Mark Neumann: “The bill kicks out actually during the time of emergency and during the time of war, and remember, the bill says we have…”

“The bill kicks out actually during the time of emergency and during the time of war, and remember, the bill says we have to keep at least a 1 percent difference in this growth rate. There are going to be other times where it is more than a 1 percent gap; that is, spending is going to be going up much slower than the rate of revenue growth. We happen to be in one of those times right now. As a matter of fact, revenues to the Federal Government today are growing by 7.3 percent, and spending is only going up by 3.2 percent. There is a 4-point spread in there right now. This chart shows how it works with only a 1-point differential. So during the good times like those that we are in right now, I think we find a wider than 1 percent spread, and during those bad times the bill would kick out, because in all fairness, if we are in a war, I do not think we want this sort of thing restricting us, and if we went into some sort of a major recession, there may be a reason for the Government to actually spend more money. Today, that is not the case. Today, our economy is booming. There are job opportunities for people. We are seeing the welfare rolls decline with the welfare reform that went through a year ago. We are seeing a lot of good things happening in our country, but we do not want to tie our hands with this sort of legislation that we could not adjust in the event of an emergency.”