Concurrent Resolution On The Budget For Fiscal Year 2008
Floor Speech
CONCURRENT RESOLUTION ON THE BUDGET FOR FISCAL YEAR 2008 -- (House of Representatives - May 08, 2007)
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Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
I think it's important to put up a chart so we will know who's saying what about fiscal responsibility, because this chart shows what happened in the nineties when, with President Clinton's veto vetoing Republican bills after the Democrats set the budget off in the right direction, we were able to create a surplus that when this administration came in in 2001, we had a projected $5.5 trillion surplus. As a result of Republican initiatives, that surplus looks like it's going to come in, a 10-year surplus, at about a $3 trillion deficit, a swing of $8.5 trillion. And to put that in perspective, we've spent about $500 billion in Iraq; $8.5 trillion deterioration of the budget, $500 billion in Iraq, that is $0.5 trillion; $8.5 trillion deterioration, $0.5 trillion attributable to the war. And the Democratic budget, again, responsibly digs us out of this mess.
The important thing to note is, we talk about 9/11. We were broke. We spent the surplus, other than Social Security and Medicare, before 9/11. So you can't blame 9/11 for the fiscal decline that has happened here.
This budget is responsible. It shows how we can dig ourselves out. Unfortunately, we have, first of all, no leadership from the White House. Even the Republican budget pretty much ignores the President's budget. The President's budget had us in a ditch, never coming into surplus. At least the Republican budget has us coming out of the deficit and into surplus in 2012, but it does it in such a way that is not responsible and not predictable.
The Republicans' budget assumes that we're going to whack about $250 billion out of Medicare and Medicaid, about $250 billion cut out of health care. This is at a time when doctors are telling us now that they can't absorb the cuts. We are having situations now when States are not paying dentists enough for dentists to even take Medicaid. $250 billion cut. It's not going to happen. We're not going to go into surplus under the Republican budget.
The main factor that we have to look at is, who's talking? The Democrats dug us out of the ditch; Republicans put us back in the ditch; and the Democrats are digging us out again with a responsible budget. The Republicans have a budget that is so draconian on health care that 40 Republicans even voted against the Republican budget.
And so we have a responsible plan. Let's stick with the responsible plan, dig us out of the mess again, and have fiscal responsibility.
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Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, PAYGO is a very simple concept. If you are going to increase spending, you pay for it. If you are going to cut taxes, you pay for it. You don't go into the ditch. If you have a tax cut, you have to pay for it either with increases of other taxes or spending cuts to pay for it. If you have spending increases, you have to pay for it with cutting spending somewhere else or increasing taxes to pay for it. It is a very simple concept.
Mr. RYAN of Wisconsin. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin.
Mr. RYAN of Wisconsin. If you are going to reduce taxes, you have to pay for it by either raising taxes or cutting spending. That is what your PAYGO is, correct?
Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. That is correct.
Mr. RYAN of Wisconsin. Well, you are violating it if you accept this amendment then.
Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. That is the concept, and that is how we got out of the ditch that we got into. If you build up a surplus, then you have something to spend. That is consistent with PAYGO.
But the point is that we got out of the ditch with fiscal responsibility, and as soon as 2001 came along, you let PAYGO expire, passed tax cuts that we couldn't afford and put us right back into the ditch. The fact is that the only way the Republican budget makes any sense is if you have $250 billion in cuts, mostly in Medicare and Medicaid, at a time when we can't even afford the cuts that are already in effect.
To put that $250 billion in context, there are plans out there, including the All Healthy Children Act, which can cover all children with healthcare for $15 billion a year. You are talking about cutting healthcare $250 billion. Obviously, you are not going to do it and so obviously the budget is not realistic.
But what are your priorities? Tax cuts that we can't afford at a time when we need to cover children? We can't even afford the Medicaid program we have got now. In most States, you can't find a dentist because the reimbursement rates aren't high enough, and here we are cutting Medicare and Medicaid $250 billion.
Mr. Speaker, I would hope that we would adopt the Democratic budget and reject the motion to recommit, because it requires us to assume $250 billion in cuts that we are not going to make. We have a responsible budget. It digs us out of the ditch that the Republicans put us in starting in 2001.
I would hope again we would reject the motion and adopt the Democratic budget as we passed it in the House.
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Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I think it is important to note that when you talk about average tax cuts, this is an average $250 a family tax cut, average $250 for a family of four. But you notice who gets it? This is involving personal exemptions and standard deductions.
If you make a $1 million, $17,000; $650 if you make $200,000 to $1 million; $11 if you make $100,000 to $200,000; if you make less than $100,000, you get on average of zero.
This is what you call an average $250 a family tax cut.
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