Steny Hoyer

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. I want to speak about this bill, but I also want to respond to the chairman of the Republican Conference, who apparently fails to realize that we've created 4 million jobs, 3.96 million to be exact, over the last 24 months. We've had 10 quarters of growth in America. As opposed to losing 786,000 jobs the last month of President Bush's term, we added 257,000 last month in the private sector. So to say that the President's program is not working is simply inaccurate. Now, ladies and gentlemen, this is a wolf in sheep's clothing. They don't like the health care bill. That's what the chairman of the conference just said. He wants to vote to repeal that. We understand that. They want to pick it apart piece by piece. Let me talk about it. Two years ago, we passed a comprehensive health care reform package that is already lowering costs, expanding access, and contributing to deficit reduction. The Affordable Care Act was a significant moment when Congress once again took bold action to constrain the growth in health care spending and make insurance more accessible and affordable for all Americans. As the wealthiest country on the face of the Earth, we ought to make sure that people can get insurance and have affordable, accessible health care. Insurance companies can no longer deny coverage to children with preexisting conditions. I bet they think that's a benefit, a protection that will be extended to all Americans by 2014. I've had a lot of people talk to me about that provision. They like it. Insurance companies can no longer drop Americans from their policies when they get sick or impose arbitrary and unfair caps on coverage. You buy insurance to make sure when you get sick you have coverage. If you get very sick and need more coverage, it says you can't cancel because you're really sick. I think Americans like that. Since the Affordable Care Act was signed into law, over 32 million seniors on Medicare have access to free preventative services. The Medicare part D doughnut hole is on the path to close completely by 2020. Seniors who fall into this coverage gap are right now getting a 50 percent discount on their brand drugs. They like that. Now 360,000 small businesses have already taken advantage of tax credits that are helping them provide more affordable coverage to over 2 million workers. Lifetime limits on over 105 million Americans with private insurance have been eliminated. Over 2,800 employers have already received financial assistance that helps them provide affordable insurance to 13 million retirees who are not yet eligible for Medicare. The CBO continues to project that the Affordable Care Act will reduce the deficits by tens of billions of dollars by the end of this decade. Despite all of these benefits, today Republicans will take yet another vote to repeal part of the Affordable Care Act. But what they want to do is repeal the act. That's what the chairman said of the conference. I take him at his word. I appreciate his honesty. Today their focus is on the Independent Payment Advisory Board, or IPAB, which couldn't be a less timely issue. IPAB is a backstop mechanism to ensure that the Affordable Care Act's savings and cost- containment provisions will be achieved. But CBO has already said they don't expect it to be triggered at all over the next decade. That's because the Affordable Care Act's cost-containment provisions are already having a significant impact on slowing the growth of health care and Medicare spending. This proves that the Medicare spending can be constrained without turning Medicare into a voucher program as the chairman has said. That forces seniors to spend more and ends the Medicare guarantee. Americans don't want that. The Republican plan does exactly that and tries to mask the end of Medicare as we know it by talking about choices and competition.

Mr. HOYER. But both competition and choice already exist in the Medicare program. Of beneficiaries, 99.7 percent have access to at least one Medicare Advantage plan, and in the majority of counties, they have an average of 26 private plans to choose from. In spite of all these choices, about 75 percent of all seniors still choose to remain in traditional Medicare. The Republican budget, released just yesterday, paints a clear picture of their priorities, showing once again they stand for ending the Medicare guarantee, shifting ever-increasing costs on to our seniors and repealing all of the Affordable Care Act's patient protections. I stand behind the cost-containment provisions, the delivery-system reforms, the improvement to Medicare, and the new benefits and protections that were enacted under health reform. And I stand with my fellow Democrats and America's seniors in support of preserving the Medicare guarantee and ensuring that Medicare remains available and affordable for generations to come. I appreciate the ranking member's leadership on this issue and all of those who were critically responsible in ensuring that Americans have access to affordable quality health care.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, today I urge all Members to join in commending William J. ``Bill'' Boarman, who honorably and skillfully led the Government Printing Office, GPO, as the 26th Public Printer from January 3, 2011, to January 3, 2012. Bill slashed agency spending dramatically by eliminating nonessential hires, cutting needless travel, restricting use of overtime and reducing the GPO's annual spending plan for 2011 by 15 percent. He held the line on salary increases consistently with the President's government-wide pay freeze. Bill created a specialized task force to collect funds owed to GPO and within months collected over a third of the money due, some outstanding for seven years. To avoid potential lay-offs in the future, Bill authorized a buyout of up to 15 percent of his workforce, but excluding from eligibility employees in mission-critical positions. Together with his restrictions on new hires, the buyout plan achieved 94 percent of its goal and reduced the GPO's staffing to its lowest level in a century. This achievement will save GPO and taxpayers tens of millions of dollars in future years. Bill also worked with the two appropriations committees to provide GPO with funding 15 percent below the prior year but which nonetheless assures GPO's ability to perform its essential functions. To address questions about the work GPO performs for Congress, Bill provided persuasive testimony on the value of the printing services that the GPO performs while at the same time ordering the first-ever survey of Congress's printing requirements. This precedent-setting work, which was commended by the House Appropriations Committee, resulted in the largest single-year percentage reduction in the number of printed Congressional Records delivered to Congress since the GPO began to transition to online versions in 1994. As a result of these and other efforts, Bill's annual report to Congress reported that the GPO ended the year with a net income of $5.6 million, a positive result validated by an external auditor. Yet Bill's leadership at the GPO was about more than cutting costs and improving financial returns. He made customer service GPO's primary strategic goal, a direction that earned the agency applause in a government-wide agency survey. He put GPO on Facebook and ordered the development and release of the GPO's first mobile Web application. While continuing the development of GPO's online Federal Digital System and the GPO's plan for a new automated composition system, he emphasized efficiency and agency control over the GPO's digital systems rather than ceding operations to contractors. He devised and won approval for a new annual investment and spending plan for the GPO that is 6 percent less than his previous year's plan, and which puts the GPO on a path finally to begin retiring several presses that are more than 30 years old. In other areas of the GPO, Bill's achievements were equally impressive. For example, he pushed forward with aggressive plans to make more GPO space available for lease to other agencies, and at the end of the year the GPO was in active negotiations with several organizations. As a former proofreader at the GPO, his return to the agency restored confidence and bolstered employee morale. Under his watch the GPO observed its 150th anniversary, opening an exhibit of its history to the public and issuing a new book on its past, Keeping America Informed. Last month Bill made GPO history by appointing a highly qualified senior manager, Ms. Davita Vance-Cooks, as Deputy Public Printer, the first woman ever to hold that post, and with Bill's departure, she is today the first woman ever to head the agency. Mr. Speaker, Bill Boarman's tenure as Public Printer set a new standard of achievement for his successors to emulate. In my judgment, the actions of a handful of Senators to block an up-or-down vote on the President's nomination of Bill Boarman deprived Congress, Federal agencies, and the American public of his faithful service during this time of difficult transition when most needed. Regardless what may come next, Bill Boarman can leave the Government Printing Office confident that GPO is better than when he found it, and that he has left it in good and capable hands. Please join me in offering the thanks of a grateful Nation to a dedicated public servant. We wish Bill only the best.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from New York for yielding time. I'm proud to stand with her and with other Democratic Members in support of women's access to comprehensive, affordable health care, access that was greatly expanded by the Affordable Care Act which passed 2 years ago this week and which my Republican colleagues want to repeal. Thanks to health care reform, over 13 million previously uninsured women will gain access to health insurance. Thanks to health reform, insurance companies will no longer be allowed to discriminate against women by charging them higher premiums than men for the same exact policy or by denying them coverage altogether simply because they are women. Thanks to health care reform, millions of women with private insurance will no longer have to pay for preventive services like mammograms, cervical cancer screening, contraception, and a host of other services. As a dad of three daughters, as a grandfather of two granddaughters, and as a great grandfather of one great granddaughter, I am glad we did that. And thanks to the Affordable Care Act, preventive services are already free for Medicare beneficiaries. If I had the time, I'd say the other benefits of this bill that we ought to keep, and I will not join my friend from New Hampshire in trying to repeal a provision of this act.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentlelady for yielding, and I rise in strong support of these six pieces of legislation which have been put together and called a jobs bill. I think they have a positive effect on economic growth in our country. I think they are good bills. I particularly support the Himes bill, currently called the Quayle bill; but I'm pleased to support it by whoever's name it might have on it. Four out of the six components of this legislation have been previously passed overwhelmingly. This is a recycle, but doing a good thing twice is not bad. So I'm going to vote for it, and I'm going to be enthusiastic about voting for it. As a matter of fact, I suggested a number of these ideas on our side of the aisle. This bill makes it easier for small businesses to go public and raise the capital they need to expand and hire new workers by reducing regulatory burdens. It also raises the SEC registration thresholds for community banks, which will free up bank capital for lending to small businesses and individuals. That's an important step we ought to be taking. A number of my Democratic colleagues worked hard on these provisions, including, as I said earlier, Representative James Himes of Connecticut, who introduced one of these bills months and months and months ago, and it passed 420 2 in this body. He has been a leader on this issue of small business access to capital, and I congratulate him for his efforts. I'm glad the Republican leadership is bringing this bill to the floor, and I hope it signals a new willingness to work with us to create jobs. This bill is called a JOBS bill. Catchy title. I sort of refer to it as the ``just old bills'' bill, but they are good bills. As I said, we're doing a good thing twice in hoping the Senate will pass it; and I hope the Senate does pass all of these bills and this bill as a package. But make no mistake about it, Madam Chair--and America should make no doubt about it--this is not the jobs bill America needs, one with tweaking around the edges and pretending that we've put something together that's going to create a significant number of jobs. This will help and in the longer term it will create jobs. I'm for it. I think it's a positive step forward. But make no mistake about it, this is not the jobs bill that the President asked for. This is not the jobs bill that America needs. This is not the jobs bill that millions who are unemployed and can't find employment are crying out for in America. America needs a comprehensive jobs plan to help get the millions who have lost jobs and are still looking for work. This bill alone simply is not enough. We must do more. And I will tell my friend--and he is my friend--from Texas, I'm prepared to work with him on a real jobs bill. This is a real jobs bill, but you and I both know it's a small-bore jobs bill. That doesn't make it bad. It doesn't mean that we shouldn't pass it. I thank you for bringing it to the floor. But let us not delude America or deceive ourselves that this is the jobs bill that we need to be passing.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for yielding. This is a sad day for America. It's a sad day for the Congress. It's a sad day for our African American brothers and sisters who have lost a real leader and an extraordinary friend. I first met Donald Payne when I was in my mid-twenties. He was active in the Young Democrats in New Jersey, and I was active in the Young Democrats in Maryland, and that's how we first met. Don was about 6 years older than I am. When you're in your middle twenties, somebody in their thirties is really old. But we all saw him as a very serious individual, serious about his activities, serious about his objectives, serious about the people. He had an extraordinarily productive career. As the leader has mentioned and as I know other speakers before me have mentioned, he was a teacher. He was a teacher in the tradition of Frederick Douglass. Frederick Douglass, a fellow Marylander, said that it is easier to build strong children than it is to repair broken men. Donald Payne was focused on that concept as a teacher. Then throughout his life, he was focused on making sure that America kept the faith with people around the world; that its values, that its hopes, its visions for ourselves were also our hopes and visions for others. Donald Payne, before he came to the Congress, I think had traveled to more countries than perhaps any other Member of Congress. He cared about people, and particularly people who lived in Africa. I think there was no Member who knew Africa better than Donald Payne, no Member who risked more for the welfare of those who lived on that continent. My first trip as majority leader, I went to Sudan and to Darfur. I made that my first trip because, at that point in time, it was one of the most troubled--and still remains--lands in our globe. Donald Payne, unfortunately, could not go on that trip. He had another thing to do. But we had a briefing before we went, and Donald Payne was there. It was clear from those who briefed us that Donald Payne was obviously the person they looked to for knowledge and insight into how we could get from where we were then to the plebiscite, to what is now the independent South Sudan, and hopefully it will remain so, notwithstanding the violence of Sudan itself. Donald Payne was an extraordinarily conscientious Member of this body, but more than that, he was a man who cared about his fellow man and fellow woman. Donald Payne was a serious Member of this body. That does not mean he was always serious. He had a sense of humor. He was a wonderful, engaging person, but he was serious about what he did, and it reflected how deeply he cared about those whom he served and about his country. We could all speak for Special Order after Special Order after Special Order and still not reach the magnitude of praise and thanks that he deserves. Suffice it to say that this body was a better place for his service. As Reverend Cleaver so eloquently intoned, we were better people for having been his friend and his colleague and his coworker. I am pleased to join all of you who, like me, knew Donald Payne as a Member of Congress, yes, but as a human being, as an individual, as someone who cared about us, and we cared about him. I join Leader Pelosi and all of you and our friends on the other side of the aisle, because Don worked across the aisle. Don was not an observer of partisan differences, although he understood they existed. His objective was to work with all for the betterment of all. So, I'm pleased to have this opportunity to join all of you in thanking God that He gave us Don Payne, that He gave him sufficient years to make an extraordinary mark here in this country and around the world.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman. Ladies and gentlemen, we remember the difficult path we trod as a Nation to ensure the participation of all, and we ought to do everything we can to preserve it in our own day. It is not just history that we want to learn; it is the lesson for today that we must remember and learn. I thank John Lewis for his leadership. I thank the thousands, black and white, young and old, rich and poor, who joined together to make America a better place.

Mr. HOYER. I thank my friend John Lewis for yielding. I thank John Lewis for his service to our country, to its principles, to its values, to its people. I thank John Lewis for being my friend, and I thank John Lewis for allowing me for the ninth time to walk with him across that bridge. As I do, I will be holding the hand of John Lewis and holding in my other hand the hand of my 10-year-old granddaughter Alexa. This coming week marks the 47th anniversary of the fateful Bloody Sunday march for civil rights. I want to say to Dan Lungren, my friend, I thank him for the remarks he just gave. They were heartfelt and on target, and the letter from the Birmingham jail to which he referred is certainly one of the great epistles, as he referred to it, to the American people, to people of conscience, to the fierce urgency of now, which he referenced in that letter. On March 7, 1965, our friend and esteemed colleague from Georgia, John Lewis, was among the leaders of that march. It says he was among the leaders. He was the leader, he and Hosea Williams. Two-by-two they walked, some 600, with John and Hosea at the front of the line. That day, in an extraordinary practice of nonviolence, he and other marchers were brutally beaten while trying to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama. They were on their way to Montgomery, the State capital, to protest the murder of a young man, Jimmie Lee Jackson, who had been shot and killed while protecting his mother during a voting rights drive. They were marching to Montgomery to say, in a nonviolent way, every American deserves the right to be able to register and to vote. Every moment has its darkest hours when the exuberance of hope yields to the reality of difficult and painful struggle. Selma brought that reality into homes across the country. News of that Bloody Sunday awakened millions of Americans to the horrors of Jim Crow. It opened their eyes to the injustice that had cut off so many of our people from participation in their government. It made clear that while we said in our Declaration of Independence that we believed in equality, that we believed that all men, and hopefully we would now say of course all women, all people, are endowed by God with certain unalienable rights. We were not doing that in this country. That's what that epistle from Birmingham jail was about. That's what this march was about. That march led to another march 2 weeks later that could not be stopped, one that saw 8,000 Americans from a diversity of backgrounds join together in solidarity and with a faith in the enduring promise that America provided. John Lewis, our colleague, our friend, our brother, was one of the compelling figures of that time and of this. I've been blessed with the privilege of traveling to Selma, as I said, nine times with John Lewis, to worshipping in Terri's church. The visit this weekend will be, I know, another instructive lesson for me and for others on how we need to be continually aware of the discrimination and prejudice that exist today; the attempts at exclusion that exist today; frankly, the attempts to not empower people to vote even today. What happened in Selma 47 years ago ought to be remembered as a moment when America chose to fight hatred with love and put their faith in the values of our Constitution. In his memoir, which I hope all of you have read, ``Walking with the Wind,'' John Lewis explains: If you want to create an open society, your means of doing so must also be consistent with the society you want to create. Violence begets violence. Hatred begets hatred. Anger begets anger, every minute of the day, in the smallest of moments as well as the largest.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I yield to my friend the majority leader, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Cantor), for the purpose of inquiring of the majority leader the schedule of the week to come.

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for his information, and I would say with respect to the bills that he will be offering, we have, as the gentleman knows, considered four of those bills on the floor. They passed overwhelmingly. I think they're good bills, and I look forward to supporting them again. There are two bills which are new. One of the bills was considered when it was sponsored by Mr. Himes. It was a good bill then, and it's a good bill now. I believe our side certainly is going to join in supporting these bills, which we think will have some positive effect on small business entrepreneurs, business formation, and capital formation. I have had the opportunity of talking to Mr. Steve Case, a good friend, and I want to thank Steve Case, as I know you do, for his role working with the White House and working with us on moving these bills forward. I think they are a positive contribution, and as the gentleman knows, four of the bills received over 400 votes when they were first passed on the House floor not too long ago. We think those are positive steps. So, I look forward to next week being a week in which we can vote together on something. I'm sure America does as well. Again, I want to congratulate Steve Case for the work that he has done with respect to this package. I do want to, however, say that we do look forward to additional legislation dealing with jobs creation. We've talked about the President's jobs bill or other jobs bills that might be offered. We would look forward to those coming forward, as well. Let me ask the gentleman: one of the jobs-related bills that we're talking about, of course, is infrastructure, in this case, the highway bill, the infrastructure bill. The gentleman did not mention that for next week. And I know he's concerned about it. We're all concerned about the March 31 date on which the highway program will run out of authorization. As the gentleman knows, there is a severe funding shortage, and it is our fear, our concern, that literally hundreds of thousands of people will lose their jobs if we do not act. Can the gentleman tell me when he thinks we might be acting on either a big bill or an extension? I'll yield to my friend.

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for that information. I want to assure him that our side of the aisle looks forward to working with his side of the aisle towards hopefully coming together with a bipartisan bill which will certainly keep the program going. But from our perspective, it is more than an investment in infrastructure, which this country needs to remain competitive, but it is also an investment in job creation, which we think this bill will do as well. The Export-Import Bank authorization, as the gentleman also knows, will be coming to a close, and Financial Services has shared jurisdiction with that. Can the gentleman tell me what the status of the Export-Import Bank is? As the gentleman knows, I think we have a joint agenda, because I think a lot of things on there are supported by both sides of the aisle, what we call a Make It in America agenda. We believe this is very important for Make It in America--encouraging manufacturing and job creation here in America. Can the gentleman tell me the status of the reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank? I yield to my friend.

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for those comments, and we look forward to continuing to work together. The next question I would like to ask is, clearly, we're coming up on March 15 in the not-too-distant future. It's my understanding from Chris Van Hollen, who is the ranking member of the Budget Committee, that he believes that the committee will markup a budget on the 19th with the possibility of reporting a budget to the floor on the 26th of this month. Can the gentleman tell me, is that a schedule that he contemplates, and is that information accurate? I yield to my friend.

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman. Mr. Speaker, in closing, let me say that Mr. Cantor and I had the opportunity to speak on the floor today. We spoke on behalf of a resolution that was passed overwhelmingly, unanimously, that spoke to commemorating the march that both the majority leader and I have participated in in the past, and I'll be participating in again this weekend, a march commemorating the march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge from Selma to Montgomery. Today was a day of unity on the floor of this House in which Mr. Lungren and Mr. Lewis and others expressed their thoughts, as did so many of the rest of us, about how this is a great lesson on the fact that we have not always been where we promised to be as a Nation, but that we've made progress, and a reminder that there is still progress yet to be done. I want to thank the majority leader for his comments that he made on the floor today and for his focus on this issue. I yield to the gentleman.

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for his comments, and as he observes, House Members have participated in this. There is a wonderful organization known as Faith & Politics. We believe strongly in the separation of church and State, but as I tell people, we do not believe in the separation of the values our faiths teach and the policies that we pursue. There is that discussion, and multifaiths are represented in those discussions. As the majority leader and I are of different faiths, we are of one mind with respect to ensuring that the values of our respective faiths are realized in our public policies. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. Madam Speaker, I now yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Van Hollen), the ranking member of the Budget Committee.

Mr. HOYER. Madam Speaker, I yield myself 5 minutes. I have taken the unusual process of claiming time in opposition to this bill. I have done so so I would have sufficient time to place in context the bill that we're considering. I do not rise to necessarily defeat this bill. I'm going to vote against this bill. I'm for almost all of this bill. What we are funding this bill with was unnecessary, unfair, and ought to be rejected. I want to say at the outset that my friend Mr. Camp and I had a very positive discussion. I believe that Mr. Camp and I could have reached an agreement, which would have put me in support of this legislation. We didn't get there. We tried late in the game, and we didn't get there. I regret that. I think Mr. Camp tried. I know that everybody on my side would have supported the agreement that Mr. Van Hollen and I put forward. That agreement would say, as the current agreement, that the only individuals paying for this bill out of 315 million Americans are the 2 million civilian workers who work for us, who work for all of us, who day after day, week after week, month after month make sure that we give services to the people of the United States, protect the United States, ensure that our food is safe, ensure that we have FBI agents on the job, make sure that at the Defense Intelligence Agency we know what other people are doing. These are all our civilian employees, highly skilled, highly trained, highly educated, and, yes, highly motivated. Every day they give outstanding service to the people of the United States. We talk here and we pass laws here, but none of that talk and none of those laws makes a difference unless somebody implements what we say and the policies that we set. This Congress is on the path to being the most anti-Federal worker Congress that I've served in. I'm going to place that in context for you, which is why I wanted the time. What is the context we find ourselves in? First of all, we have a very struggling economy. The good news is the economy is coming back, but not fast enough. We need to create more jobs, expand opportunities, and make sure that the American Dream is alive for all working Americans, working Americans like our Federal employees, working Americans like the folks at GM who have just done very well, working Americans who work in the hardware store, the grocery store, the gasoline station, hardworking Americans. And we don't have enough jobs for them. As a result, we have high unemployment. I congratulate my friend from Michigan (Mr. Levin) for his leadership in making sure that the unemployment provision in this bill is sufficient to try to reach those folks and make sure they don't fall off the ledge. We walked away from them in December. I'm glad that we're not walking away from them today. We also have, as all of us know, a struggling economy; and, therefore, we put into effect giving $1,000 more to each and every worker. Now, many of your leaders did not support this 2 percent reduction, and I understand that. I won't go into their names. Some are in the Chamber. But the fact of the matter is, it puts an additional $1,000 into average working Americans' pockets--people who pay FICA, that is, people who are making less than $106,000. That's an important thing for us to do to try to keep this economy growing. I'm for that. I was for it in December. I'm for it in February. I'm glad that we're going to have consensus on that today. In addition to that, we are playing a silly little game with the doctors and with Medicare patients; and this silly little game pretends that we're going to extend SGR for 10 months. That's baloney, and everybody knows it. We're going to continue to extend SGR over and over and over again. We should have done it permanently in this bill. We should have done it last year and in the last Congress, the Congress in which I was the majority leader. We should have done that.

Mr. HOYER. Madam Speaker, I would inquire of the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Levin) whether or not he is opposed to the conference report.

Mr. HOYER. Madam Speaker, in that event, I claim the time in opposition to the conference report.

Mr. HOYER. I yield myself 2 additional minutes. So with respect to SGR, ladies and gentlemen, we're playing a game, and the doctors all over this country and the Medicare recipients all over this country know we're playing a game. We're giving them no certainty, no confidence that, come this September, October, November, we won't have another one of these silly little debates. Now we also, in that context, have a deep deficit and debt that confronts this Nation that we have to deal with. And we had two commissions that said we had to deal with it. One was Bowles-Simpson-- my friend from California (Mr. Becerra), who sits in the Chamber here with me, sat on that commission--the other was Domenici-Rivlin. And we've had others, including the Gang of Six in the United States Senate. And all of them had as a premise that we needed to deal with the fiscal problem that confronts us. And the other premise was all of us need to contribute to that solution. All of us. Now what do we see that's being proposed in this Congress, partially in this bill, but only partially in this bill? We have either on the floor proposed or passed over the last 2 years--listen to this, ladies and gentlemen--we are about to cut or propose to cut $134 billion out of our Federal employees over the next 10 years. Nobody else in this bill--not a millionaire, not a billionaire, not a carried-interest beneficiary, not an oil company--nobody in this bill, other than Federal employees, is asked to pay. I understand we have hospital cuts. By the way, how do we have $5 billion of that? Because we just increased by 1 year the cut that they know they got. It's the same for some other things. No individual, other than a Federal employee, is asked to take a cut in this bill.

Mr. HOYER. I yield myself 2 additional minutes. Now, you will say to me, Oh, it's future Federal employees, so it doesn't really matter. That's $15 billion of the $134 billion that has been proposed. They've already paid $60 billion, $60 billion. And by the way, your side of the aisle is not going to give them that 0.5 percent that the President asked for, so that will be $30 billion. So in 3 years--Mr. and Mrs. America ought to know, Madam Speaker--Federal employees will have paid $90 billion in contributions to help bring this deficit down. And by the way, Federal employees, as a percentage of our population, are down by a third over the last 20 years. It's not that the bureaucracy has grown. Yes, our population has grown. We are trying to serve them. They are down by a third in numbers. Now, I know something about Federal employee pay. I represent 60,000 Federal employees. And you could say, Well, Hoyer is up there defending his people. You would be right. You would be very right. But most of the Federal employees don't live in the Washington metropolitan area. They live in your districts, all over this country, serving your farmers, serving your drugstores, serving everything that you do. Do I think it's the private sector that makes this country great? Absolutely. Do I believe they need an energized, high-morale, highly educated Federal workforce as their partner? I do. And you will not have that, ladies and gentlemen, if we keep along this path of every time we come to a bill that's a little bit of trouble, the pay-for is to reach into the Federal employees' pockets. They're pretty much going to say, I'm not with you any longer. And I want to tell you: in terms of recruiting and retaining, you will not do it. Forty percent of the Federal workforce, ladies and gentlemen, can retire in the next 5 years.

Mr. HOYER. I yield myself 1 additional minute. Ladies and gentlemen, you are going to be able to recruit those folks only if you have a competitive workforce. Let me give you a figure that you might find interesting. There are 33,300 employees at Goldman Sachs. Average salary, ladies and gentlemen: $367,057, the average salary of 33,300 people. You won't be able to compete. You won't be able to get NSA employees, as opposed to Siemens or Microsoft or some of those other corporations, many of which are in Ms. Eshoo's district. You won't be able to recruit them, and you won't retain them to have the best and the brightest defending America and making America the strongest and greatest country on Earth. Do you want America to be an exceptional country? Then you'd better have the best civil service on Earth, as well as the best private sector.

Mr. HOYER. I yield myself 1 additional minute. Ladies and gentlemen, I don't know whether most of you know this. I saw a gentleman from Florida who's been here for a couple of months pontificate that I didn't know anything outside of the Beltway. I was the sponsor of the Federal Employee Pay Comparability Act. And George Bush Sr. signed that act, and we worked with his OMB to get it. And what does it say? Federal employees cannot get a raise unless the private sector gets a raise. We're precluded from getting a raise unless the private sector gets a raise. And what does it further say? That the private sector--which is the economic cost index, by the way, in case you want to know exactly what the statistic is--says, we're going to take a half a point less. So what have you done in this bill, unnecessarily? Because you're going to freeze their salary for a third year in a row. Bowles-Simpson said do it for three. But Bowles-Simpson said, Everybody ought to share, everybody. We ought to get $1 trillion in revenues, $1 trillion in cuts. Everybody.

Mr. HOYER. I yield myself 1 additional minute. But nobody but Federal employees, nobody is targeted in this bill other than Federal employees. You can tell I'm angry about that because that's not fair, and that's not how you ought to treat our employees, America's employees. America's public servants, we call them. We ought to stop dissing them. We ought to stop demagoguing them. We ought to stop using ``bureaucrat'' as an epithet. America needs them. I will have some other things to say in a few minutes, Madam Speaker. But we ought not walk away from our Federal employees any more than we ought to walk away from those 160 million people who need this tax cut or walk away from those 2.4 million who need that unemployment insurance or walk away, as we have, from the doctors who need certainty, long term--not for 10 months, but long term. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. HOYER. I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. HOYER. Madam Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Connolly).