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Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Madam Chair, we must acknowledge that passing a continuing resolution will do nothing to create jobs. We are stuck with an unemployment rate of 9 percent and have left the long-term unemployed who have exhausted their unemployment benefits out in the cold.
Representative Lee's amendment makes it clear that some of us have not forgotten about these individuals and their families. The amendment will ensure that these hardworking Americans will have access to unemployment benefits during this historic economic recession. It's not only the right thing to do, but it will also help our economy.
Economists estimate that the U.S. economy grows by over $1.60 for every $1 the government spends on unemployment compensation because unemployed persons usually spend all of their benefits quickly. This $1.60 is in stark contrast to the 20 cents in economic activity generated by some of the tax cuts we passed last month. Put simply, unemployment compensation is one of the most efficient and effective ways to stimulate the economy. But extending benefits is only one part of a comprehensive approach that is needed to get the long-term unemployed back to work.
Many of the Americans who have lost their jobs have lost jobs that are not coming back, jobs that have been shipped overseas or jobs that now require new skills. So while unemployment compensation is the temporary solution, we need to simultaneously be providing job training programs and educational training to help American workers develop the new in-demand skills. Unfortunately, this resolution actually cuts job training programs.
We face very difficult choices when it comes to the Federal budget, and there's no easy solution to solve our budget problems. When I first came to Congress in 1993, we considered a budget that put an end to fiscal recklessness. We passed a budget that, by the end of the 8 years of the Clinton administration, would not only have eliminated the deficit but had a projected surplus large enough to have paid off the entire national debt held by the public 2 years ago. That means we would have owed no money to Japan, China, and Saudi Arabia. That budget also led to record job growth, but it required tough choices; and in fact, dozens of Members who voted for that budget lost their seats in the next election.
In contrast, under the Bush administration, we passed popular but huge tax cuts without paying for them,
a prescription drug benefit without paying for it, a $700 billion bailout without paying for it, and cut taxes in the middle of two wars, all of which put us in the economic ditch. Now, in order to get the present deficits under control, we are going to have to make some tough choices. Unfortunately, at the end of last year, we made a move in the wrong direction when Congress passed a huge tax cut bill, at a total 2-year cost of $800 billion, without paying for it. To put that number in perspective, $800 billion exceeds the general fund budget of all 50 States. That's right. Add it up. If you add up all the general fund budgets of the 50 States, it comes up to a total of $650 billion, less than the cost of the $800 billion tax cut bill.
Before that bill was passed, many of us asked how we're going to pay for it, but nobody wanted to answer it. Everybody who supported the bill focused solely on the nice tax cuts. But now we're going to debate a long list of spending cuts in the proposed resolution to show how we're paying for it. The safety net is attacked: low-income energy assistance; Women, Infants and Children's nutrition; the health centers; housing; and investments in our future, like the National Science Foundation, NASA, Pell Grants, job training, clean water, high-speed rail. These are the things that we're cutting to pay for some of last year's tax cut bill. Now the American people are seeing how we're going to pay for it.
Last year we passed the tax cuts that gave great benefits to multimillionaires, and now we're paying for it by inflicting pain on vulnerable portions of our population. We can do better, and that's why we need to fight against these draconian cuts and programs that are so important to so many people and, instead, provide assistance where it helps not only individuals but helps the economy, as the Lee amendment does.
The American people deserve better than this resolution. We should support the Lee amendment but oppose the underlying legislation, and I urge my colleagues to do just that.
I yield back the balance of my time.
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