New Jobs for America Act of 2011

Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of H. Res. 72, which directs certain House committees to review the effect of Federal regulations on job creation and economic growth.

Last year, the Department of Education published a proposed regulation that sets a Federal definition of ``gainful employment'' and requires certain institutions of higher education to seek the Department's approval before creating new educational programs. This regulation will likely eliminate hundreds of course offerings and degree-granting programs at proprietary and nonprofit institutions of higher education, preventing students from having access to these programs and, often, to careers that will ensure that the United States remains competitive.

Access and affordability remain important pieces of the higher education discussion. As voters resoundingly underscored in November, the Federal Government should be focused on accountability for taxpayer money, but that responsibility should not come at the expense of educational opportunities for students.

Thomas Donohue, the president and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, in a recent speech on the ``State of American Business,'' listed the gainful employment regulation as a prime example of Federal overreach. He pointed out that, if permitted to become final, the regulation would deny students access to colleges and universities across the country.

Fewer students receiving the education and gaining the skills necessary to get a high-skilled, high-paying job means fewer people entering the workforce. While the proprietary school sector is a diverse group of institutions, many of these colleges and universities serve individuals who are looking for short-term education or seeking certifications that can be obtained in a year or less. These are exactly the types of educational programs that provide individuals with new skills that can immediately be put to use in today's dynamic workplace.

One of the many benefits of the proprietary school sector is its ability to create quickly new programs to train students to help the local population meet the labor shortages of a particular area. Many of these institutions have advisory boards composed of key business leaders in the program areas offered by the institution. The proposed gainful employment regulation will take away that flexibility by requiring the Federal Government's approval for every new program created at a proprietary institution.

While we can all agree that we do not want bad programs to exist, this regulation paints an entire sector of higher education with the same brush and does nothing to give incentives to institutions to improve their student outcomes. This regulation could also have a disproportionate impact on programs that serve low-income students who may need to borrow more funding under Federal student loan programs to pay for their education.

In either case, colleges and universities will have difficulty enrolling students into educational courses that prepare them for careers. The gainful employment regulation is the exact opposite of what the Federal Government needs to be pushing during an economic downturn.

Mr. Speaker, as a former small business owner and steadfast advocate of government accountability, it is a pleasure to speak today recognizing the important work that must be done to reduce the economic, job-crushing harm imposed by Federal overregulation.

As the economy struggles to recover and so many Americans remain jobless, it is critical that Congress takes immediate action to reduce waste and free up capital to unleash the job creating potential of small businesses and other private sector employers.

The need to improve government transparency and accountability motivated me to author bipartisan legislation, H.R. 373, the Unfunded Mandates Information and Transparency Act, which would expand cost estimate reporting requirements and close loopholes that have been used to leave the public unaware of the full impact of Federal mandates.

It is important to understand the real-world impact of overly burdensome Federal regulations that are acting as a boot to the throat of so many would-be job creators.

One example comes to me from a budding entrepreneur who has recently started his own remodeling business specialized in installing energy efficient doors and windows.

This man, who is too scared of the long arm of the Environmental Protection Agency to be identified, represents the universe of private employers who are uniquely positioned to quickly create the new jobs Americans so desperately need.

In his own words, this beleaguered entrepreneur explains that:

``Since the new lead laws were initiated on April 1, 2010 then moved to July 1, 2010 because the EPA was ill-prepared for all of the contractors to be registered and monitored, the complete law and process we must follow has been nothing short of a confusing, unnecessary mess.

``Although the law started with an `Opt out option' allowing homeowners to opt out of `Lead safe renovations' if they met the criteria of no children under age six and no one pregnant in the household, that exception was eliminated because we were told that it is `unconstitutional' to ask if someone is pregnant. Now we are required by law to follow a laundry list of `Lead Safe Renovations' guidelines, with fines for each violation amounting to $36,000 per occurrence.

The contractor continues: ``The EPA states the health risks but I am unaware of any data to support this outrageous new law. There are so many contradictions in this law such as we are to test for lead on any house built on or before 1978 and if there is lead we must be certified as a `lead safe renovator' which requires spending $200 to attend a class, $300 on the EPA's registration fee and $60 to register in Iowa. At that point, we must initiate lead `abatement' procedures. This multi-step process involves:

``1) Testing for lead with lead test swabs costing $4.50 each.

``2) Properly recording all data for six years or risk a significant fine and audit by the EPA.

``3) Plastic off inside rooms by taping plastic on doors, vents, windows, floor and all other indoor surfaces.''

``4) Plastic off the outside area, 10 feet away from structure and 20 foot wide posting with warning sign and caution tape, which imposes approximate costs of $100 for each section of the structure for plastic and tape.

``5) Optional donning of a non-reusable lead suit, respirator and shoe covers, which cost $40 to $60 each time used.

``6) Start abatement process of removing wood with lead on it and wrapping this wood in more plastic, duct tape shut and throw in landfill. Although I am uncertain how safe the heavy duty plastic is for the landfill, I'm sure the EPA will find out 15 years from now and make the public pay for it.

``7) Use a certified HEPA vacuum cleaner to clean the room before using baby wipes to wipe down the inside of the room from ceiling to floor. When complete, test sections of each room must be wiped with clean baby wipes and photograph comparisons of the test wipes with official EPA chart. HEPA vacuums cost anywhere from $250 to $3000 and baby wipes a few dollars for each job and every photograph and all information must be recorded or risk large fines.

``Originally the EPA said this would only add approx 5% onto the cost of a job. In my experience it has added no less than 25% and sometimes as much as 40% per job, depending on difficulty.

``Furthermore, these rules are inconsistent as they do not apply to nursing homes and homeowners can still work on their own homes without following the regulations.

``The lead laws contradict OSHA requirements as putting a ladder on plastic or scaffold creates an obvious safety hazard, meaning we could be fined by OSHA for following EPA lead laws.

``The EPA is relentless in accusing businesses of not following all the rules, even though the businesses are following the rules they were taught in the class.

``We in the industry understand parts of the law, but things continue to change fast without proper notice. Something must change before this continues to suffocate the remodeling industry in this free democratic society. Unfortunately we feel these new laws are nothing less than a government power grab in the name of `keeping people safe from lead poisoning'.''

Mr. Speaker, this is just one of a million examples of the long arm of the Federal Government reaching down to grab the throat of innocent, hard-working job creators of this great country.

If we are serious about creating jobs, we should stop the talk. Stop the government spending. And act to unleash the job growing potential of the private sector.

I urge your support for this resolution which is a first step towards these ends.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to claim the Agriculture Committee's time, which I believe I am sharing with my colleague from Minnesota, and I yield myself 5 minutes.

Today, American agriculture is under attack. Every day, the administration seems to demonstrate just how vastly disconnected it is from the folks who feed us. The administration fails to realize that rural America's economy is dependent upon agriculture. The in-your-face approach that the administration has taken regarding government regulation has increased the cost of doing business for America's farmers and ranchers. If the administration is allowed to continue down this path, the only choice many farmers and ranchers will have will be to stop farming altogether. From the dairies of Vermont to the wheat fields near the Chesapeake Bay to the cornfields in the Midwest, American agriculture is under a constant barrage of irrational and unworkable regulations from the Environmental Protection Agency, which are burdensome, overreaching, and that negatively affect jobs in rural economies.

This EPA is mostly interested in pursuing the extreme agenda of environmentalist groups without any consideration for the impact it will have on our farmers and ranchers. For example, the EPA wants to treat milk spills like oil spills simply because milk contains animal fat. The EPA has suggested that milk storage should be regulated under the Clean Water Act as large oil tanks. The EPA wants farmers to till fields without producing any dust. Clearly, the folks at the EPA have never stepped foot on a farm in western Oklahoma, or otherwise they would know that dust happens, and all the regulations in the world can't eliminate its existence. The EPA wants farmers to ensure that none of the spray we use for pests drifts even 1 foot away from the original source.

The EPA has started an unprecedented re-reevaluation evaluation--yes, I said re-reevaluation--of the popular wheat control product Atrazine. In 2006, the EPA completed a 12-year review involving 6,000 studies and 80,000 public comments, yet one of the first orders of business for the Obama administration was to start all over after an article appeared in The New York Times. The EPA is trying to regulate watersheds based off of inaccurate and flawed models--a problem recognized even by the top officials at USDA.

The list goes on and on. But what further illustrates the alarming frame of mind of the EPA is that the agency has gone so far as to recently hold a contest for the public to create videos explaining what Federal regulations are ``important to everyone.'' In many instances, the agency is overreaching its authority. Instead of operating within the law, the EPA believes it can order Congress to pass legislation that gives it more authority and threaten to regulate anyway if Congress chooses not to act.

The message from the President is clear: Pass a cap-and-tax bill or we'll pursue an endangerment finding. Pass more authority to regulate watersheds or we'll proceed with an Executive order.

Sadly for America's farmers and ranchers, these regulations are not limited to the EPA. The Department of Agriculture's Grain Inspection, Packers, and Stockyard agency's proposed rule on purported ``fairness'' far exceeds congressional intent expressed in the 2008 farm bill. It lacks a credible economic analysis and has so far been the result of a regulatory process that can only be described as flawed. We have a responsibility to producers, packers, processors, retailers--and yes,

consumers--to continue to examine this proposal's implications and act accordingly.

In addition, over the past several months the CFTC and other Federal financial regulators have been engaged in writing unprecedented new regulations over the derivatives market. As Chairman Gensler reported in our committee yesterday, since September alone the CFTC has issued 39 new rule proposals involving thousands of pages of regulation. By comparison, before Dodd-Frank, the CFTC averaged about five rules per year. The speed with which the CFTC is issuing new rules precludes their ability to conduct an adequate cost-benefit analysis to ensure that the rules do not impose unnecessary or undue regulations on our financial system and our economy. And unlike many of the provisions of Dodd-Frank, title VII is not limited to financial firms. In fact, it has the potential to impact every segment of our economy, from farmers and ranchers to manufacturers and energy companies to the fields of health care and technology.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself an additional 30 seconds.

Many of the rules the CFTC has proposed would substantially increase the costs of hedging for commercial end-users, extending Wall Street regulation to Main Street companies. As we work to revive the economy and create new jobs, we simply cannot afford sweeping new regulations that are poorly vetted, that impose substantial costs that outweigh the benefit for our financial system and our economy, or that are crafted in the interest of speed rather than in sound policy.

The Agriculture Committee has set forth an aggressive oversight plan that will shine a bright light on these regulations and show the real- world consequences of them. I hope the administration will work with us in our efforts. Our Nation's farmers, ranchers, and small businesses are all counting on us to do it.

I reserve the balance of my time.

The ranking member is always a pleasure to work with.

Madam Speaker, I now yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Missouri (Mrs. Hartzler).

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Conaway), one of our subcommittee chairmen.

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to another outstanding subcommittee chairman on the Agriculture Committee, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Rooney).

I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the subcommittee chairwoman from Ohio (Mrs. Schmidt).

(Mrs. SCHMIDT asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

I yield the gentlelady 30 additional seconds to conclude.

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to a first-term subcommittee chairman, the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Thompson).

Madam Speaker, I now yield 3 minutes to one of the senior members of the House Agriculture Committee and one of our subcommittee chairmen, the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Johnson).

Madam Speaker, I now yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Gibson).

I now yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Hultgren).

Madam Speaker, I now yield 1 minute to the Congresswoman from Alabama (Mrs. Roby).

(Mrs. ROBY asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Madam Speaker, I next yield 1 minute to the good gentleman from the great First District of Kansas (Mr. Huelskamp), my neighbor from across the line in Kansas.

Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Austin Scott).

Madam Speaker, may I inquire how much time remains.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes.

I would note to my colleagues on the floor, as you have seen today, the members of the House Agriculture Committee are very concerned about the impact that these regulatory issues have on farmers, ranchers, on processors, on the American consumer; and we are very committed to working in a bipartisan way with our colleagues on the entire Ag Committee to try and make sure that this onerous, burdensome, potentially economically destructive path that we seem to have gotten on in recent years is reversed.

We will use the oversight hearing process. We will use every tool available to us, working with other committees. We will in areas where perhaps we have some jurisdictional questions at least dwell upon the impact and the effect of direct regulation.

I promise you over the course of this session of Congress the next 2 years, it will be one of the highest focuses of the House Agriculture Committee, and perhaps, if we are successful, we will enlighten some unelected bureaucrats. Perhaps, if we are successful, we will prevent the implementation of rules and regulations that will not only prevent jobs from being destroyed but perhaps, if they are unfortunately implemented, destroy jobs that exist in this country. That's our commitment on this committee. That's our effort. We pledge very much to do that.

With that, Madam Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Andrews).

(Mr. ANDREWS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Once again, instead of working to rebuild our country and create jobs, this House of Representatives is engaged in a debate on a measure that offers neither. For 10 hours and 2 days, the House of Representatives' time is tied up on a motion telling our committees to perform their constitutional duties.

We understand that vigorous oversight and rooting out inefficiencies and waste are absolutely essential, and they are our duties and we must perform them on behalf of the taxpayer. That's not a question. We know that. In fact, on January 15, the Education and Workforce Committees unanimously approved an oversight plan. That plan calls for review of regulations. This resolution calls for review of regulations.

Today's debate is duplicative. It is duplicative of our oversight plans. It is unnecessary and a total waste of taxpayers' dollars. Worse yet, we are taking away valuable time when we could be rolling up our sleeves, getting the number one priority of the American people in front of us: creating jobs.

For instance, the Education and Workforce Committee could be responding to the very real skills crisis that our Nation's workers and businesses are facing. A recent article in the Washington Post found that, in November, there were an estimated 3.2 million job opportunities across the country. However, businesses interviewed by the Washington Post with ``help wanted'' signs were struggling to find workers with sufficient skills. This is in the United States of America. This has crippled their ability to keep the line running and keep their doors open. This is a major disconnect, Madam Speaker, a disconnect that must be explored and it must be quickly addressed.

Certain sectors, such as health care and technology, are projected to grow considerably over the next decade. These sectors actually require more skilled workers, not fewer. That's why our committees should be back in our committee rooms right now looking to ensure the connection between employers that want to hire and workers can be fulfilled. That means looking at training and education programs that connect to the jobs available today and in the future.

At a time when jobs are important, this shortfall means lost economic opportunity for millions of Americans. It means a shortfall of businesses that

want to make it in America, with American workers.

Now, when it comes to reviewing regulations, I have heard some disturbing views from the other side of the aisle recently. I refuse to accept the argument that our Nation's health and safety protections need to be reduced to the level of China's in order to compete.

There is a reason why the law of the land ensures basic health and safety protections on the job, and that reason is too often written in the blood of dead workers.

Rolling back protections to satisfy powerful special interests at the expense of worker safety is a fool's errand. Relying on faulty one- sided studies that exaggerate the cost of worker safety regulations while excluding any of the benefits, such as the life of a family's breadwinner, leads to a dishonest debate.

We have seen the deadly results of failing to properly regulate. We have seen what happens when you rely on self-certification, voluntary compliance, and inadequate protections. Eleven workers die when an oil rig blows up in the Gulf of Mexico. Workers die over and over again on massive construction projects on the Las Vegas Strip. Fourteen workers die in a sugar refinery outside Savannah, Georgia, because there are no protections covering combustible dust.

There are 700 workers losing their jobs in North Carolina because loopholes in OSHA regulations allow a massive factory explosion to happen. The explosion killed three and injured more than 50 workers; and that factory is now relocating rather than rebuilding, dealing this community a double tragedy.

Madam Speaker, without proper regulation and enforcement, workers are misclassified as independent contractors, robbing them of benefits, robbing our Nation's Treasury, and putting law breakers at an unfair advantage over law-abiding employers. And workers' hard-earned pensions are gambled away.

We have the best workers in the world, and these workers deserve basic protections. Our Nation's workers also deserve a Congress devoted to growing and strengthening the middle class, not meaningless debate like today's.

I urge this Congress, get to the business of the American people without delay. The business of this Congress should be about jobs, and the business of this Congress should be about rebuilding our Nation's competitiveness, and that business should begin now. We cannot afford any further delays or distractions.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, we need to talk more about what real regulations are that we should be focusing on, not the regulations for oversight that we have already determined we are going to handle committee by committee, particularly this committee, and we always have.

USA Today had an article about the sugar blast victims in Savannah, Georgia, and one of the victims is quoted in that article, because his brother was killed and he was injured. He says, ``I've been thinking about my brother,'' who was burned over almost half his body, and ``I know it could've been prevented.''

Now, I am going to say, with the right regulations, it could have been prevented.

Then the article goes on to say, ``Despite the outcry after the blast,'' the blast that I said had killed 14 people and injured 40 others, ``the United States still lacks Federal regulations requiring industrial plants to prevent the buildup of fine dust particles that can form explosive clouds in confined areas.''

The regulations that OSHA has to work with are so outdated that they

don't include sugar refineries or other industries that would benefit from having dust regulations.

The article went on to say that ``Federal regulators concluded that the explosion and fire at the refinery in Port Wentworth, just west of Savannah, was caused by a spark that ignited sugar dust like gunpowder.

``The blast set off secondary dust explosions that turned the packaging plant where Butler worked with his 35-year-old brother, John Calvin Butler, into fiery rubble.

``Last summer, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration proposed $8.7 million in fines against Imperial Sugar and cited the company for 211 safety violations at its two refineries here in coastal Georgia and in Gramercy, Louisiana.

``OSHA has a dust regulation from,'' as I told you earlier, ``the 1980s covering grain and plant silos. But another Federal agency says that's not enough because food processors,'' yes, ``wood manufacturers,'' yes, ``and other industries face the same risks.''

Why are they not covered? Where are the regulations? Why are we not bringing OSHA into the 21st century, instead of having a debate today that has nothing to do with jobs and protecting our workers, and instead talking about oversight regulations that we are already committed to deal with on our committee.

Madam Speaker, ``In 2006,'' the USA Today article goes on to say, ``the U.S. Chemical Safety Board, which investigates industrial accidents, called on OSHA to close that gap by adopting a new combustible dust regulation. Over the past three decades, the board says, about 300 dust explosions have killed more than 120 workers nationwide.''

Those are the regulations we should be dealing with. Those are the debates we should be having. Those are the steps we should be taking to bring OSHA into the 21st century, not keeping it back in the dark ages.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield myself the balance of my time.

So we have had 10\1/2\ hours, 2 days of debate on regulations, oversight regulations, that our committee and other committees have already agreed they are going to deal with. This, to me, shows that the Republicans are truly in disarray. We are not discussing jobs, the most important issue in the United States of America for our people, and at the same time, in their disarray, the Republicans are pushing an irresponsible and dangerous spending bill that will threaten jobs.

I yield back my time.

Madam Speaker, as we meet this morning, there are 15 million unemployed people in our country. And what I'm hearing from our constituents is they want us to work together to find ways to help the job generators of this country, small businesses and entrepreneurs, to put Americans back to work.

Here we are again, really, just having a political discussion that doesn't hire a person, help a company, or really go anywhere. Frankly, the majority has gone from ignoring the unemployment problem to worsening it in the last couple of days. In the 5 weeks that they've been in the majority, there has not been one bill, not one word, not 1 hour of debate on a bill that would create jobs in the American economy. Instead, what we've had is a series of political exercises that have ignored their promise to ``focus like a laser beam on job creation.''

Now, the problem has gotten worse this week, and it will get worse as the day goes on with the announcement of the majority's plan to finish out the budget year with massive cuts in the budget.

Now, let me say from the outset, we agree completely that sensible spending restraint is necessary to reverse our trend of deficit and debt and help the American people and the American economy, and we look forward to working with our friends in the Republican Party to make this a reality. But one of the areas that is being considered for up to a 30 percent cut is education.

Now, the Federal Government spends education money on essentially five things: We help the most disadvantaged children in the country learn how to read and do mathematics through Title I; we help children confronted with a learning disability, with Downs Syndrome or autism, get special education services through the IDEA; there are scholarships and student loans for people of all descriptions to get a higher education at a college or a tech school; there are programs for someone who's lost his job at an oil refinery or her job at a bank to be retrained for their next job; and there's a small but crucial amount of money that helps our teachers become better

instigators of science education or math education and instill in the next generations the hunger to learn and the power to achieve.

You need not listen to Members of Congress about the consequences of these kinds of cuts. Listen to the job generators of our country. Listen to Andrew Liveris, the leader of the Dow Chemical Company, who, as part of the business roundtable report in December, said the following, and I quote. ``I think if you had to go to the easy ones, education is a sweet spot for the government, for Congress and for all of us. If we don't get a well-educated workforce back in this country, if we don't invest in science, technology, engineering and math, if we don't pull it all together,'' he goes on to say, ``there will be trouble.'' And he further says, so what we've got to do is ``have a sustained investment, government and public companies together, private partnerships in education.''

This is not the Democratic leader of the House. This is not President Obama's administration. This is the leader of Dow Chemical Company saying that to grow jobs in America and win global economic competition, we need to invest in education.

The majority's taking us in exactly the wrong direction. Proposing cuts of up to 30 percent in education programs will be on the floor next week. So, sadly, they've moved from ignoring the jobs problem to worsening it.

We want to work together with the Republican Party and with Independents to find ways to empower small businesses and entrepreneurs to put our country back to work. We've spent 9\1/2\ hours in this debate talking about something else. Let's get on with this debate, get on to business, put the American people back to work.

I thank my leader from South Carolina.

Madam Speaker, the prior gentleman who spoke is right. Americans are asking, ``Where are the jobs?'' And the majority is saying, ``We'll get to that later.''

This week, the first thing that they did was to try to rush to the floor, without hearings or consideration, an extension of the Patriot Act, which is a very serious and profound issue for the country. And it didn't work.

Then they brought to the floor a bill that was supposed to recover money from the United Nations, which we're all for, but the Congressional Budget Office says it wouldn't actually save any money. The New York City police commissioner said it would be harmful to his efforts to protect the people of New York against terrorism that might come up around the United Nations. And I think the rest of the world said, Why is the United States rocking the boat at a time when there is profound global crisis going on in the most dangerous area of the world? So that didn't work.

They then brought to the floor this bill, which commendably says that committees should look at whether there are regulations that don't make any sense, that are harmful to jobs and businesses in our country. They're right. We should do that. We're already doing it. In other words, each committee adopts what's called an oversight plan when it meets. It talks about all the different things it wants to do. In Education and the Workforce, we did that. In Armed Services, we did that. So we've now spent 9\1/2\ hours debating whether we should keep doing something we're already doing and bring to the floor someday, in the distant ozone future, actual bills that might actually reduce such regulations.

Now if that really weren't bad enough, the majority really switched this week, from ignoring the jobs problem to worsening the jobs problem. Because out of the view of the public on this floor, in their private meetings, they're planning to bring to the floor next week a bill that will dramatically reduce investments, and let me give you an example. We only know what we read in the newspaper because my understanding is that they have yet to post their spending bill online, which they've promised to do 72 hours before it comes up, but you can project this out that they're probably calling for a 30 percent cut in things like air traffic controllers.

I want you to think about this, Madam Speaker, for a moment. Putting aside the obvious safety consideration, I don't think any of us would put anyone we love or care about on a plane we didn't think was safe. That's obviously true on both sides of the aisle, and I'm not suggesting the other side wants to do that. But there are consequences to not having a full complement of air traffic controllers. And beyond the safety consideration is an economic consideration: How can you have a thriving economy if people feel like they can't fly safely?

I come from a State, New Jersey, which prides on being the medicine chest of the world, in our pharmaceutical industry. How can you have a cutting edge in pharmaceutical products if you lay off people from the FDA, the Food and Drug Administration, that review the applications for new drugs? How can you have a supermarket industry that's thriving and employs millions of people in the agriculture and food industries if the people who inspect our meat and our milk and our food are not there?

Now these are questions that are going to be debated and answered next week here. They do have an effect on jobs--a profoundly negative effect on jobs. We understand that there is a common responsibility to enact sensible restraint on what our government spends. That's why Democrats balanced the budget when President Clinton was in office. That's why Democrats passed a pay-as-you-go statute.

I would urge that we return to the business of the House.

Madam Speaker, I rise in support of the resolution, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Today's effort is driven by a simple goal: to ensure every area of the Federal Government is dedicated to job creation. If we are to get the Nation back to work, we all must work together to remove barriers to economic growth and prosperity.

Every job matters, and every effort to help create a new job matters. The American people have demonstrated a relentless determination to make the difficult choices necessary to get through these tough times. We should do no less.

Employers need certainty, flexibility, and freedom to expand their businesses and hire new workers. Red tape should not tie down economic growth, and onerous regulations should not be roadblocks to job creation. Congress can no longer accept sweeping changes that affect the lives of students and workers without first determining whether it is good for our long-term competitiveness, good for job creators, and good for our economy.

We were sent here to focus on getting the economy back on track and the American people back to work. Today we are moving forward with our commitment to do just that. In my conversations with constituents, I have seen the desperation that follows months of searching in vain for work. I also have witnessed the hope that is renewed at the prospect of future employment.

Everyone agrees you need rules of the road and commonsense protections; bad actors will always exist, and they must be held accountable for breaking the law. But we shouldn't accept lost wages, lost jobs, and lost opportunities as inevitable consequences to advancing fairness, accountability, and responsibility.

The Education and Workforce Committee oversees a broad range of policies that affect the Nation's workplaces and classrooms. A number of those policies will be discussed by other leaders of the committee in a few moments.

In the time remaining for myself, I would like to discuss one area in particular that deserves closer examination. Is the Federal Government using its authority fairly and on behalf of American workers, or is it pursuing a partisan agenda that makes our workplaces less competitive?

The National Labor Relations Board is an independent Federal agency created by Congress more than 75 years ago. The NLRB is charged with preventing and remedying unfair labor practices and establishing whether employees desire union representation. Its responsibility is to fairly protect the rights of workers against unlawful encroachments by employers and unions.

Unfortunately, the board has recently shown an eagerness to tilt the playing field in favor of powerful special interests. A culture of union favoritism has seized the board, with consequences that reach into virtually every workplace. Stripping workers of their right to a secret ballot through a backdoor card check scheme is just one looming threat. The board also has threatened legal action against States seeking to protect the secret ballot, and it has diminished safeguards for employers. We cannot allow the board to rewrite the rules of the game to circumvent the will of Congress in pursuit of its own job- destroying agenda.

This same culture of union favoritism has also swept across the administration, expanding protections for big labor at the expense of rank-and-file workers. Project labor agreements and high road contracting sound innocent enough, but they put small businesses and the vast majority of their workers at a disadvantage--at the expense of the taxpayers, I might add.

These are the kinds of policies that should be examined to determine whether they undermine economic growth. Our efforts will not be blinded by partisanship. If we learn of a rule or regulation that stands in the way of a strong workforce, regardless of the Congress or administration that put it in place, we will take a look at it. This is a critically important responsibility, and I look forward working with every Member of Congress to get it done.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this resolution.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, before I yield to the gentlelady from North Carolina, I feel compelled to respond for just a minute to the remarks of my good friend from New Jersey that underscores the fundamental difference here.

We believe that the issues that we have been talking about and are talking about today and will be talking about next week strike directly to the problem of unemployment and the lack of jobs in this country. Without fiscal responsibility, without addressing the exploding debt, without addressing the job-killing health care plan, which we've done, and without addressing the blizzard of regulations that are coming out of this administration and every industry, we're not going to be able to create those jobs. It's a fundamental difference.

The debate will go on, but clearly we believe, and I believe, that we are directly addressing jobs because we found out over the last few years, certainly the last 2 years, that spending billions and hundreds of billions and trillions of dollars does not, in fact, put America back to work.

I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Ms. Foxx).

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to yield 5 minutes to the chair of the Workforce Protection Subcommittee, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Walberg).

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Austria).

I yield the gentleman an additional 15 seconds.

Madam Speaker, I am very pleased that we're spending this time talking about real job creation. For the last 2 years, we've watched the Democrats spend literally trillions of dollars in failed efforts to create jobs, with more government spending. We need to get the private sector back to work.

We've heard examples here today, and we'll hear more this afternoon, of how this blizzard of regulations is getting in the way of that job creation and preventing Americans from getting back to work. We need to step up to our responsibility, and this is just the opening of that discussion as we step up to do our jobs in oversight.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I want to thank the ranking member for the time.

Madam Speaker, my subcommittee, Courts, Commercial and Administrative Law, has had hearings on these bills, the REINS Act, as well as the regulatory reform bills that have been proposed. The REINS Act would require all measures that have a cost of $100 million or more, before their regulations go into effect, within 70 days of the promulgation of those regulations, they would have to be approved by a positive vote of this House and our equal House, the Senate, and signed by the President before they go into effect.

The reality, Madam Speaker, is this would stifle government and stifle growth, because, as we have seen, the Senate has difficulty doing much of anything within 70 days. In fact, it had difficulty doing much in 2 years. And to ask the Senate, where any one Senator can put down a slip on a judicial nomination or hold up legislation if they so choose unless they get what they desire and want, the last vestige in reality that we have in this county of ``don't ask, don't tell''--don't ask the Senator what they want and don't tell what they got--all of these regulations would be at the whim and caprice of any one individual Senator.

That is not what the American public wants. The American public wants the government to work. They want the House and Senate to work. They don't want the system in the Senate where one Senator can kill almost anything, to where ``Senator No'' can stop the government from actively promoting the general health, welfare, and safety of the American public.

Now, the REINS Act wasn't needed, apparently, during the time that George Bush was President, and yet there were more regulations and rules during that time than there have been during President Obama's time as President. It is interesting to note that my colleagues on the other side understood the separation of powers doctrine and the fact that article II allows the executive to carry out and administer the laws, and they should be able to do so.

But once President Obama came into office and there was financial services reform--the financial services reform we needed, because without regulations the financial services sector almost took this country into another Great Depression. They did take us into a Great Recession, costing us jobs and jobs and jobs and jobs.

The high unemployment rate is the result of the lack of regulation in the housing industry, in the financial service industry, where those two worked together to almost bring down this Nation's economy and the world's economy to where we had a day when President Bush brought us the TARP to save our economy. And in a bipartisan fashion we passed the TARP that Secretary Paulson told us we had to pass because we were on the brink, as President Bush also said, of financial collapse. Yes, financial collapse because of the lack of regulation. And yet in this Congress, the 112th, we're being asked to say that no regulations would take effect unless the House, and the Senate--that body known not for its alacrity but for its ``deliberateness''--would have to act and possibly pass something within 70 days.

Health care legislation; regulations couldn't go into effect to keep young people on their parents' insurance until they're 26 unless the Senate acted within 70 days. Preexisting conditions would continue to be an impediment for children to get insurance and to be treated. Lifetime caps would continue to exist because we couldn't get regulations approved within 70 days.

The fact is, it's the executive's responsibility to carry out the laws that the Congress passes, that Congress is not the Executive. And because Barack Obama is President is no reason to change what the Founding Fathers set up as a great document, with three separate and equal branches of government being challenged now. The REINS Act would go back to what the Founding Fathers wanted. It would go back on the Constitution, which we spent time reading on this floor--the entire Constitution--that included article II, the powers of the executive, an equal branch of government to the legislature. And the REINS Act would say that the Constitution doesn't matter; that the Congress, the legislative branch that is supposed to pass the laws, will also be a part of executing the laws.

I hold the Constitution in high regard and don't believe we should shred it because we want to have an opportunity to slow up financial regulations passed as part of the Dodd-Frank bill and health care for the American public. The whole idea of this review of regulations that we've gotten and this discussion on this floor of the House has taken this House to a place where the American public doesn't watch the Congress make laws and make improvements to create jobs and to improve the welfare of the American public, but it makes it a debating society, because we already have the power to review rules, and we do it in the Judiciary Committee and we do it in all committees. But now we're going to have reality television; and C-SPAN, instead of watching us pass laws, is going to watch us discuss what we already have been doing, always do, and are supposed to do, which is review regulations and have oversight but not veto over the executive.

So, Madam Speaker, it is with great regret that I participate in this debate because this debate is not a part of a law and an action and a bill to improve the American public but simply a political show. And with all due respect to the chairman of the committee and the members who have brought this legislation, it violates the Constitution, which we read. That shouldn't have been a show. That should have been something we held deeply to our hearts. This violates the Constitution and the powers of article II.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to join in this discussion with my good friend Chairman Lucas of the Agriculture Committee, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

As the chairman indicated, yesterday on a bipartisan basis we adopted the oversight plan, such as what we have done in the past when we were in charge of the committee, working in a bipartisan basis. And I would argue that the committee, under my jurisdiction, did the oversight work that was necessary and we made the changes and addressed the issues as they came up. We made significant improvements in the farm bill back in 2008 in terms of conservation programs, other kinds of things--crop insurance--through the new SRA that was adopted in May. So I would argue that we did our work on the Agriculture Committee.

A good part of the chairman's time was taken talking about the EPA. I couldn't concur with him more. But the problem is, we don't have jurisdiction over the EPA. I hope that under the new leadership here that we will be able to work with the committees that have jurisdiction so we can straighten out some of the things that are going on over in the EPA and some of these other agencies. But all we can control is what we have under our jurisdiction in the Agriculture Committee. And I can commit to you that the Democrats on the committee will work with the Republicans to make sure that we do the right things on the Agriculture Committee; that we follow the plan that we adopted yesterday, and we do the aggressive oversight. We are 100 percent in favor of that.

In terms of the issues that the chairman talked about that are under our jurisdiction, the GIPSA law or rule that's being proposed, the CFTC rule that's being proposed, these are still proposed rules, and they're going through the process. And I have some optimism that at the end of the day that those things are going to come to a point where they're readable and acceptable. But if they aren't, we will take a look at them.

In terms of the CFTC, there are a lot of rules and regulations that they are in the process of implementing. The reason they are doing it is that we asked them to do it. This is not something they have manufactured over there. This has been directed by the Congress, and I would argue that it's needed.

We had a situation before where they were only doing five regulations a year because we had a $600 trillion, $700 trillion market that was completely unregulated, completely in the dark, and it was a big part of this financial crisis and collapse that we had.

At the time that we did the CFMA back in 2000, we were told that the folks who were in the swap market were rich people, that they had to have $10 million to even get into this market, that they were gambling with their own money. Really, it was none of our business that they were rich. They knew what they were doing. If they wanted to gamble their money, that was their business. The problem, we find out, is that they weren't putting the money up. They weren't putting the capital and collateral behind these swaps, and it almost took down the entire world financial system.

So I would argue that a lot of what the CFTC is working on are things that are going to have to be done. Not that I'm a big fan of regulation, but in this case, the private sector went amuck in some of these areas. I think we are going to have to require that they put their money up, that they put up the capital and collateral, and that we make sure we don't get in this situation again where the public has to bail out these financial firms.

We heard yesterday from the Secretary that he has no intention of regulating the end users. We gave that exemption in the law, and it looks like, in the way he has implemented it, the end users are not going to be subject to these capital and margin requirements. On the other hand, the financial firms that qualify as swap dealers or as swap participants are going to have to put their money up, and it needs to happen because we don't want to get in this situation again.

Having said all of that, let's see what happens and what the final rules are that they come out with at the CFTC. Let's see what happens with the final rules that come out with regard to GIPSA. I am hopeful that we are going to get the right kind of outcome when they listen to everybody. They've had an open process, and they've been listening and taking thousands of comments. If there are problems and if they've gone beyond the law or if they've gone off in a direction that we didn't intend, I will work with the chairman to make sure we get that straightened out.

So I am here today to pledge the cooperation of the minority on these issues. I hope the chairman can convince his colleagues on these other committees, which are driving us nuts in some of these areas as well as some of these other agencies, to come up with some process where we can be involved to straighten some of that out. I would love to work with you on that. We are with you 100 percent, and I look forward to working with the chairman and with the other members to get the right kind of outcome.

Madam Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

I thank the gentleman from California for yielding.

I do rise in support of H.R. 72.

When the framers of the Constitution started writing, they began article I, section 1, with a simple and clear statement: ``All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress.'' After a great debate, the priority concern was the possibility that some other entity other than Congress would attempt to exercise legislative powers or compel their will on American citizens.

If laws could be made by someone who has no accountability, they could create any rule based on their own preferences and force unchecked spending on the will of their fellow citizens without accountability. This is an unfunded regulatory mandate.

It is my concern that in the race to regulate, we have moved from regulating American business to running State and local governments and have made them, in effect, Federal Government extension employees charged with regulating all aspects of public and private business. Every stage of business is now regulated, from how to interview an applicant to how to fire an employee.

Government paperwork abounds. Every company needs compliance officers and attorneys just to make sure they are running their business based on the preferences of someone from some agency they have never even heard of. That is not real job creation. American companies want to produce products and services, not hire de facto government employees. We need real job growth.

It is time for Congress to assume its responsibility. If there is a grievous regulation, it shouldn't be EPA's fault, HHS's fault or even the executive branch's fault. It is ours.

Let me give you some examples of these unfunded mandates in my own home State of Oklahoma. The City of Bartlesville, Oklahoma, is currently drowning under a new EPA requirement to filter the storm water. That is correct, filtering the rainwater.

The City of Bethany, Oklahoma, spent over a quarter of a million dollars in 1987 to put in two water wells, only to be required a few years later to take them out by EPA because of their wastewater. Then EPA changed their wastewater requirements in 2006 and cost the City of Bethany over $9 million. The street signs in Bethany must also change to a new type of reflective material to meet new DOT regulations, costing the city who knows how much.

The Oklahoma Department of Transportation has to go through millions of dollars of hoops to tear down an old bridge to replace it with a new bridge in the exact same spot. They have to navigate the Clean Water Act, the National Historic Preservation Act, the Endangered Species Act, the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, and many more, while people drive over an old, deteriorating bridge.

I will tell you, I will be the first to promote wheelchair ramps on sidewalks, but Federal interpretation of ADA to construct accessible curb ramps at intersections and other locations has been invoked where no connecting sidewalks even exist. In Oklahoma City, where I live, such a wholesale directive results in curb ramps that terminate in adjacent vacant lots, to a ditch, embankments, and sometimes straight into a light pole. The desire to do the right thing sometimes leaves no room for exercising common sense.

We are regulating common sense out of Federal, State and local governments, and we are costing State and local taxpayers millions in unfunded mandates.

Sometimes our regulations don't cost money but they do cost trust in the relationship between citizens and their Federal Government.

Last Christmas, a community bank in Oklahoma was told by a Federal regulator that their employees had to take off the buttons that said ``Merry Christmas, God is with us,'' and remove the scripture verse announcement on their board because it might cause someone to feel discriminated against that walked into the bank. This is a privately owned business in America.

Every person in that community has lost trust with the commonsense leadership of the Federal Government because we have allowed unchecked regulation. The assumption that Federal agencies are the only people who care about clean water, clean air, fair business practice, et cetera, is arrogant and misinformed. I don't know anyone who loves the air, water and land in Oklahoma more than Oklahomans, and I am confident that is true for other States as well.

We must take a serious look at unfunded mandates and regulations. We need to hear the cry of our cities, counties and States where they say please stop the flood of regulations. They want two things: predictability and clearly defined limited scope.

This is a bipartisan issue. We have common agreement with the other members of my subcommittee, and we will immediately take this up next Tuesday in our first subcommittee hearing.