mr. MUSKIE. This table shows the major programs of the President's January budget as they have been estimated by the Congressional Budget Office. They total $629.2 billion in Federal outlays for fiscal year 1981, the figure at the bottom.
The $629.2 billion figure assumes that Congress will enact savings in existing law of $5 billion in 1981. Those are savings many of which we assumed in the 1980 budget resolution but which the Congress has failed to enact.
If Congress does not make these savings, the $629 billion figure for the President's January budget would rise to about $634 billion.
In the series of meetings between the congressional leadership and the administration last week we agreed Congress should try to make most of these savings.
We also agreed to make further spending cuts, the smokescreen spending cuts to which the Senator from Delaware alludes, totalling almost $16 billion in savings in order to produce a balanced budget for 1981. The total savings we agreed to, including the savings assumed in the President's budget, totaled about $21 billion.
The table, Mr. President, is divided by a red line. Above that line are national defense, the major retirement programs, medicare and medicaid, veterans' programs, and interest on the public debt. These categories are shown separately because of the real difficulty we face in trying to reduce any of them.
Interest on the national debt must, of course, be paid. It is a contractual obligation, a permanent one. And there seems to be no sentiment to cut defense below the President's budget. Pressures are all the other way.
So unless you cut the benefits for either older Americans, veterans, or the unemployed, we have limited savings possibilities within these figures which total $486 billion, or 77 percent of the budget.
Nonetheless. in the congressional leadership meetings we agreed to attempt a number of changes in the programs shown above that line for total savings of $3.5 billion. Those savings are principally in medicaid and medicare, but they also include the unemployment compensation bill the Senate passed this month, and limiting inflation adjustment in Federal retirement benefits to once a year as we already do in social security.
Below the line is 23 percent of the Federal budget for $143.2 billion. Some of them are just about as hard to reduce as those above the line. To achieve a balanced budget, the leadership group agreed to try to save about $13 billion from the $143.2 billion which will be spent in those programs in 1981. The total set of budget cuts which the leadership group considered above and below the line will produce a budget balanced at the $613 billion expenditure level proposed by the President in his message last week. That balance does not depend upon the oil import fee and it does not depend upon the proposed withholding on interest and dividends.
The President has imposed an oil import fee which will raise about $10 billion in 1981. He has also proposed legislation to withhold the taxes which are legally due on interest and dividends.
That would raise another $2 billion or $3 billion in 1981. So balancing the budget at a $613 billion outlay level will produce a surplus in the neighborhood of $11 billion, available as a cushion in case our estimates are wrong — as they have been this year to the tune of $11 billion plus — or for a tax reduction if the $613 billion outlay ceiling is not breached.
When the Budget Committee meets this week to mark up the 1981 budget, we will do our best to meet and even go below the $613 billion outlay level, and I anticipate we will try to devote the surplus that spending level would provide for a tax cut in fiscal year 1981. That is the kind of budget we will recommend to the Senate when it returns just after the Easter recess.
Mr. President, may I ask how much time I have remaining?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 9 minutes and 15 seconds remaining.
Mr. MUSKIE. I wonder if I might use some time from the bill at this point?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the Senator may proceed.
Mr. MUSKIE. I yield myself 10 minutes.
Now we have the Roth resolution which would mandate the Budget Committee to cut outlays to 21 percent of the gross national product. Sure, the Roth resolution says it is the sense of the Senate, but may I say to my colleagues if the Senate were today to adopt the Roth resolution, with Budget Committee markups beginning tomorrow, as chairman I would have to regard the Senate's action as a mandate, as a must, giving us no option but to present a budget with an outlay limit geared to 21 percent of 1981 GNP.
CBO estimates the 1981 gross national product is $2.794 trillion. Twenty-one percent of that figure is $587 billion, or $42 billion below the President's budget. But since the Federal budget is part of the GNP, withdrawing $42 billion from the President's budget will lower the GNP because of the contradictory effect that reduction in Federal spending would have on the rest of the economy. So the economists advise us that if you take $42 billion out of the President's budget, the GNP also drops, and 21 percent of it turns out to be $584 billion.
So the real spending limit called for by the Roth resolution is $584 billion, which is about $45 billion less than the President's January budget.
I assume Senator ROTH would use, to achieve cuts of that type, the $16 billion in smokescreen cuts which are included in my budget. They are a smokescreen in my budget but they are real cuts in his budget. There is a very real distinction. The Roth resolution would require $29 billion more in cuts than the $21 billion in cuts needed to balance the budget at the $613 billion level.
Where would that additional $29 billion come from? Will we cut the national defense budget below the President's request? Can we refuse to pay interest on the national debt?
Will veterans programs, retirees' benefits, or medicare and medicaid be reduced beyond the reductions the leadership group has already agreed to try to save in those programs?
Mr. President, I have asked to have distributed to every Senator a chart of the principal spending-cut alternatives that we would need to consider in order to meet the Roth budget outlay level. What I have done is assemble those programs in terms of their 1980 outlays, which is current law, and 1981 outlays, which include the President's budget. The President's budget includes cost-of-living increases for a lot of programs above the line.
Here is what you could get by eliminating cost-of-living increases for social security recipients. You could pick up $20.1 billion; you would still have $9 billion to go. You could pick up $17.9 billion in increased defense spending. I am talking about the President's defense number, not that of others in this body, who think that number is too low.
Medicare and medicaid, $6.4 billion; unemployment compensation, $4.3 billion; food stamps, $3.5 billion; Federal employee retirement, $2.7 billion; community and regional environmental public works — this is below the line — $1.7 billion, and so on, as you can read on the chart. But I have given the big ones and you would have to touch the big ones to get at $29 billion of additional cuts.
I propose in my resolution to report a balanced budget and also to report an amendment which will tell the Senate which of those programs in this chart I have distributed would have to be cut, above the cut to obtain a balanced budget, in order to get down to the 21-percent figure.
Apparently, that suggestion troubles my "smokescreen" friend. That amendment would not be a smokescreen. That would put right in front of us, where we could eat it, the consequences of the Roth amendment beyond the balanced budget.
No; Mr. ROTH would prefer to have us do it in the Budget Committee and then blame us. I can see what would happen if we produced a Roth budget according to his prescription. It would cut $29 billion below what is needed to achieve a balanced budget. Then some ingenious Senator — and I shall not try to suggest on which side of the aisle it would come from — would propose an amendment to the budget resolution increasing spending in defense, upping the social security cost of living, and so on down the line.
The argument will be, all the country is asking for is a balanced budget and we can have a balanced budget and still take care of the old folks, still take care of national defense, still take care of unemployment compensation, and so on. I can just see that amendment on the floor. And the Budget Committee will sit there, looking like Scrooge, because we had insisted, pursuant to the mandate of the Senate, that we produce a surplus, that we cut beyond what is needed to balance the budget.
Mr. BENTSEN. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. MUSKIE. Yes, I yield to the Senator from Texas.
Mr. BENTSEN. Mr. President, I commend the distinguished chairman of the Budget Committee, and the members of that committee, for their long and successful efforts on behalf of a balanced Federal budget and decreased Government expenditures as a proportion of GNP. As those of us who participated last month in the review of the President's budget proposals can attest, the work of the Budget Committee is a complex and frequently thankless task. In recent years, Senator MUSKIE and his colleagues on the committee have, however, introduced a welcome element of discipline, responsibility, and long-range planning into the budget process. Thanks in no small part to their efforts, this country stands at long last at the door of sound fiscal planning.
Mr. President, I have an amendment for myself, Senator BOREN, and Senator BRADLEY, it has been discussed with the chairman of the Budget Committee and I believe it meets with his approval.
The amendment I am proposing could not be simpler or more direct. It states that one-half of any tax reduction that shall occur as a result of a balanced budget, coupled with reduced Government spending, should contribute to the efforts to increase productivity in America.
It has become apparent, Mr. President, that inflation — the basic cause of our economic problems today — is deeply rooted in the American economic system. All too often in the past, we have attempted to deal with our economic problems by treating the symptoms rather than the root causes of inflation.
In the process, we have learned that recession is no cure for inflation. We had a recession in 1974 and, in the process, we managed to reduce the CPI from 12.1 percent in 1974 to 4.8 percent in 1976. But that recession, Mr. President, was not coupled with gains in productivity, and when it was over, the symptoms of inflation returned with a vengence. The CPI went up to 6.8 percent in 1977, to 9 percent in 1978, to 13 percent last year and today we are staring down the barrel of 18-percent inflation in America. There has never been a time when I have been more worried about my country's economic future.
We are not going to cure inflation with recession. And — let us admit it — we are not going to cure inflation simply with a balanced budget. Unless we seize this opportunity created by a sense of impending crisis in our economy to realize fundamental reform in our economic system, any short-term gains we may achieve today will be wiped out tomorrow. We will simply ratchet up the baseline and restart the inflationary cycle in the future at an even higher level.
I believe there is broad agreement in this Chamber, Mr. President, that America's problems with productivity are at the heart of our problems with inflation. Our rate of productivity increase is currently the lowest of any major industrial democracy. Last year, for the first time in our history, productivity in America actually decreased by 2 percent. One does not have to be an economic authority to understand that when productivity decreases while wages andprices are increasing, inflation is inevitable. There is no way to avoid it. Throughout the post-World War II period, tax cuts in this country have traditionally been directed toward demand stimulation, with roughly two-thirds of the benefits going to consumers. By constantly stimulating consumption — and by attempting to spend our way out of recessions — we have placed significant demands on our economy while doing virtually nothing to expand productive capacity. Demand has gradually outstripped our capacity to produce, and inflation has been the result.
The amendment I am proposing, Mr. President, would insure that one-half of any future tax reductions would contribute to increased productivity in America. They would enable us to fight the root causes of inflation by producing goods and services more efficiently. They would provide appropriate incentives for American business and industry to invest in a more modern plant and equipment.
I respectfully suggest, Mr. President, that the real question we are debating today is not simply whether we should have a balanced budget in 1981. Sure we are going to have a balanced budget; we really have no alternative. What we must determine, however, is how to convert balanced budget policies into a comprehensive strategy that will yield stability and real economic growth for the future. What can we do, as we balance the budget, to attack the root causes of inflation?
I submit we can insure that half of the benefits that will accrue from a balanced budget and reduced levels of government expenditure should be channeled toward our efforts to increase productivity in America.
This country does not need and cannot afford future tax cuts that stimulate demand. We urgently require, and really cannot succeed without, increased incentives for savings and investment in our economy. To the extent that we can use tax policy to create a more efficient American economy by stimulating growth in productivity, we can lay the foundation for real growth and prosperity in the future. We can break the spiral of demand-induced inflation. We can beat inflation with production lines rather than unemployment lines.
Mr. President, I urge the adoption of the Bentsen amendment.
Mr. President, I should like to say that my distinguished friend, the chairman of the Budget Committee, has never been lacking in courage. I want to thank the chairman and the members of that committee for the discipline they have exercised in trying to cut back on Government expenditures, trying to bring us a balanced budget. I worked with him during those joint administration-congressional leadership meetings on the budget for 9 or 10 days and nights trying to find a way to make the appropriate cuts to achieve a balanced budget for 1981. I know how complex it is, I know that it is a thankless job. I, for one, am very grateful for what the chairman and his committee have done.
A balanced budget is important, particularly from a psychological standpoint, to break the inflationary expectations which dominate our economic environment. But we must not follow the same kind of boom-and-bust cycle we have followed before, where we will pump the prime, and then turn around and prime the pump.
I would like to see us do some long term things to turn productivity around to try to put new machines, and better tools, and equipment in the hands of American labor. The average American worker is just as productive as anybody in the world if he or she has efficient tools. The Japanese turn over their industrial base once every 10 years. In this country, we are tearing down our factories and replacing our equipment once every 30 years. You do not have to be an economic genius to understand that their working people are going to have more modern, more effective tools in their hands than ours.
I believe the most effective way to fight inflation is not by unemployment lines but by production lines, putting more goods on the shelf more efficiently, cheaper, to make us competitive in world markets.
Mr. President, as I said, I have an amendment I wish to offer for the chairman's consideration and for the Senate's consideration, that half of these tax cuts that we are talking about, out of any budget surplus that might develop, go to try to increase productivity in this country, that an emphasis be put on productivity, that business get tax incentives to modernize America's productive capacity.
An example of what we are talking about today is that there are 22 modern blast furnaces for the production of steel in the world. Fourteen of these are located in Japan; none, not one is located in the United States.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to take another 5 minutes off the bill.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. BENTSEN. I thank the chairman.
Mr. President, I would like to offer this amendment on behalf of myself, Senator BOREN, and Senator BRADLEY, who are as deeply concerned as I am on the question of productivity. I have discussed the amendment with the Senator from Maine. I would appreciate very much his consideration.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I say to the distinguished Senator from Texas that we were much impressed in the Budget Committee by his testimony as chairman of the Joint Economic Committee and with that of Representative CLARENCE BROWN, which is supportive of what he has just said. I think there was general agreement, although we did not vote on it in the Budget Committee, that use of the Tax Code to stimulate productivity increases and improvements should clearly be part of our long-range goals, and not too long range. I know the Senator indicated in those hearings that he would like to see such tax cuts enacted in the latter part of calendar 1981. I hope that, if we follow the right kind of fiscal and monetary policy this year, that might be achieved.
I have had the opportunity to look at his amendment. I have also discussed with him the possible addition of a goal of offsetting social security tax increases as an additional goal to be reflected in this substitute resolution. I think both objectives make sense. I think both of those objectives are clearly widely supported in the Congress, even though I do not think there are many votes on that combination particularly.
We anticipate that if we can maintain budgetary discipline and the effect of that on the economy is positive, we should have some surplus to devote to these kinds of tax modifications. So, following my discussion with the Senator privately and following the colloquy that we have had on the floor now, I should like to modify my amendment
Mr. STONE. Mr. President, a parliamentary inquiry.
Mr. ROTH. Mr. President, I object to the modification.
Mr. MUSKIE. I have not yielded the floor, Mr. President. I am sending the modified substitute to the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has the right to modify his amendment. Is the Senator making the request?
Mr. MUSKIE. Yes, I make that request.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The amendment is so modified.
The amendment, as modified, is as follows:
Strike all after the resolving clause, and insert the following:
"That it is the sense of the Senate that the Committee on the Budget shall report a federal budget for fiscal year 1981 which is balanced in accordance with the mandate of the Congressional Budget adopted pursuant to the Public Debt Limit Act and which reserves any surplus for a tax deduction, one-half of such reduction being designed to increase productivity, and the other half to offset social security tax increases, and shall also report such additional specific reductions, if any, necessary to reduce federal outlays for fiscal year 1981 to 21 per centum of the gross national product.".
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from Texas and also the Senators from Oklahoma and New Jersey for this amendment. I should like to take a few minutes now to complete my opening statement.
Mr. President, I have addressed myself to the possible cuts in the programs above the line that would have to be considered if the Roth amendment is adopted. Those, incidentally, total $65.5 billion, out of which $29 billion would have to be found if cuts are made above that line.
So we come down to the programs below the line on the chart.
Now the leadership group has already cut that $143 billion total below the line by about $13 billion, and maybe some more. So you would guess that, of the $130 billion left, we would have to cut about $1 out of every $4 to save the other $29 billion called for by the Roth resolution. But it is not quite that simple.
I wish my colleagues would listen to this arithmetic.
Almost $1 out of every $3 in outlays in the entire 1981 Federal budget really is uncontrollable, because it pays for an actual commitment — like a construction contract — the Government has already made and which cannot be recalled, even if you change the law now. Outlays for programs below the line include the greatest concentration of payments for these prior-year obligations.
Of the $143 billion in outlays for the programs below the line, CBO estimates that $83 billion is the result of these prior-year obligations which cannot be withdrawn now, even if we change the law.
That leaves $60 billion which we agreed to reduce that $60 billion by $13 billion.
So we get down to $47 billion in controllable outlays in which to find $29 billion in cuts.
The simple reality is that, if we look below the red line, Senator ROTH's additional $29 billion can only be saved by radical reductions in a lot of programs, including revenue sharing for the cities, food stamps, aid to the poor, energy programs, the Space Shuttle, most aid to higher education, and the foreign aid program. We would have to virtually shut down the operation of most of these programs below the line if we looked to that area to find the $29 billion additional Roth cuts.
In short, achieving the 21 percent of GNP target suggested by Senate Resolution 380 may be theoretically possible in 1981. But to seriously attempt it would be unacceptable to most Americans and most Members of the Senate.
If we are going to cut the budget to Senator ROTH's $584 billion in outlays without virtually eliminating many of the programs I have mentioned, we would have to do so by significantly cutting national defense and the amount that older Americans would otherwise receive in their retirement income and health programs.
It appears that some of the cosponsors of the Roth resolution know these are the facts and are reconsidering their support of the 21-percent limitation in the Roth resolution. I understand one of Senator ROTH's leading cosponsors may offer an amendment here today to increase the Roth $584 billion outlay limit to $597 billion, a $13 billion retreat from the 21-percent goal in the Roth resolution.
I believe the substitute amendment I am offering today provides a more reasonable approach to the important issue of budget limitation.
The substitute I am offering reaffirms the commitment to a balanced budget we made last year in the debt ceiling bill and the congressional budget resolution.
The substitute calls on the Budget Committee to report a balanced budget this year containing the lowest prudent outlay limit. It also instructs the committee to report an amendment to that budget containing the additional outlay cuts, if any, necessary to reach the $584 billion limit.
Finally, the substitute calls on the Budget Committee to reserve any surplus generated by the balanced budget for a tax cut if the Congress adheres to the spending limitations of the budget resolution.
Mr. President, let us deal reasonably with the options which are reasonably available.
Sure, we could pound the table, square the jaw, and demand that Federal spending be limited overnight to some arbitrary percentage of the gross national product. This is the stuff of which headlines are made.
But the making of a responsible and workable Federal budget is another matter entirely.
The substitute resolution commits the Budget Committee to recommending the most stringent Federal budget in memory. It would instruct the committee to approve the second balanced budget in 20 years — with projections of subsequent balances for years to come. It would impose truly drastic spending cuts — not just in frills, but in programs once considered untouchable.
It will provide for the Budget Committee to report a thoroughly considered amendment to make still further reductions to the $584 billion level, if the Senate chooses to do so.
In short, the substitute I am offering provides all that the Roth resolution provides, but in a more responsible fashion. And the substitute resolution includes a provision for tax reduction. The Roth resolution does not.
Mr. President, I will conclude by drawing the Senate's attention to the last of the charts prepared for this debate. One, on the easel behind me, is titled "The 1981 Budget Picture." It shows that the Roth resolution would require $45 billion in reductions from the President's January budget.
Second, examine the chart on each of your desks entitled "Principal Spending Cut Alternatives to Meet the Roth Resolution."
As the debate continues, I hope that Senators will keep both those charts in the corner of their minds.
I hope that the Senate will muster the discipline and the courage to balance the 1981 budget. I believe that we will.
But think about the prospect of cutting that $45 billion from the budget. Think about what that would mean to elderly Americans — many of whom are already ill fed, ill housed, and ill clothed.
Think about what that would mean to our defenses, or to our colleges and universities, or to our efforts to achieve a solution to the energy crisis, or to the problems of our local communities.
Finally, think about whether the Senate should choose to balance the budget and move in the direction of a smaller Federal share of GNP — or whether we should go on record for an arbitrary spending limit which is unrealistic, unworkable, and unworthy of the responsibility for sound fiscal planning which the people have entrusted to us.
Instead, I recommend the adoption of the balanced budget, tax reduction substitute I have proposed.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the RECORD the tables, prepared for this debate and to which I have referred this morning.
There being no objection, the tables were ordered to be printed in the RECORD, as follows:
[Tables omitted]
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I say to Senator ROTH and his charge of smokescreen just this.
First, the Muskie amendment promises a balanced budget for 1981. The Senator from Maine has undertaken to meet every commitment he has ever made as chairman of the Budget Committee, even though that put him in ranks with only 13 colleagues on one recent occasion, to meet the requirements of the budget.
I have had to oppose programs toward which I have a great deal of sympathy in order to hold the line.
But I am proposing not smokescreen cuts. They are real cuts. If Senators do not believe that, wait until constituents begin to approach them, as I have been approached.
They are not complaining about smokescreen. They are complaining about cuts that draw blood and cut into bone and muscle. If they have not felt that yet, then they are living in a smokescreen world.
Second, what we have promised is that if there is a reserve that we ought not spend it in advance, we ought not spend it until we are sure we are in a position to implement a balanced budget objective, not just on May 15, but on September 15, or October 1, which is the first of the next fiscal year about which we are talking, and taking into account the events of next March when the supplementals come up.
That is why we need the reserve. With the uncertainties of the economy, the ups and downs that are possible, with the possibility of breaches of even a balanced budget amendment, we need some reserve to make sure we keep our promise to the American people of a balanced budget.
But if there is a reserve, as there may well be, then that will be identified in the Muskie resolution as available for productivity tax cuts and offsets to social security tax increases.
Finally, Mr. President, I think this is what really makes the distinguished Senator from Delaware very uncomfortable. The Muskie resolution would require the Budget Committee to report out to the Senate — so that Senator ROTH or one of his colleagues may pick up such an amendment and offer it in order to clearly identify their commitment to the ROTH principle — an amendment to the balanced budget resolution, which would identify the range of cuts and the possible cuts that would be necessary to reduce outlays in the balanced budget resolution to the 21 percent level.
That would not be, I promise, a comfortable amendment for any Senator in this body to offer.
We will put it together. We will send it to the floor. It will he at the desk. That is the only way I can see to force the Roth cosponsors to face not just the generality of budget cuts, but the specifics.
The history of the budget resolution in the Senate, I am ashamed to say, is that all too often Senators vote for generalities like this Roth proposal. Then when it comes to backing it up with votes on specific programs, they run away. That is what senator ROTH and his cosponsors really object to in the Muskie substitute, because the Muskie substitute will, take my word for it, require the Roth sponsors to decide whether or not to pick up a Roth amendment at the desk and support specific cuts — to make cuts in defense, social security, medicare, medicaid, veterans programs, unemployment compensation, Federal retirement, or to dismantle the programs below the line.
That is what the Muskie resolution would require, and that is a smokescreen? No. The only smokescreen in all this, Mr. President, is the attempt of the Senator from Delaware to concede the toughness of the Muskie resolution, and especially its toughness as it would affect the sponsors of the Roth resolution.
Mr. President, I reserve the remainder of my time.
Several Senators addressed the Chair.
Mr. ROBERT C. BYRD. Mr. President, I ask to be a cosponsor of the Senator's modified amendment.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the distinguished majority leader be made a cosponsor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. Who yields time?
Mr. ROTH. Mr. President, before I yield time to the distinguished Senator from Florida, it is my understanding that the chairman of the Budget Committee will have to be away from the floor.
That raises some serious questions, because I have a number of comments I would like to make in response to the statement of the distinguished chairman. of the Budget Committee. I wonder what the leadership intends to do during that period.
Mr. MUSKIE. We can arrange to have the floor covered, so far as the sponsors are concerned, if the Senator will put in his arguments what I have said.
Mr. ROTH. This is a very important and serious debate, and I think the distinguished chairman has raised a number of points that need to be considered on the floor.
However, we are in the position, I point out to the majority leader, where we cannot have a discussion of these issues unless both sides are present. I think it is very important that the public understand what we are debating.
Mr. MUSKIE. I say to the Senator that my side of the argument is in the RECORD. The Senator has an opportunity to put his side in the RECORD.
Mr. ROTH. Yes, but I may want to ask some questions.
Mr. MUSKIE. The Senator can reserve his questions until later. I suspect that the questions he might ask have been answered already. I will be glad to answer them later. I think I have put plenty in the RECORD for the Senator to comment on until such time as I return, and I will be glad to engage the Senator in as long a discussion as he wishes.
I feel that his resolution is just as damaging to the fiscal policy of this country as, apparently, he thinks mine is. So there is plenty of room for debate. I never have been reluctant to engage in debate. At the moment, I have a very important private commitment. I think other Senators, from time to time, have left the floor in response to such private considerations. I have to leave.
Mr. ROTH. Mr. President, I object to this being counted against my time.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator can decline to yield. The Senator has approximately 3 minutes remaining of the time on the amendment.
Mr. ROTH. Mr. President, I should like to ask the distinguished majority leader a question.
Senator STONE wants to proceed, and I will yield time to him. But it is very difficult to debate what I consider the most economic question before our country if no one else is here. I understand — and of course I agree — that the distinguished chairman has to leave. Perhaps we should go into recess, so that we will have the time remaining for debate.
Mr. ROBERT C. BYRD. Mr. President, I do not think we should go into recess. There will be other Senators who can speak on the pending substitute or on the resolution itself. I suggest that we not go into recess.
How many minutes remain to the distinguished Senator from Delaware on the Muskie substitute and how many minutes remain to Mr. MUSKIE?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. On the Muskie substitute, the Senator from Delaware has 2 minutes and 11 seconds. The Senator from Maine has 9 minutes and 28 seconds. Time remains to each on the resolution itself.
Mr. ROBERT C. BYRD. I ask unanimous consent that I may control the remaining time allotted to Mr. MUSKIE on the substitute.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Mr. ROTH. Against whose time is this counting, Mr. President?
Mr. ROBERT C. BYRD. Count it against Mr. MUSKIE, on the resolution.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. ROBERT C. BYRD. I say to the distinguished Senator that Mr. CHILES is a member of the Budget Committee, and he is on the floor. He will be capable of engaging in any colloquy or answering questions while Mr. MUSKIE is away.