Time for Congress to Get Back to Work

After what has felt like an eternity since last fall, September is finally here. The leaves are slowly turning brown and the kids are going back to school (sort of). Pumpkin spiced everything has appeared and stores are starting to roll out their Halloween advertising. And, Congress is ready to get back to work after an August recess truncated by postal hysteria.

But, as the clock runs out on the rest of the fiscal year (September 30) and the calendar year, lawmakers have yet to address several critical priorities facing the country. The national credit card is maxed out at nearly $27 trillion – or more than $200,000 per household. Tackling the debt while restoring economic growth will require a dedicated and bipartisan focus on enacting several critical reform measures. Below, the Taxpayers Protection Alliance (TPA) has highlighted three policy areas where Congressional action is sorely needed. Hopefully lawmakers from both sides of the aisle can stop the blame game and hysteria and work together to get America back on track.

Reconcile the Defense bill…without earmarks

Now that the House and Senate have passed their respective versions of the $741 billion Defense bill, lawmakers will have to reconcile the two bills in committee. This may take a while. According to a report by Stars and Stripes reporter Corey Dickstein, “Lawmakers have said they do not expect the NDAA to be finalized ahead of the new fiscal year on Oct. 1.” The media is poised to focus on the House version’s requirement that Confederate base names be removed, given President Trump’s veto threat over that provision. But the bigger issue for taxpayers is the inevitability of earmarks being snuck into the bill.

Last year (fiscal year 2020) TPA found the Defense appropriations bill contained an astounding 785 earmarks totaling $16.1 billion (click here for the full list). Top billing included an astounding $2 billion extra for the F-35 program, despite the fighter jet’s history of problems and an estimated lifetime budget of $1.5 trillion. This fighter jet costs each household more than $10,000, yet still faces basic logistical issues and can’t even cobble together a functional supply chain. Let’s hope that lawmakers cut out the earmarks this year and focus on trimming the fat from the Defense bill.

Deliver on postal reform

Yes, we know that lawmakers are probably sick of this issue after having to deal with the unwanted, unneeded postalpalooza over the summer. Driven by the reckless misinformation pushed by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), lawmakers returned to Washington, D.C. in August to vote for a nonsensical $25 billion postal bill and listen to Postmaster General DeJoy reiterate the myriad problems facing the U.S. Postal Service (USPS). America’s mail carrier has accrued more than $160 billion in unfunded liabilities and lost nearly $9 billion last year alone. While a $25 billion bailout passed by the House will only provide a blank check for continued mismanagement, postal reform done right can turn around the ailing agency.  Political posturing and fear mongering won’t fix the agency, real reform will.

Congress should work together with the USPS to cut out bloated middle-mile contracts that cost the agency more than $1 billion per year. Under the failed-status quo, these private contractors charge the USPS – and taxpayers – the full amount of their services even if deliveries are late and not performed satisfactorily. Wasteful practices like these need to end. Furthermore, lawmakers should give Postmaster General DeJoy the flexibility he needs to continue streamlining operations. Unneeded mail collection boxes and sorting machines not only incur maintenance costs, but also divert critical manpower away from handling critical drug deliveries and hand-sorting election mail. Congress should give the green-light to this long-overdue, much-needed network streamlining.

Unshackle the healthcare system from price controls

Since the start of the coronavirus crisis, lawmakers such as Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) have been pushing extra hard to include healthcare rate-setting (i.e. price controls) in relief legislation. These onerous policies would allegedly curb the problem of surprise billing, a situation that occurs when patients receive an out-of-network bill from attending physicians after being discharged from an in-network hospital. But this pressing problem would actually be made worse by bureaucrats dictating prices to healthcare providers across the country.

In a recent policy analysis, Dr. Wayne Winegarden of the Pacific Research Institute examines California’s failed experience with rate-setting. In 2017, the Golden State mandated that doctors accept artificially-discounted in-network insurance rates while treating patients at in-network facilities. The results were not encouraging: “Price controls have led to fewer doctors on call in emergency rooms, and independent doctor practices consolidating into bigger hospitals. When government puts its thumb on the scale, it’s ultimately patients that are hurt the most.” Provider practices have consolidated across California, while doctors have even contemplated leaving the state. Now would be the worst possible time to export this failed model nationwide. Lawmakers should resist the urge to include this disastrous policy in any future relief legislation.

To conclude…

The list of needed reforms goes on and on. Unless Congress gets its act together, American families will be on the line for mounting debt and runaway regulatory costs. This fall will come with plenty of anxiety and uncertainties as schools contemplate when to bring their students back and healthcare providers continue to cope with the coronavirus pandemic. Lawmakers should resolve to get spending under control and finally provide Americans some peace of mind. Stay tuned as TPA continues to monitor these critical policy issues.