Providing for Consideration of H.R. 1874, Pro-Growth Budgeting Act of 2013; Providing for Consideration of H.R. 1871, Baseline Reform Act of 2013; And Providing for Consideration of H.R. 1872, Budget and Accounting Transparency Act of 2014

Floor Speech

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Mr. NUGENT. Thank you, Mr. Woodall. I certainly do appreciate it; and to my colleague from Florida on the other side of the aisle, once again, it is always a pleasure.

Mr. Speaker, only in Washington can politicians pat themselves on the back for cutting spending while actually increasing spending. That is a novel idea.

Say, for example, we spent $100 on a program 1 year. The next year, we automatically assume that we are going to spend $103 on that same program, due to inflation. If we only end up spending $102 versus the $103, according to official government accounting, we have cut spending, but we increased spending by $2.

In the real world--at least back home--you can't simultaneously cut spending while increasing spending and then say you cut spending. You can't do both. It is one or the other.

Families don't budget this way. Businesses don't budget this way. It would have made my life a whole lot easier as sheriff if my budget automatically increased 3 percent because of inflation that may or may not exist within the program.

If you change the baseline every year by inflation, no one has to justify what their increase is; but then, again, we live in this fantasy world called Washington, D.C. This is where we live today.

The fantasy is that we can spend more money than you take in, and it will all work out in the end. We can be $17 trillion in debt today, but don't worry about it because it will get better on its own.

How does it work? It doesn't work that way. Mr. Speaker, our current budget process is broken. By assuming automatic increases in spending, our system favors more and more spending without any accountability.

Under this scenario, programs don't receive a real examination as to whether or not they deserve the increases. They just get it anyway. Just because they exist, they get more money; not that they need it, not that they can show folks that they absolutely have to have it, we just get it.

As Chairman Ryan pointed out last night in the Rules Committee, our current budget process has not been significantly reformed since the Budget Control Act of 1974. That is 40 years ago. We haven't done a thing. Given our fiscal situation, it is about time we do something to try to get this on the right track.

I appreciate the committee's work, and I particularly appreciate Mr. Woodall's bill today. These are important steps to refine and reform the budget process.

You hear folks from the other side of the aisle say that these are gimmicks. Well, I will tell you that, back home, it is not a gimmick when I stand there and have to justify why I need more money in my budget as sheriff.

I had to stand there with the appropriators and say: Here are the reasons why I need more money; and by the way, here is what we have done with the money.

So we show that we have actually earned it, and the taxpayers can see that there was a reward at the end of the day and that they got what they paid for.

There is none of that up here. I sit in committee meetings, day in and day out, in regards to seeing money being spent by government. Nobody is held accountable. We give people five-digit bonuses, Mr. Speaker, for doing a lousy job, but that is the way government works. We reward mediocrity.

This budget idea, if enacted, actually reins that in and makes people accountable for the dollars they are given from the American public so they can say: Listen, we are not talking about it; we are doing it.

So to Mr. Woodall and to Mr. Ryan, I do appreciate all their hard work and what they have done and where they are trying to move this process forward.

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