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Pay for Performance Act

Floor Speech

Date: April 1, 2009
Location: Washington, DC
Issues: Finance and Banking Government Budget and Spending


PAY FOR PERFORMANCE ACT -- (House of Representatives - April 01, 2009)

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Mr. BILIRAKIS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself as much time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, this Congress has an obligation to protect taxpayers. The $590 billion that was handed to Wall Street firms does not belong to Wall Street. That money is the property of the American people. The fact that I voted against the TARP legislation is no excuse for me to wash my hands of the matter. I have a duty to my constituents and to the American taxpayers to do everything in my power to protect their investment.

H.R. 1664 will impose restrictions on TARP recipients who refuse voluntarily to change their excessive compensation practices. However, those firms that are not receiving taxpayer dollars who directly engage in business with a TARP recipient must be assured they will not find themselves falling within the compensation restrictions of this bill.

The bill, as written, recognizes this and states that a company that did business with a recipient of TARP funds will not be subject to the requirements of the bill. This language gives assurance to the non-TARP recipients that it is safe to do business with those firms on taxpayer life support, which is vitally important to protect taxpayer investments.

However, this same language in the bill has the potential to inadvertently let most, if not all, TARP recipients off the hook.

For example, Goldman Sachs is a TARP recipient and has engaged in business with AIG, another TARP recipient. Since Goldman Sachs does business with a recipient of TARP moneys, then by the terms of the language of the bill, Goldman Sachs will no longer be subject to the requirements of the bill. And for that matter, AIG will not be subject to the requirements of the bill because AIG does business with Goldman Sachs which is a TARP recipient.

As you can guess, virtually all of the largest TARP recipients have done business with each other and therefore will escape the compensation restrictions of H.R. 1664 if this language is not corrected.

My amendment solves this problem by clarifying the language in the bill to eliminate the possibility of this unintended result.

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Mr. BILIRAKIS. Mr. Chairman, I strongly recommend that the Members vote favorably on this very important amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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