Top Economic Adviser Says Outsourcing of Jobs a Good Thing

TOP ECONOMIC ADVISER SAYS OUTSOURCING OF JOBS A GOOD THING -- (House of Representatives - February 10, 2004)

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur) is recognized for 5 minutes.

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I would like to follow up on the remarks of my colleague, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Brown), about the unbelievable report that this White House has produced in which the President's top economic adviser, not an intern who is studying for a master's degree or a bachelor's degree, his top economic adviser says, "Outsourcing of jobs is just a new way of doing international trade. And that's a good thing."
Well, coming from the State of Ohio, I would like to say to this President, bring 'em on. Come right over to us.
The day after the State of the Union address, the President flew and landed in Toledo, Ohio, my home district, a State in which hundreds of thousands of people are out of work, with people where he has cut off their unemployment benefits and has not extended them. They cannot find jobs. There are people in my church who stopped looking. They do not know where else to go.

We have some jobs available to work in our primary election March 2, and I have been telling people to at least apply at the Board of Elections to work for $85 a day. At least it is one day's wages. The job scene out there is really rough, and it is extraordinarily rough in the State of Ohio.

The day after the President left, the unemployment rate in Ohio ticked up. Then last week, just a few days after he left, another plant closure was announced in Sandusky, Ohio. The little Dixie Cups, everybody knows Dixie Cups, 207 more people permanently out of work, people who have families to support, people who depend on their check, people who depend on their health benefits and people who depend on the retirement benefits that they had worked so hard for, some for as many as 30 years.

What is going on in this great land?

I turned the news on the other night. Domino Sugar in New York City, closing down. The yellow and white bags have been a fixture in our family since I was a little kid and learned how to bake from my grandmother. Gone.
Just north of the line of where I live in the State of Ohio, Electrolux up in Greenville, Michigan, 2,700 jobs permanently gone, closed down.

What is happening under this presidency? Nearly 3 million manufacturing jobs out the window, and the President's top adviser in a written report says that the movement of American factory jobs, along with white collar work, is a good thing.

Where do these people live? You know what? I have a hunch most of them are the privileged children of privileged parents. They do not have any idea of what struggle is really about. And the rest of us who think we know something about struggle have to be polite, we have to be refined, we have to have upper-class and middle-class behavior, when you really want to take the people who took your jobs and level them.

That is what it feels like when you lose everything, when people in your district lose their health benefits.
A company in my district called Pilkington was promised that their health benefits would be there in their retirement years. Now they are being charged $170 more a month for their health benefits. I talked to some of these folks over the weekend, 80-years-old, 84-years-old. Their hands shake. Promises were not kept.

I would say to the President of the United States, it wold have been a good thing had he ever had to work for a living. If he had, his chief economic adviser would not have prepared a report which was in the L.A. Times and the headline read, "Bush Supports Shift of Jobs Overseas." The Seattle Times says, "Bush Report Sending Jobs Overseas Helps the United States." In the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, a city that knows a whole lot about outsourcing, "Bush Economic Report Praises 'Outsourcing' Jobs." And way down in Florida, the Orlando Sentinel, "Bush Says Sending Jobs Abroad Can Be Beneficial."

I would tell my colleagues whose job I would like to send abroad, and we have about 7 or 8 more months to do it. I would really like to see any President who says this to the people of Ohio carry a single vote in our State.
Mr. Speaker, I really am very proud to be a Member of this Congress, and I try to be a voice for the people who have been so adversely affected. I urge every American who is out of work and everyone who is worried about their jobs being outsourced to register to vote, vote in your primaries, vote in the general election on November 2. Let us change the direction of this Nation once and for all.