Christopher Shays

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Kentucky [Mr. Ward], a former Peace Corps volunteer.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Maryland [Mrs. Morella]. (Mrs. MORELLA asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Porter]

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 10 seconds to express my appreciation to the chairman of the Committee on Rules for recommending to the primary holders of time that all sides within each party be given time, and specifically, to the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers], for honoring that request and yielding time to the minority within the majority that strongly opposes repeal of the automatic weapons ban. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from New Jersey [Mrs. Roukema]. (Mrs. ROUKEMA asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute and 10 seconds to the gentlewoman from Connecticut [Mrs. Johnson].

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I yield one minute to our distinguished colleague, the gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Moran].

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California [Mr. Campbell], our newest Member but also a former Member. (Mr. CAMPBELL asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, it is not my intention to use the full hour, but I would like to address the Chamber in regards to a number of issues dealing with what we are seeking to do in this new 104th Congress, this new Republican majority. Mr. Speaker, I said earlier in part of a special order that former Prime Minister Rabin, the Prime Minister of Israel, had said that politicians are elected by adults to represent the children. I am struck by the power of that statement, because really what our task is as Americans, certainly in government, is to leave this country better for the generation that will follow. That is what our forefathers did for us. They founded a country and left it better for us, and we have to leave it better for our children. Mr. Speaker, we have three main objectives in this Republican Congress: This is to seek to get our financial house in order and finally to balance our Federal budget, we are looking to save our trust funds, particularly Medicare, from insolvency, bankruptcy, and we are looking to transform our caretaking, social, corporate, even farming, welfare state into what I would refer to as a caring opportunity society. We are not looking to throw our hands into the air and say, ``Listen, this is not a problem with the government, you're on your own.'' We are looking to help people grow the seeds. We just do not want to keep handing them the food. We as Members of Congress have a solemn pledge to do a number of things, but obviously one of them is to vote on a Federal budget each year. What some of the listening audience may not know and something I did not fully grasp, even after I was elected a Member of Congress in 1987, was that whereas on the State level I voted on one budget, here in Washington we vote on 13 separate appropriations bills, but they only constitute one-third of all the spending that we do in Washington. When we vote out a budget, we are voting on one-third. When we vote, we vote on one-third. We think of how we spend one-third of the budget. Fifty percent of the budget is literally on automatic pilot. It is what we call our entitlements, it is food stamps, Medicare, Medicaid, welfare for mothers and children. It is agricultural subsidies. You fit the title, you get the money. We in Congress do not vote on it each year. It is on automatic pilot. I can remember early on in my career as a Member of Congress, I would go back in a community meeting and I would say ``I voted to cut spending,'' and they said, ``I know you did, but how come it keeps going up?'' It is a good question. I went back to my office and I said, ``How come if we keep voting to cut spending and they actually pass, the budget keeps going up?'' I realized that in Washington, unlike any place I have ever been before, they use what they call a baseline budget. They say this is what it cost this year, and to run the same level of service, if it cost $100 million this year, and it is going to run to the same level of service, we spend $105 million to run the same level of service. So then if you only appropriate and spend $103 million, Washington calls it a $2 million cut. If it costs $100 million and you spend $103 million, how can you call it a cut? It is a $3 million increase. The argument is you have more people and you have inflation, and so that is the baseline. Therefore, anything cut from the baseline is cut. I guess that is how you get these outrageous predictions that when we have voted on the budget that we have cut things like the earned income tax credit. This is a payment that goes to a working person who pays no taxes because they do not make enough to pay taxes, so they actually get money from the Federal Government. The earned income tax credit was a program that was really inaugurated by Republicans but then expanded by Democrats, and the program is simply at a point where it will become the largest entitlement if we do not slow its growth. So we are allowing the program to grow from $19.9 billion in the last year to, in 2002, 6 years from now, $25.4 billion. That is referred to as a cut, and yet it is going from $19.9 billion to $25.4 billion. Only in Washington when you spend that much more money do people call it a cut. The school lunch program, remembering the President and legislative leaders on the other side of the aisle literally going to schools, telling kids that they are going to lose their school lunch program because of what this new majority was doing in Congress. Yet when I look at that program, it is growing from $5.2 to $6.8 billion in the seventh year. Only in Washington when you go from $5.2 billion to $6.8 billion do people call it a cut. It is not a cut, it is a significant increase in spending. Admittedly it is not growing at 5.2 percent, it is growing at 4.5 percent. Then we are allowing States to reallocate 20 percent of that money for other programs dealing with food for Kids. The student loan program, I was outraged when I heard Republicans were going to cut the student loan program, because, I mean, that is what the President said and the President would be, it seems to me, wanting to be accurate in his statement. When I questioned my own colleagues, I wrestled with the fact that the student loan program last year was $24.5 billion. In the seventh year, in 2002, the year we balance our budget, it grows to $36.4 billion. That is a $12 billion increase, $12 billion on top of the $24 billion spent last year, a 50- percent increase in the student loan program We are still allowing students to borrow up to $49,000. The average loan will still be $17,000. What did we originally attempt to do? When a student graduates, they are given a grace period of 6 months before they have to start paying back the loan. The Federal Government, the taxpayers, men and women who work who pay money into this general fund of the Federal Government, were paying and are paying the interest from graduation to that first 6 months. Our proposal was that you simply take that period of 6 months and you say that student pays the interest, and we amortize it during the 10 years that the student is allowed to pay back the loan. In some cases they are given more than 10 years, but 10 years tends to be the average. So we are saying that a student will have to pay the interest from graduation to the first 6 months, and no longer it will be the taxpayers. Believe it or not, we save in the 7 years about $4 billion doing that, close to it. Now, what did it amount to in terms of the student costs? Because we amortized it during that 10-year period, it amounts to about $9 more for the average $17,000 loan. Nine dollars more is the cost of a pizza. It is also the cost of a move and the most inexpensive soda. I have no trouble whatsoever telling the student who has borrowed money from the Federal Government at lower interest rates that they are going to pay $9 more a month in order to save $4 billion for the taxpayers of this country. So we are increasing the student loan 50 percent, not cutting it; increasing it. The Medicaid program, which is health care for the poor and nursing care for the elderly poor, it is growing under our plan this last year $89 billion to $127 billion. Only in Washington when you go from $89 billion to $127 billion do people call it a cut. It is not a cut. It is a significant, almost a gigantic increase in spending funded by the taxpayers. Medicare is going to grow from $178 billion, which it was this last year, to $289 billion, over $100 billion more spent in the seventh year than spent today. We will be spending 60 percent more in the course of the seventh year to what it was last year, and people say, well, that is 60 percent more. But you have all of these elderly people who are growing into the system. It is accurate we do have more elderly, but on a per elderly, it is going to grow 49 percent, going to grow from $4,800 to $7,100 per beneficiary. What we are doing with Medicare? We are going to save $270 billion, that number, by the Congressional Budget Office, was moved to $240 billion. The President called it a cut. We viewed it as a savings, particularly since we knew we were going to spend more each and every year. I mean $4,800 per beneficiary. Per senior, the $7,100 is a significant increase, not a cut, a significant increase, a 50 percent of 49 percent increase per beneficiary in the seventh year. But referred to as a cut. I was trying to wrestle with this idea how the President and others and my colleagues on the other side of the aisle could call it a cut, and it would be like if my daughter was able, if we were able to afford it, we told our daughter that she could buy a new automobile, she could buy a Taurus automobile for $20,000 retail price and the dealership A sold it for $20,000 and dealership B sold it for $17,000 for the same automobile instead of 20. I would hardly tell her that the $20,000 we gave her to spend that she was foolish and irresponsible because she saved $3,000 buying the same automobile. Now like in the argument that she could buy this automobile for $20,000 in one dealer and buy a better automobile, one that had a sunroof and had a few extra points, a better engine, other features to it, and if she bought it for 17, I would hardly say that she cut the program, that she was foolishly saving but not saving, cutting, when she was doing what I would hope any rational person would do, get a better program and spend less to do it. Now, how could we possibly say that by saving $270 billion we are or $240 billion later, scored by the Congressional Budget Office, we are getting a better program? That on the face of it seemed like it looked too good to be true. I think most seniors could answer why it is true. There is not a senior, not a senior who cannot describe the extraordinary fraud in some cases, and the outrageous abuses we see in this program. It is a great program, but it is a very, very wasteful program. We look to save money. We save $240 billion in Medicare by not increasing the copayments on seniors. Maybe we should have, but we did not. Not increasing the deductible, maybe we should have. We did not. Not increasing the premium on seniors, we kept it at 31.5 percent. Now, 31.5 percent of the premium, that is on Medicare part B, is going to cost more each year because 31.5 percent, as health care costs go up, that premium will cost more the taxpayer, though, is still going to pay 68.5 percent. That tax revenue is coming out of general funds. We have Medicare part A, which is the hospital program, and we have Medicare Part B, the health care services, all the equipment, all the doctors costs, all the other costs associated with serving health care, non- hospital costs. Now, what we learned last year and actually in the years before, we were being told, not listening, this Congress is the first Congress that said we are going to do something about it, we learned that Medicare was going to go bankrupt, insolvent, starting this year, according to the trustees, five of whom are the President's appointees, and we learned that, in fact, this was going to happen. So what we looked to do is to save money in the Medicare part A trust fund and save money in the Medicare part B trust fund. We looked to do that so the program would not go bankrupt. What we then found out is last year, instead of $4 billion more going into the fund than going out, in Medicare part A, did not happen. In fact, $36 million more went out than went in; $36 million in this program is not gigantic, but we were supposed to have $4 billion more coming into the program, which did not. I mean that sets off alarm bells to any rational person. That says, my gosh, this fund is going insolvent 1 year sooner than we were told and by $4 billion more than we expected that it would happen. What did we do then? We did not increase the copayment. We did not increase the deductible. We did not increase the premium. We left it at 31.5 percent. What did we do? We said the wealthier, if you made more than $125,000, would have to pay all of Medicare part B, not just 31.5 percent, all of it. It is still the best deal in the world for seniors. But if you make $125,000, that is not well known, Republicans do not like the wealthy to know we want them to pay more, I guess it is not the Republican thing. I am hard-pressed to know why Democrats clearly do not want people to know Republicans are asking the wealthier to pay more, because Democrats like to tell people the Republicans just want to help the wealthy and hurt the poor. That is simply not true. But that is what they like to say. So Democrats are not sharing that the wealthier are paying more and Republicans are not making that point either. The fact is if you make over $125,000 of taxable income, you will pay all of Medicare part B. That gives us $9 billion more of our $244 billion savings. Where do we find the biggest savings? The biggest savings is not we slow the growth of payments to doctors and hospitals, which we do, not as much as the President, but we do, the biggest savings is that we allow seniors for the first time to have choice in Medicare. Why would that save money? Because the Federal Government does such a pathetic job of controlling the growth of these programs that there is just simply a lot of opportunity to save. Now, we are allowing private sector, the private sector to get involved. When the private sector gets involved, they cannot say you are going to get less than you are going to under Medicare part B, they cannot say that because they are not allowed to have that happen. They have to provide the same level of service or better. The fact remains, if they cannot offer anything less and charge less, they have to attract seniors. The way they attract seniors is they say we will give you eye care, dental care, we will give you prescription care, costs of helping pay prescription drugs. They will also in some cases say we will rebate the copay or deductible, maybe we will pay the Medigap. That is the difference between what Medicare pays and what the beneficiary has to pay. Quite often they want to shield themselves from any costs, so they simply buy a Medigap program. There will be some private sector groups that will come in and do all of the above or part of the above, but they will make it less expensive than it is for a senior today. Now, seniors can stay in the old system. They can stay in the fee- for-service. They can get Medicare just as they have gotten it. They do not have to leave. If they leave and they do not like the program, they do not like the program, what they do, they leave, they have the opportunity to go right back into the private care model. They have the opportunity to go right back every 30 days for the next 24 months. A senior who moves into private care who does not like it, maybe does not like the doctors, does not like the program, does not feel they are getting the kind of care they want, does not think the Medigap coverage or the dental care, prescription care, warrants their leaving their fee-for-service, they can go right back into the traditional fee-for- service system. It is amazing, but the plan saves an extraordinary amount of money because the private sector simply is going to police the system better than the Government sector does. Now, I chair the Medicare task force and Medicaid task force for the Committee on the Budget. I am also chairing the Human Resource Committee that oversees the Department of HHS. We oversee HUD, Labor, Education, and Veterans Affairs, but we also oversee HHS, Health and Human Services. That means we oversee FDA, HCFA, which is the Health Care Administration, that basically handles Medicare programs. We oversee the Centers for Disease Control. We have looked into the Medicaid program, the Medicare program. It is astounding to know that we have contracted out to private carriers simply to police the system, but we do not give them any incentives to do it right. Basically, the carriers do not have the bottom line kind of ability in a bill that is presented on Medicare, if a doctor takes care of someone's broken or sprained ankle, and they do a chest x-ray, which is clearly not related to the sprained ankle, they can submit the bill and know it is likely it will be paid, even though it should not be paid, because HCFA does not require any more than 5 percent of the bills to be checked and only less than 1 percent, less than 1 percent of all the dollar amounts of bills to be checked. So what has the GAO told us, the Government Accounting Office, what have the inspectors general told us? They said, if there was a basic auto-adjudicated system, with software to kick out these inappropriate bills, the Federal Government would save about a half a billion dollars. Well, that is your government at work. The Government, your government at work chooses not to save a half a billion dollars. The Government has set up a Byzantine system of changing the purchase of health care products. We know that the Veterans' Administration is able to buy a particular product that Medicare pays, and for the last 4 years has paid $4 billion more than the Veterans' Administration pays for that same product. In other words, if we paid the same price for what the Veterans' Administration pays for that particular product, the Federal Government, the taxpayers, would have saved over $4 billion. I can go on. I mean, why is it that men under Medicaid are sometimes, and Medicare, Medicare particularly, why would they have been charged for giving birth. It is humanly impossible, but it happens. And we go on and on. I mean I had in one of my community meetings, I always have people come up and tell me the outrageous bills that they get. One of them was a nurse, and she said she knew health care services, she knew that this bill was incorrect. She had looked at it, knew it was incorrect, and went to the hospital. The hospital said, well, we are not properly paid by Medicare, so we have to find other bills in order to get what we think we are properly due. It is why doctors sometimes go into nursing homes, poke their head in a window, Emily, how are you doing, John, how are you doing? They see 15 people in 15 minutes, and they are able to make out like bandits. I mean I can go on and on. One of the ways we save in our Medicare plan is that we make health care a Federal offense, finally we prevent people from going State to State. We are going to save billions of dollars by finally getting tough, finally in a Federal way against abuse in Medicare. Now, there is lots I could deal with and talk about as I yield the floor. I do not want to just make mention of a few more issues. I know this looks like a food fight to a lot of people. Republicans and Democrats on the floor yell at each other. I am not proud of that. We look like Little League deciding who is safe at second. In fact, we probably are doing a disservice to Little League to say we look like Little League. They might take issue at that. We are pretty childish at times. I guess my point to this Chamber, to put it on the record, is that this is not a food fight. It is an epic battle about what kind of country we are going to become. I look and think of what we have done, allowing the Federal debt since the Vietnam War to go from $430 billion to now $4,900 billion. In 22 years, in 22 years, we have allowed the Federal debt to increase ten-fold. That is during the time of peace. It is not during a time of war when you just spend whatever you have to spend and then you pray that you will succeed in your battle against, in this case, Hitler's Germany. We just spent what we had to and we ended up with a sizable debt. But since the Vietnam war we have allowed the debt to increase ten- fold, ten-fold in 22 years. I think of what I like to think of myself, as a historian, I certainly would appreciate it, that was my college degree in American history. I think of how historians graded the Congress after the death of Lincoln, the Reconstruction Congresses. It is not a proud time in our history, the time after the Civil War. I think that historians will look at the Congresses over the last 22 years, and even the White House of both parties, and say this was not our proudest moment. I think I am being kind. I think they will say it was one of the darkest times in our history, when we have literally been willing to mortgage our children's future for present-day expenses. I do not think that when historians will look at what we have done in Congress, in the White House, and, candidly, I think historians will be not complementary even of the American people, because the American people, as much as they may feel they are not part of this process, they are very much a part of it. I would have liked to have shut down the Government after Thanksgiving break and not open it up. I was on the losing side in my own conference. I think it was a mistake to open the Government until we balanced the budget. I regret dearly that we did. I think it is a mistake to vote out increasing the national debt until we come to grips with the balancing the budget. I prayed that Congresses of earlier years and the White House of earlier years would have, at least one of them, would say no more, we are not going to allow these deficits to continue. We are not going to mortgage our children's future. We care to leave this country better than we found it. If only 10 years ago a Congress or White House, one of them had said no more, we are not going to allow this to continue. So I say well, you know, it did not happen. We are not going to shut down the Government I do not suspect. We crossed that line, and I guess we will just continue working day by day until the White House and Congress come to grips. We need to have an agreement, but it cannot be a superficial one. It has got to be a substantive agreement. How did I start this special order? I started this special order by pointing out that 50 percent of our budget are entitlements. Fifty percent of our budget. We do not vote on them, they are on automatic pilot. Only one-third of the budget is what we vote on, the 13 different budget items. Congress has the upper hand in the negotiations with the President on appropriations. He vetoes a budget, the Government shuts down. That is not good necessarily for us or the President, but it calls the question. And it is certainly not something Federal employees wanted. They are caught in the middle. But it is much bigger than Federal employees. It is whether we are going to finally come to grips with the budget. When the President vetoes entitlements like he did, when he vetoed our balanced budget bill, when we wanted to reform Medicare and Medicaid and welfare, what did we end up with? Not nothing. We ended up with what exists, the automatic pilot, what is existing law. So for Congress to simply cave in and allow the President to allow and force us to spend more on appropriations without a corresponding change in entitlements would be very foolish and irresponsible, in my judgment. I learned a great term when I was in graduate school when I was getting my MBA and MPA and majoring in economics, a concept I wish I had learned earlier. It is called opportunity costs. If you spend money here, you give up the money to spend it here. If you spend money here, you give up the opportunity to spend it here. If you spend some money here, you can maybe spend some money here. But you give up opportunities, depending on how much you spend. Our entitlements are growing at 10, 11, 12 percent. If we do not get a handle on the growth of Medicare and Medicaid, if we cannot slow Medicare and Medicaid to about 7 percent a year, and prevent them from growing at 9, 10, 11 percent, if they go up at 9, 10, 11 percent, then the appropriations part of our budget is going to be continuing to be squeezed and squeezed and squeezed. Our need to help our young children dealing with teenage pregnancies, a whole host of things I think are necessary, are simply not going to be able to be funded, if we just allow entitlements to grow and grow and grow. I know a number of good Members in both the House and Senate are quitting. They say this is not a fun place anymore. I am hard pressed. I have been here 7 years and I love this job, and I have never felt I have been critical of serving in Washington. I love Washington. I love this opportunity. I mean, this Congress was formed by our Founding Fathers in the Constitution of the United States. I mean, I look at this flag with great reverence. I look at the Constitution with great reverence, and I look at what the Constitution did. It established a Congress, it established a Senate, it established a White House, and they knew there would be times we have disagreements. Our Founding Fathers knew that sometimes it might even look like kids, but they knew that ultimately we would have a system to resolve our differences. So I just ask the American people to see beyond just this debate that seems to not be as substantive as they want, and look for the fact that this truly is an epic battle. I would encourage some of my colleagues who are quitting and not running again because they say this is not a fun place to level with the American people and acknowledge this really has never been a fun place. It has been an important place, but not a fun place. Candidly, I am not so sure it matters whether it is a fun place anymore. I am not even certain that the issue of whether we are always civil to each other is an overriding issue. It is not pretty to look at, and I regret it and like to think I am not a part of that kind of dialog. But when I see some of the people I have admired over the years quitting, and I admit I do not walk in their shoes, their moccasins, I do not know what their life experiences are, but it seems to me on the outside looking in on what they are doing, that they really were part of a Congress over the years that allowed us to get in the mess we are in. We are in this mess, and it is very serious, and it requires a lot of heavy lifting. We have got to confront the seniors, we have got to confront the young, we have got to confront the rich and poor, and we have got to come to solutions to our problems. It is a very contentious time. My take on their leaving, not to be unkind, is that simply that now that the difficulties are here, now that we are clawing to get out of the deep hole we find ourselves in, they are quitting. They are quitting when it is tough. They helped get us in this mess, and, frankly, I think they should stay to help get us out of this mess. When I hear a colleague say, ``Well, now that I am not running again, I can really be honest with the American people,'' I am thinking to myself, why were you not honest when you were running? Tell the American people the truth. They are going to have you do the right thing. Tell the American people things that just simply do not add up, and they are going to give you confused messages. So I think it is a shame they just did not tell them the truth while they were candidates. If they told the American people the truth, I do not think we would be in the mess we are in today. Mr. Speaker, with that, I have a sense you were not sure that this was going to be as long a time as it has turned out to be, and I notice a colleague on the other side of the aisle, so you will probably be here a little longer than you wanted, but I thank you for giving me this opportunity.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. There will be no money for any department, and any grant and any program for those departments according to Senator Kerrey.

Mr. SHAYS. If the gentleman would yield, just to close the loop on both programs, the bottom line to our Medicare plan is we do not increase copayments, we do not increase deductibles, we allow the premium to stay at 31.5 percent, we provide choice. It is true, we ask the wealthiest of wealthy to pay a higher part for the premium for part B. I think sometimes Republicans do not like people to know we are asking the wealthy to pay more, and Democrats do not want people to know Republicans are asking the wealthier to pay more, but we are in that instance, and that makes sense. Most importantly, we are allowing for choice in the program and providing for the kind of innovation you and others have talked about. In this way we are trying to work to save the program from bankruptcy and to make sure it can continue for future generations.

Mr. SHAYS. If we can end with Mr. Rabin's quote that, ``The politician is elected by the adults to represent the children.''

Mr. SHAYS. We actually have 10 programs we can choose and then variations within those programs, so we have lots of choice and we want seniors to have that same choice.

Mr. SHAYS. I thank the gentleman. I remember the first day when we started this new Congress, and the gentleman basically introduced the Congressional Accountability Act, getting Congress under all the laws that we impose on the rest of the country, to the Congress. This was his first act on his first day as a freshman. The gentleman and his colleagues, other Members who had just joined us, did such a wonderful job of introducing that bill, the rule and so on, and getting that bill passed. I think we Republicans and Democrats alike can take great satisfaction that we now are looking to be under all the laws we impose on the rest of the country, something that we had not been for the last 30 years. I have been wrestling with really what is concerning me most. I cannot really speak to what is in the President's budget or what is not. All I know is that when I was elected in 1987, the gentlemen all triggered that major point, that I voted on one-third of the budget. Gramm-Rudman, which dealt with what came out of the Appropriations Committee, the 13 budgets out of the Appropriations Committee, the defense budget which was equal to the other 12 appropriations bills, was what I voted on. Yet we tried to control the growth of spending by basically squeezing the annual votes on the appropriations bill. While we were doing that, we had Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, agricultural subsidies, and a whole host of what we call entitlements. You fit the title, you get the money. We do not vote on them, they are not sunsetted, they were growing at 10, 11, 12 percent. In fact Medicaid a few years grew at about 20 percent a year. They double every 5 to 6 years. Now they are 50 percent of the budget, and if we do not do anything by 2002, they will be about 65 percent of the budget. We really need to get a handle on it. The thing that concerns me I think more than anything, and I do not think that history will be kind to Congress over the last few years or the President over the last few years. I am candidly bringing in Republican Presidents as well. Republicans did not want to control the growth of defense and Democrats did not want to control the growth of entitlements, and they both agreed to just let things happen and ignore that we were creating these large deficits. But what I am most afraid of is, in the last 12 years since 1974, since the end of the Vietnam War, we have had our national debt grow from about $430 billion to $4,900 billion, a tenfold increase. So what do I think history is going to say about Congress and the White House? I think they are going to say there was a time when they basically decided to let their children and their children's children pay for the bill. Mr. Rabin, the former Prime Minister of Israel, pointed out on more than one occasion that the job of an elected official, they are elected by the adults but their job is to represent the children. That is really what this is all about: How do we save this country for future generations? How do we leave it better for future generations? What we attempted to do was get a handle, slow the growth of Medicare, slow the growth of Medicaid, allow those programs to grow and to meet all the needs that they have to meet. But if I could just conclude, I am constantly hearing in this place that we are cutting, and we are cutting some programs but not the ones that are identified. We are consolidating certain departments and agencies. We are eliminating some programs and discretionary spending, but the earned income tax credit, a program to help the working poor, that is growing from $19 billion to $25 billion. The school lunch program, which we were told we were cutting, is growing from $5.2 billion to $6.8 billion. The student loan program, that is the one that really gets me, it is growing from $24 billion to $36 billion, a 50 percent increase. Hardly a cut. Maybe in this place a cut, but anywhere else around the world it is known as a 50 percent increase. Just to end, Medicaid growing from $89 billion to $127 billion in the seventh year of our program; Medicare, $178 billion to $289 billion. Only in Washington when you spend so much more do people call it a cut. We are spending 60 percent more total amount on Medicare. Per beneficiary 49 percent more, from $4,800 to $7,100. I just hope that we keep the course, I hope we do not let up, I hope we try to get a handle on this budget for the future generations that ultimately would have to pay the bill if we do not.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. I am grateful to have this opportunity, Congresswoman Clayton, to participate in this very important dialog, and to salute you for your taking the leadership and making sure that we as a Congress begin to confront what is an extraordinarily serious problem for our country. I am here to salute you, to participate in this issue, and also to compliment and to praise the President for establishing the National Campaign to Reduce Teen Pregnancy. I know that you circulated a letter, which I would like to read later in this special order. But first to tell you that as someone who is chairing the Committee on Human Resources and Intergovernmental Relations, we are going to be having a hearing on this issue and will obviously be inviting you to help lead that off. It is incredible, the more I get into it, and candidly, I have not spent the kind of time that I should have, but to think that up to 1 million teenagers become pregnant in the United States, and that 85 percent of those pregnancies are unplanned and that the vast majority of mothers are simply unmarried, to think that teenage mothers are more likely to be impoverished, go on welfare and never finish school, to think what kind of future they have for themselves and the promise that they have for their children who they grow to love dearly. I think probably more than anything else in my own childhood, what I value the most was that my parents taught me to dream, but my dreams were realistic. I mean, I really felt I could meet those dreams. It is hard for me to understand how a pregnant teenager, a young 15-year-old or 14-year-old who is giving birth is able to think of dreams that get that individual, get her out of the welfare cycle and get her the opportunity to think of being able to live what the American dream is, to think of what it must be like for her children. I am stunned by the statistics that say that adult males are the fathers of approximately 66 percent of babies born to teenage girls. I am talking about adults impregnating young kids, the thought that, according to the U.S. New and World Report, that 65 percent of teenage mothers are unmarried, up from 48 percent in 1980 and that, most importantly, that 39 percent of 15-year-old mothers say the father of their babies are 20 years or older. Fifteen-year-old kids. I have a 16-year-old daughter, and it is hard for me to comprehend a 15-year-old daughter, and it is hard for me to comprehend a 15-year-old young girl describing the fact that nearly 40 percent of these young girls are saying that they were impregnated by 20-year-olds or older, and for 17-year-old mothers, 55 percent of the fathers are adults, and for 19-year-olds, 78 percent are the fathers, are adults who have been involved in this relationship. You sent a letter that you circulated, and hundreds of Members of Congress signed this letter, and I would love to read this letter for the Record. You drafted this letter to President Clinton. You said: ``Dear President Clinton, we write to applaud your efforts and those who have agreed to serve in the bipartisan National Campaign to Reduce Teenage Pregnancy. The mission of the National Campaign,'' quote, `to reduce teenage pregnancy by supporting values and stimulating actions that are consistent with a pregnancy-free adolescence is,' end of quote, ``one that each of us supports, and the goal to,'' quote, `reduce the teenage pregnancy rate by one-third by the year 2005' is one that each of us endorses.'' We are trying to reduce the pregnancy rate in the next 10 years by one-third. It seems to me obviously like a goal that all Americans could unite behind. You go on in your letter to say: ``The increase in out-of-wedlock childbearing is alarming. Even more alarming is the vicious cycle into which pregnant teenagers are thrust. The young women, as well as the young men, who become teen parents have few expectations, few ties to community institutions, few adult mentors and role models, and little hope. Many live in communities where crime and drug use are common and where dropping out of school and chronic unemployment are even more common. This is a very costly human burden for our society.'' You then go on to say: ``In addition, teenage pregnancies cause a heavy burden on the federal budget, especially Medicaid funds, one of the elements of the budget that is spiraling. Food stamps and AFDC funds are also taxed by these young people is the dawn of their lives. Indeed, teen pregnancy is a strong predictor of a new generation of disadvantaged. As poverty is the most accurate predictor of teen pregnancy, teen pregnancy is a near certain predictor of poverty.'' Your letter then goes on in three more paragraphs: ``We believe the approach to this problem that will be undertaken by the National Campaign is correct. It is critical that this Nation first take a clear stand against teen pregnancy and, in doing so, attract the interest of more national leaders and organizations. Enlisting the support of the national media in supporting and stimulating State and local action are necessary steps in the effort to reduce teen pregnancy. These and other activities will help to foster a national discussion about how religion, culture, and public values influence both teen pregnancy and the responses to this dilemma. But most importantly we believe the intent of the National Campaign to strengthen the knowledge base, to educate, will be invaluable.'' And your last paragraph: ``The National Campaign to Reduce Teenage Pregnancy should not be bound by politics, party or philosophy. The situation is urgent. By our endorsement of this letter, please note that we stand behind you in the National Campaign. The goal is ambitious, but it is within our reach.'' And I would just salute the President for his establishment of this committee, the appointment of Dr. Henry W. Foster, Jr., as the senior adviser. He will be coming before our committee to begin that hearing, and we are grateful for his participation and for the nonpartisan approach which the President took in naming former Senator Warren Rudman, a Republican from New Hampshire, the former New Jersey Governor, Thomas Kean, a Republican from New Jersey, obviously, and the former Surgeon General, Everett Koop, actress Whoopi Goldberg, MTV President Judy McGrath, chairman of the executive committee of the Washington Post, Katherine Graham. I mean this is a distinguished committee and one which I salute the President for forming. And again, I thank you for giving me the opportunity to, one, take a stand on this issue, to announce that our committee, because of your work and the work of others, will be holding hearings to alert the Nation of this nearly desperate problem and to hope that we, as American citizens, can do a better job of helping to have our young kids, our young kids, have dreams and hopes and to let them know that they can always be parents, they can always have a child. They just do not need to have a child when they are in school. They can grow to lead blessed lives, and they can grow to mature as individuals before they then try to help a young person grow as well. Kids raising kids is kind of insane, and it is, I think, that history will look back on our generation, look back on Congress, look back on the White House, not just this White House and this Congress, but for the last few years and the last few presidencies, and say we were really asleep when we should have been awake. I thank you for this opportunity.

Mr. SHAYS. I look forward to working with you and other Members of Congress.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. I just would like to thank both of you. You claimed the time, and I thank the gentleman from Maine for doing that and just say that we do live in the greatest country in the world, and we are going to save it. I mean, we are not going to listen to polls. The polls are not going to guide us. We are going to do the right thing. If Abraham Lincoln had listened to polls, we would not be one Nation under God, indivisible. We would be two nations very much divided. We are going to stay one Nation, and we are going to pursue this.

Mr. SHAYS. So what is the bottom line?

Mr. SHAYS. The point is we are not blaming parties. But now we have a chance.

Mr. SHAYS. You mean while we were running to get over here, when you took over the floor?

Mr. SHAYS. In fact, it has gotten much worse.

Mr. SHAYS. What was this legislation intended to do?

Mr. SHAYS. It is more process-oriented?

Mr. SHAYS. If you had three children you would get $1,500. It is important to point out, we did not just have a tax cut without paying for it. The way we pay for it is cut government spending or slow the growth of some programs in order to afford to reduce taxes by probably about $180 billion by the time we ultimately have an agreement with the President. If we do, it is in that range, we want it about $240. That $140 billion was paid for by reducing government more so we could afford that tax cut. The thing that just simply amazes me is we have some of our colleagues who say, ``I want to balance the budget, but I do not want a tax cut for the wealthy,'' quote unquote. The irony of that is that our $500 tax credit is going to families who make less than $75,000. That is the bulk of our tax cut. They are hardly wealthy people. But they say they do not want that, as if they want to balance the budget. The crazy thing is they want to still balance the budget in 7 years without a tax cut, so it means that they are going to spend the money that we save for a tax cut, they are going to take and spend it for more government. So they are not balancing the budget any sooner. They are just making government larger than we would make it.

Mr. SHAYS. Really what the gentleman is describing, if the gentleman will yield, he is describing a situation where people think we have a revenue problem, and we know that we have a spending problem. Revenue keeps going up every year. It is just that our spending is going up by a greater amount.

Mr. SHAYS. If the gentleman will yield, this is just an exact circumstance. When I was first elected in 1987 I kept hearing that we were cutting spending, and we actually had bills that said we were cutting spending. I would go back to my district and say, ``We cut so much.'' At one community meeting someone said, ``Young man,'' and I was younger then, ``how come the budget keeps going up?'' A good question. I went back to my office, and we learned about this amazing thing that started to happen in 1974, which was called baseline budgeting. We spent $100 billion this year, and then they said it would cost to run the same level of service $105 billion and Congress spent $103 billion, and they would call that a $2 billion cut, even though we were spending $3 billion more. One of the things I hope we do in this special order is to really just talk about where are we cutting, where are we freezing, and where are we allowing growth to continue to grow, quite frankly, at a significant rate. I know our colleague from Michigan, Mr. Smith, is here. I don't know if he wants to be on theme. If he is going to be on theme, we would welcome him to participate.