Nancy L. Johnson: “certainly it is the tradition of the Congress that going to conference is a time when House Members and Members of the…”

“certainly it is the tradition of the Congress that going to conference is a time when House Members and Members of the other body think together anew about legislation, and the best ideas from both sides are merged. So, there is no doubt in my mind that what comes out of conference will be a bill we will all be proud of. I do want to go back to something that my friend from New York said, and that is jobs; what are we going to do if there are no jobs? And why do all these religious groups oppose the bill? Well, I would say to my colleagues that welfare reform is not just about welfare. Welfare reform is about system change in America. Those groups do not understand that. They do not see the possibilities. I think we are missing the understanding of the new opportunities this bill creates. For example, it has always been unfair for local taxpayers, and we know how terribly, terribly stressed people are at the level of local property taxes. Those people are paying their local government people, and they are participating in paying welfare benefits. Through attrition, without anybody who is employed losing their job, there is not any level of government that cannot open up entry-level jobs for welfare recipients so right off the bat they get real wages for real work. They make contacts and then the local governments can use that money to up the salaries of some of their people to do supervision and to do coordination.”