The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

girls just for noon wound and your lap tonight on the macneil lehrer newshour we look at the fights to cut amtrak and federal bailout other things the

perfect perfect perfect early for seth seth stern that evening

leading the news today farm deal was apparently struck late today to halt a senate filibuster and permit debate and a confirmation vote on edwin meese new figures say the us economy grew at a healthy rate last year than originally thought and president reagan hold his first news conference of the new year tonight robert macneil is away charlayne hunter gault is in new york shot my first tonight a summary of today's major news events then on to four focused segments the lead one looks at whether the proposed end of governance subsidies to amtrak means the end of the amtrak next we find out how proposed cuts in federal paychecks will affect some workers and will have a debate about the overall impact we hear how fidel castro plan to treat cubans being deported back to their homeland after being labeled criminals and mentally ill by the united states government and we find out why the pennsylvania legislature is suddenly seeing red over blackjack life the macneil lehrer newshour is funded by at and t

the corporation for public broadcasting and the station and other public television stations there was an apparent agreement to end the filibuster in the us senate late the second and the farm state senators conducting it said they got what they wanted an agreement from the administration to intensify credit really financially strapped farmers the senate is now expected to move on to the real business at hand to debate and then vote on the confirmation of edwin meese to be attorney general the filibustering senators said they're delaying action had no connection the maids was aimed at getting action on farm credit the deal on it came after a series of meetings that involve the senate republican leadership democratic farm state senators and agriculture secretary john block the deal is explained this way about one of the filibuster later senator james exxon a democrat from nebraska they have given an on the one hundred percent faithful we agree that the faithful leagues

that's really funny and if he makes it he can the math the last step before a final compromise on all of this takes effect comes when the senate democratic caucus approves the agreement there were true stories today concerning budget director david stockman the associated press said he had been told to calm down his rhetoric by white house chief of staff don regan the ap said reagan drove stockman some of his recent statements about cutting back on farm programs

and military pensions could have been left unsaid or better express the other stockman story as america wants he was hospitalized at georgetown university hospital in washington after feeling fate last night at a dinner party he was released this morning eight hours later and his condition was said to be fine right transportation secretary elizabeth dole faced three hours of hostile congressional grilling today she made her first attempt to justify sharp cuts in mass transit assistance and elimination of money for amtrak facing a waltz solid opposition to cuts of some two point seven billion dollars from both republicans and democrats alike secretary dull responded this way a place where there is a significant and that their demand for services one thing that carrier will provide it and i'm confident that even the odd the gorillas in the service or not continued that die are on our all of these terrorists must resign of the airlines will continue the idea that you know we have a land

under way now that provides for doubling of airline service in this country alone or as lanza we are anticipating that this one did rove is wonderfully movement on and and the reclines worked in that wretched well andy and sort of later on we'll have to focus sections on budget cuts will be looking at whether in teenage amtrak means the end of amtrak and will have a debate on cutting federal workers pay the president is expected to be asked about that and other budget problems at his news conference later tonight the us economy turned in a better performance at the end of last year than originally estimated the commerce department today said the gross national product growth for nineteen eighty fours last quarter was a healthy four point nine percent the initial estimate had been two point eight percent the bowman the us economy is one of the contributors to the strength of the us dollar more abroad which was very much on the mind of british prime minister margaret thatcher the day she told reporters that watched the news conference that she had raised the dollar over the british pound problem with president

reagan and their two days of talks it's not any problems for the rest of the world it is it goes also problems for the industries in the united states with your based on exports and we don't know how long the resurgence of the bailout will continue and in that sense the fact that we do not know they were both trying to foresee what's been the effect of the world and also in the united states investors if it does continue i think we both believe that there are certain balances in a market economy that will eventually turn it around because of the adverse effects it would start having a great sectors of the american economy and that two would be a factor which would you would expect to stop attorney john linnell how that we can one doesn't quite know seems to us again a fundamental thing that can be done is a reduction in the deficit precisely what effect that would have on the dollar is very arguable they are terrible there will still be a president's council of economic

advisors after all white house spokesman larry speak said today berle sprinkle now an undersecretary of the treasury will be nominated chairman position has been vacant since martin feldstein resigned last july and president reagan had said in interviews that he might abolish the council that speaks sad <unk> reagan changed his mind the other two council positions will also be killed he said in bhopal india doctors are urging immediate test for pregnant women are exposed to the poison gas leaked from union carbide plant last december the team of private doctors is also recommending that women considering abortions if the defects are found in the fetuses and that women refrain from becoming pregnant until they are completely detoxify government doctors had denied an increase in either miscarriages or abortions and claim that it's impossible to attribute exposure to the gas as the source of those that did occur in georgia twenty three cubans who fled to the united states in the boat lift five years ago were deported today after a federal appeals court rejected their claims for asylum

they were with first of about twenty seven hundred cubans who will be sent home under an agreement with cuba providing for deportation of those who are in jails prisons and mental hospitals today the twenty three cubans were taken by bus from the federal penitentiary in atlanta to diamonds air force base near marietta there they boarded a chartered civilian airliner which took off for her than this as likely to be a seen often repeated the agreement with cuba are calls for the deportation of between one hundred to one hundred and fifty gallons a month and fifteen hundred of them are in the atlanta penitentiary attorney general william french smith talked about this this afternoon and about why these cubans was singled out for deportation as a result of several years of effort and a series of intensive discussions those persons to be returned or ineligible to repaint remain in the united states under our laws because

they admitted to committing serious crimes in cuba have committed serious crimes in the united states including murder aggravated assault and robbery by force or suffer from severe mental disorder later in the newshour will have a taped interview with fidel castro about his plans for the returning cubans meanwhile on another refugee front of federal jury today convicted two members of the so called sanctuary movement in houston texas jack elder who was acquitted last month in another case was found guilty of illegally transporting aliens and faces up to twenty eight thousand dollars in fines and thirty years in prison another member of the movement landmarks was found guilty of conspiracy but innocent and two other counts overseas riots continued in south africa at least nineteen are reported dead as anti government rioting spread to three black townships the protests began monday following rumors residents of a black township we're going to be forced to relocate today a government minister promised to meet with township leaders

before taking any action on that note and in durban south africa the government formally charged seven black leaders with treason the seven were ordered held without bail until their next court appearance in march in the middle east israeli troops raided six shiite muslim villages in southern lebanon on three people were reported killed israeli foreign minister yitzhak shamir said the raid were in retaliation for guerilla attacks on israeli troops who are withdrawn from london on the reagan administration was accused today of consistently under funding research into the deadly disease called aids is his allegedly resulted in a lack of research on air specks of the disease such as it's transmitted ability aids or acquired immune deficiency syndrome destroys the immune system leaving victims vulnerable to other diseases and infections that can be fatal the report was prepared by the office of technology assessment an arm of congress an official of the department of human health and human services replied that you consider the government's actions to be appropriate

our lead focus segment tonight is a drama in two parts each of them i talked nitty gritty specific in the continuing big story up now all how to cut the federal budget deficit i don't want is amtrak the government subsidize intercity passenger rail service it operates trains through forty three states over twenty four thousand miles of routes and carries twenty million passengers a year it was created in nineteen seventy one by the nixon administration is a passenger train more than a billion dollars in subsidies have gone to it since it got six other native for mayonnaise year and asked for the same amount next what the reagan administration has said now the time has come for the federal government to get out of the railroad business it was that message transportation secretary elizabeth dole talk to the senate appropriations committee today to a very mixed response we did base many difficult choices as we seek to

reduce the federal deficit without compromising our mutual commitment to maintain a safe and efficient nation's transportation system or a proposed budget will help barack by these choices by emphasizing the proper role of the federal government at this time more than ever before i believe we must over some financial needs and leave local matters the state and local authorities all the near term first recruit new hampshire but with the elimination of amtrak subsidies according to omb fifty six percent of the northeast corridor passenger is what turned the buses are claims what about the other forty four percent and what studies have been done on the number of who would use the already congested jfk ignore or to diminish your reportage well i think that one of the lessons side of err e regulation e regulation less regulation

and that where there is a significant and that demand for services one e mail carrier will provide any given the benefits of two point one billion dollars in the northeast corridor i think that it's quite conceivable that there will be our interest loan or local and state entities are at some private interest either be an interest in preserving the service remember the commerce clause of the constitution mandated congress to provide for the movement of people and their goods from state to state and some of us feel that we have a responsibility for that they become like devil's lake north dakota it's a hundred and some odd miles from the nearest town that has airline service it lost its airline service because of airline deregulation it now as i have practiced and without ever observers worry though it got a hundred miles or charlie parker earlier that sound reasonable proposal are

indeed have to make some hard decisions we don't have the funds at madame secretary's reviews would or lose with those trains are full and up early for their for a subsidy from the federal coffers is we're on amtrak for whatever route you take them on the airline except that well why they're using that service so that's that's really where the debate comes what facts give you any belief whatsoever that a private entity would pick up any portion of rail passenger service in this country i don't think that's an impact on no one said just arrived on a buick you indicated interstate near a few minutes ago but the government's opponents state local and privates would say just for trial would give you any hope that any private and he promises reforms they owned and had the discussions i

can't afford on those discussions with the intention is to contact those who might well have an interest to see if there is a winner of two men that the private sector left the whole northeast mostly united states high and dry when it came to re open its new service that's why there's an amtrak that's why there's a connecticut transportation authority the weather's an mta the guidance actors on the right this country and rail passengers within my legislative item is it unreasonable to bring the private sector into the discussions i think in light of that history what's going to happen is that they'll go ahead and take the public from arise why do you think in fact as creative as the private sector was doing a giant amtrak was created as understated as of two years test see if we can have a for profit corporation and i'd say the record and an eleven billion dollars later we're looking now at eight billion in the next decade or two percent of intercity travel and i do think it would be rather strange or list to come to the congress the various where the deficit reduction efforts need to

be focused on and not have amtrak owns madame secretary i'm not interested in discussing the general budget as a whole because you know that as well as i said that one will make out the fence and they would all of the unholy amtrak system and i don't feel obliged to go ahead and then the defense budget i don't think you should feel obliged either irresponsibility as my on this committee's transportation and we spend peanuts and crisp a story about we have the worst rail system in the world among any of the economically developed nations free nation the worst secretary what you're doing in the cutbacks of us were both the mass transit an intercity rail service is to push people back into their automobiles fastest as simple as that nobody picks up a terrible year and that is they scanned and private enterprise is not for the job regardless of your wealth about wishes he were to get back into their automobiles that'll be built transportation disaster and conservation energy disaster

we continue that debate now is senator william armstrong republican of colorado and member of the senate budget committee who supports the administration position on amtrak and congressman dan florio democrat of new jersey chairman of the house subcommittee which oversees amtrak and who strongly opposes the administration's position center armstrong has your colleague senator weicker write that this legislation of this proposal would put people back in their cars you know i don't think so in fact they're in many cases the result would be for increased use of intercity bus in some cases airline travel that isn't really the issue that has a program which it failed according to its own intended purpose it was set up as a two year cash with the explanation at the time that if if congress would come up with a little seed money this government corporation amtrak could operate profitably refurbish the cardinal knew little advertising and so on and pretty soon we'll be in the black or first year was that it cost about forty million this year it's gonna cost eight we have got about eight percent and almost a billion project of the

next year the iranian movement about a program that isn't working it's extravagant and it really doesn't fulfill any or writing national purpose there's other alternatives available for people who need to have transportation as juan forero i know you disagree just about everything in somerset was taken one of the parts that it's a failure well it's ten twenty million people here say can talk about it being a failure is a parliament port and transportation system that we have in this nation iowa talking about seventy thousand people a day use between washington and iraq the prospect but most people in cars and going into manhattan i suspect causes them to people's grief we're talking about memphis what this is a budget reduction proposal that makes no sense this would cost money to redo the system but i'm a three billion dollars of capital plant equipment will be virtually useless we're talking about them in the course of putting people back into their cars and were talking about benefits that the twenty five thousand employees who will lose their jobs in the first of october are entitled to the government isn't a

hate that far excess of the six hundred million dollars that the system costs is really the senator made the point with friends but one third of the trident submarine is equivalent of the annual cost of maintaining this is i really do think that every civilized nation the world has a rail passenger transportation system we would not if the administration when it's a system let's go through the signs on this question the car and says how could a transportation system that one twenty million people a year be a failure well the first place that so not twenty million different people and the question isn't whether or not any particular person traveled anywhere and it isn't a question will not be a washington york service would be discontinued it wouldn't be that would be continued under some money i'll probably buy private and there was no privacy not to make money and assistance which has now begun to appreciate the fact this is part of a national transportation system that is is

out there so people know what is talking about but the two billion dollars that the american taxpayers paid last year for the air traffic control segment of the faa is budget and no one is talking about the on the interstate transportation system the rows of buses are using and trucks use as being a subsidy affect matters that arsenal we'll roughly speaking the roads are very formally enters through a fuel taxes and the question of what went on a trident submarine is a significant budget item or not is not in dispute that ought to be a scaled back to either they didn't want to come back but that doesn't justify continuing a program which is going deeper and deeper into which is now costing at twenty five hundred a decade ago is serving fewer passenger mild in which in the tijuana people would be contained in the areas where it is needed either as a secretarial said through a combination of state and local government actually order the private sector i don't admit as a as an inveterate

writer fashioned route i don't admit that the private sector wouldn't have to look in areas where it's needed such as washing in new york to boston that i think what about the congressman's point about a national transportation policy that the government has a responsibility and senator henry said that on the plate with the government has a responsibility to make sure people can get around in this country do not agree i wonder if it either of my colleagues before or a senator and could name one single location in this country that has not otherwise serve either by the commercial airline or inner city motor bus or by federal highway more and more stations at least two of those three alternatives there are lots of them that that is you're buying and we're working on amtrak but you can go you don't forget that with titles like senator andrew did not say there was a bus service there not be willing to bet that there is it really talking about a concept of what we want this country to be about in terms of transportation and of what we're talking about is fuel conservation were

talking back environmental protection because twenty million people and put them into their cars the traffic congestion in some areas is just for partisan arm said this was a fight was waged in nineteen eighty one by this administration there's a bipartisan consensus that came forward that point since that time other way to respectfully dispute centers point about of course getting worst of course is getting substantially better and there's a consensus across the country even in the administration that the of the federal assistance to an amtrak has been going down his mortgage coming unfair box so that the fact is that this is an improving system and to walk away from a town where almost cost the federal government more than to make it while the cost is only going down because the worst the most egregious and most extravagant groups have been terminated and immediately terminate the rest of them what you get down to is what private sector would support that would may also make this point that the notion that somehow and dragons more environmentally sound then the automobile assembly not worn out as a matter of fact but according to general accounting office study

on this matter the least a solution oriented the form of mass transit is not railroad but the buses let me ask you the same question that person to wipe her ass sector a goal where is that is there any evidence that the private sector would pick up it keeps a washington new york is there any evidence on that i mean what what it there what would that that's an opinion yet if the convenience of leaving from downtown washington to arrive in downtown manhattan is not sufficient to justify a yes their swift sufficient to cover the cost of providing the service that they're not about to sign that people don't want to then there's lots of alternative ways to go from new york to washington is that because in fact when that route does pay for itself were talking about what but talking about the fare course the operating expenses out without a capital investment

the answer quite frankly is that you will not be able to have a private sector rail transportation system and the evidence is that the railroad industry itself while this is very capable knowledgeable about these things got out of the past the system only has a few years ago we got caught well out of the passenger aspect of their business in order to get them into being profitable so the answer is no there isn't any prospect of a private sector response to rail passenger needs you just disagree with that wealth it at first but as long as there are lots of alternatives in every community in america where amtrak service and in view of the fact that we've tried it for a dozen years or more and it isn't working according to the original specification the program and they really are and what you think this is real verizon forero if love center armstrong in the administration have their way what do you think will happen to either not necessarily an amtrak what to this bizarre but said it now

provides nationwide what you think and resolve one of the easy answers on the first of october the system stops on the twenty five thousand employees lose their jobs and you're talking in certain areas with commuters use the same tracks the cost for example images of the cost of maintaining the northeast corridor which is now borne by amtrak will have to go to the theater agencies expectation of things i'm like seventy million dollars a year to local your agency which is also facing cuts as the urban mass transportation cuts that the administration is facing and so you're also talking about not only the intercity lines affectively closing down the curator says you think that will call me and you think the day that amtrak goes out on those low so on the inner city pastors services come true and it's absolutely no i don't think so far i don't think that's the testing that there will probably be an enormous human cry for modernization labor rules that's really what killed a large portion of the railroad passenger business in the first place but beyond that i distance is that isn't that there's lots of alternate

airlines bosses would drop or in the private sector the regulation is it really the direction all conflicts and we've seen it over over again you know you can go well coast to coast cheaper by air and six hours then you can create buy a railroad today in a lot of primary care and song how about the ability of the private sector to provide that service if it's needed bill provided a new economic time it's in some support in the nation the two billion dollars to the air traffic controls is that let them get this ticket ticket buyers but the airlines pass it on to the people who would benefit from it there's no reason why a non fliers should subsidize law and any more management and made this point amtrak runs right through my state it runs right through denver and right through southern colorado and i can't see any reason why some taxpayer in little rock arkansas that may not benefit on a pay for the travel of people in colorado if the services needed travelers will pay for givat isn't the new federalism carried to its logical extreme whereby we don't think of each other in

terms of a national transportation system and let everybody figure out how they can get themselves around that really is not in accordance with the the constitutional requirements that we have in terms of it good john ashby both serve as powerful for ailes said the senator demonstration ask the same thing in nineteen eighty one didn't get anywhere what can happen as well i'm not sure my guess is that the administration probably prevail this time but sooner or later amtrak has ended up not because i say so ronald reagan's a sober because day after day year after year it's becoming more obvious as is a program which is authentic it is gonna fall its own way to mention i hope it'll be this year before another to get another a hundred million or another billion and a half or two billion or three billion or ten billion their possessions on you think amtrak isn't dead but it's disabled the president prevail in the senate in this matter and then he does prevail and the system does self destruct which i'm convinced it will then we have to hope then all the points being made on somebody else willing to commit to take care of that are true and that

is not something to put back together again and if the worst case scenario was to occur that the system self destruct and there's nobody the comedian and pick up the slack when you drop the major economic interest petitioned is locations in this country that we will pay a great price for our next focus segment looks at another budget proposal this one targets the salaries of the nation's one million civil service workers the president wants to cut their paychecks by five percent this would save three billion dollars and costs the workers an average of twelve hundred and fifty dollars a year critics say the plan is unfair because federal workers perform necessary jobs and wrongly stereotype is overpaid an underworld we're going to talk with a defender and an opponent of the president's plan but first reaction from some of the workers targeted for pay cuts is a report from kwame holdeman

at the latter is home to about twenty three thousand federal employees twelve percent of the city's workforce to find out what the impact of a five percent pay cut would be here we went to the regional internal revenue service center there's a few million platforms every year the forms are sorted checked visually that into a computer then rechecked by an army of irs workers of the twenty five hundred federal employees here eighty percent are women the average salary is in the low teaser for example works in the administrative mailroom earns thirteen thousand dollars a year and she says that the sheer volume of work handled by her office should dispel a widely held image of the lazy government worker this fed to insinuate that have in one way this situation have to return in your mailbox the new name it takes a lot of man

how to process them two of those parents belong to rosemary's attack the examiner every day she checks and process is more than one thousand tracks towards that means she has to be conversant with hundreds of different tax provisions so fresh we're honest people and work on farmland and it's not an awful lot out there on her salary rosemary stevens can afford nothing more luxurious than a public housing unit played with roaches she is a single parent who has raised five children rosemary stevens says the five percent pay cut proposed by the reagan administration would hurt it would mean a nine hundred dollar cut and her salary so i mean is it

elaine jones already has to borrow money to pay the rent and to raise her son her salary would be cut by six hundred fifty dollars what am i gonna do with his five percent of mount a clear how we're going to manage her leg on a payment deals my creditors and it without descending scale amadeo my medicine on than five percent mr donnelly oh even worse all charlene stewart opens and swords three hundred envelopes an hour earning less than six hundred dollars a month to support her three children she already has a second job he would be forced to try to get another part time job right now i don't spend enough time with my children because i'm trying to work enough so we'll have a place to

stay in if they cut my paycheck like i said i have to cause you know i work three jobs but these workers they've been worth knowing about the talk of a pay cut the effect it's had a more well this is all wrong oh just being part of the government services are really was just for our own bar you were deported government guide the government job that this time when only when tan tan tan i said do whatever they want now building so a combination of poor morale and the pay cuts could mean that the government will have a harder time attracting qualified workers and employees like these at the iris center in atlanta say they might

seek jobs in the private sector the president of the union representing women like those we've just seen is with us tonight along with a supporter of the president's proposed pay cuts robert tobias president of the national treasury for years union is taking the lead in arguing for federal workers this week some two hundred members of his union from around the country came to washington to lobby for their cause on the other side is david deng home who heads the public service research counsel a conservative group opposed to the workers' cause but two federal unions as well first outing with you mr tobias how typical are the women we've just seen of civil servants generally i think they're very very typical there is some thirty thousand internal revenue service employees to fall into the same category as those women and if the average pay roughly in the end the team says that was reported in the tape for those thirty thousand people the answer is yes

and how badly we heard what the women had said about how these cuts will affect their lives but in general how badly do you think the average our civil service worker will be affected by these cuts i think that any civil service workers could be adversely affected in their morale is can be adversely affected anytime you tell someone that they're going to be paid less being asked to do more they don't like it and that no matter what you pay no matter what you're doing to be asked to be taken a pay cut under the circumstances that people don't like it that's especially true since this is the president is asking these employees to take a pay cut the first pay cut since the great depression and is not asking that kind of a sacrifice from any other employees any federal workers are being singled out in my view they are being singled out to take a pay cut that they don't deserve to have to take a bend behind their counterparts in the private sector

since nineteen seventy eight and they've been taking a pay cut in comparison the private sector since nineteen seventy eight and now they're being asked to have five percent an additional five percent pay cut and come october first a nineteen eighty five when you say that mr dionne they don't deserve to have it can't pay cut well i think it's unfortunate that everything you've said so far concentrates on the people of the lower and the pay scale well they are getting caught i yes they are but i think in any society there will be people who are paid more than others and your entire focus is only so far on those people at the very lowest end but let's look at that how the quit rate in the federal government is extremely low the er there are nine applicants for everyone federal job available in those in those gs want to just for ratings or seven and a half applicants for every job available if you need us wind energy and four ratings and what kind of the week three people you were short on television ok and so that there are

plenty of people out there who apparently think that those are good jobs at good pay and would be quite happy to have them much more so than you would find say in the private sector of the economy but you're only looking at a very small group is true tobias says that no other sacrifices are being made nobody else has taken pay cuts in the private sector work on the airport no meatpacking which is the largest meatpacker they just took a twenty five percent cut and upi they just took it a twenty three percent cut at disneyland they just took a seventeen percent cut it is not as though you're going to the federal workers asking for a five percent cut in senior the only ones who are going out or are going through any kind of problem we don't do something about the deficit we can't do something about interest rates and the average american who would like to buy a home if the interest rates would go down one percent could perhaps save as much as fifty dollars a month on his house painted i can see where he would feel some sympathy for a person who pay was cut as much as

john oliver here but i think there are probably far more people out there who would like to be able to buy homes and who need housing hour one might have that much sympathy for someone says i won't take any cut in pay and that deprive me of a whole i don't think that you can ask people who are on social security to take cuts in benefits and at the same time say no wheels was going to take any democrat iowa let me just get visited by <unk> five federal workers are being thing well i think that they are being singled out and i think that to equate a one percent reduction in interest rate with a five percent reduction pay is ludicrous what we're talking about is whether or not we're going to have a quality federal workforce whether or not we're going to be able to attract and retain the kind of people we need to do the kind of job is government needs to have done but even if there isn't a third of them very well quit rate anything that these people believe if there's a five percent cut well i think that there must have been home is in error and doesn't know what he's talking about with respect to the service centers for example because i'm in the service centers they can't get enough people

to do the job for example in the austin service center a similar percentage us the same as the sham the service center ahead of turnover of twenty two hundred people last year that left because of the bad pay in the austin service or they can get jobs doing other things what about that incident and i heard that you have this film a segment on the show tonight so i called atlanta and i asked civil service officer whether there were any jobs available at the center and there are not available but they do have applicants they're in other words the jobs there are for it i don't know are however you explain that if conditions are so bet adding expensive that well i don't think they're to run a personnel system by saying the way we should decide on whether now inequality people is how much turnover we have i think that the private sector spends many millions of dollars of increasing loyalty to their corporation or to their firm and they they want people to a stay on his employees and what was the dental was suggesting is because we don't have turnover then pay is adequate i think that what you need to do is look at

what the pay is compare that to the private sector the surveys show that every single job is behind the private sector counterparts the most conservative study says that this time by ten point three percent of your labor statistics says were behind the eighteen point two percent that intro of incidental market i don't know where he found this most conservative study but there was a study issued by the oscars gomez reaches the stage in nineteen eighty four that simply does not show that the pay is crocus quite comparable in the middle of the gs schedule and at the very end both ends is somewhat off but in order to get that ten percent figure is talking about he wouldn't be talking about it just fifteen or above an asset we were talking about i'm talking about the hay and associates report that was produced by the produced by a an associate of management consulting firms produce allows post office and civil service commission committee and then they said ten point three percent was the how far federal

employees lag behind the private sector he has the most conservative estimate and that is not the most conservative estimate there are many other estimates that are that shows there's a device that has had been home schooling that what we've shown is that is the very small percentage of the of the federal workers that we've shown the low end of the scale but the average worker doesn't make that small amount of money and so the cuts would be distressed because we've shown well i think that what we're talking about is two point three million federal employees and every person at every job level is being asked take five percent pay cut and i think that it's unfair when you're at the bottom or the middle or witty at the top clearly those people at the bottom are gonna feel it more than a few it means somebody who's living near party already be asked to take a five percent cut it's gonna be a disaster somebody who's saving money to send a kid to college you can't lose would have to take a five percent cut of an impact on them summer's block are in anticipation of maintaining their pay level that could have an impact on them so it won't

i well i would say let's look at the american public and look at the people who are paying the taxes and all of the things that they are being asked to do our work than your truck there's talk across the war just as on the person of this program about cutting things and the cuts have been proposed now have been described as the middle class cuts in other words the governmental programs which are beneficial to the american public are also being asked to be cut we're not talking about the federal employees as a group of people taking all of the burden we're talking about the american public deciding that in order to restore fiscal solace into our federal system that we all have to make some changes and cuts if i think the people are not federal employees will be asked to make others sacrifices and those sacrifices will reflect in the level of the costs that they have favorites with interest listen to buy things that the federal workers shouldn't take any current one saying that the federal worker has taken cuts since nineteen seventy eight and that's why we we were

lagging behind their private sector counterparts we've been lagging behind since nineteen seventy eight and we're saying enough is enough sir isaac denholm about the morale affected that we heard the ladies talk about they were so proud that they work for the government and they have to take these cuts would really be a blow it might possibly affect productivity and does that concern you know it certainly does i mean there is there's no question that anybody who says take a five percent pay cut is going to have a morale problem i am sure that that's something that was taken into consideration when the proposal was made but i the fact that there will be a morale problem shouldn't be enough in itself to dissuade us from making changes that are essential to the entire nature of the of the budget says do you think it would help their morale problem with the congressman and the political appointees at the higher levels you know this has been discussed would also take some kind of work is if it is there any likelihood of there i don't know i sort of

doubted i would i would hope that that would go right along with the rest of it that they would all say yes we're going to approve a five percent pay cut and cover only five percent but i've known congress too long to to really expect that with their enterprise your people a bit in their lobbying congress this week what you think the chances of congress resisting these cuts are going to be what was certainly hopeful that congress is going to hear our play in the congress has can understand that adverse impact on produce productivity and that adverse impact on morale and well the volt the a canape increases we any images or methadone briefly what do you think congress is the reaction is going to be i think that they are racks are partial being split and that is going to end up in a package that if there's some proposals arise it'll survive as part of an entire package it will not be considered separately with thank you very much for being with us both units advise and dissent and how it still to come on the newshour tonight the view from cuba on the return of twenty seven hundred cuban boat people from the

united states and a most unusual gambling story from pennsylvania next to return to cuba twenty three cubans made the trip home today for the united states they are the first of twenty seven under the us is reporting on grounds they are criminals or are mentally ill they were among the one hundred and twenty five thousand cubans who came here and the nineteen eighty freedom flotilla all the others have been assimilated into american society cuban leader fidel castro agreed to accept the twenty seven hundred an agreement with the united states last december robert macneil when he interviewed castro in about two weeks ago asked about that agreement i want to ask you about the young people who were going to be a combat return to cuba because of the agreement while the immigration arena do that with the united states some of the

lawyers who have been taking their cases in the united states i want them to stay in the states because they say they will be persecuted if they come back here please of the performer criminals prisoners and mental patients twenty five hundred of them who went in the mariel boatlift what is going to happen to them when they come back here i would've not guilty of the conflict here is that the mentally ill people wait and upset and ridiculous the idea that we are murders jail people four thousand workers into which is that there's also a certain country would've care because it is a concern

then liz someone responsible for crime someone was violated right now one of child murder no one did it some opponents it was not a criminal what we call the people responsible for the things but not mental patients more people are responsible for prying if we have been so far thank you robert we were the country so many

resources the country of defense human rights human rights receive a mental patient has a ball and sense of that that does not the agreement we have reached at that time people did not meet the weak dollar saying goes virtual because of whatever reason maybe it's enough for us to know that victims of them now than what we do with it if you live it is a whole or someone who became really there because of the money and at some does that send them been certain that they will be cared for the municipal id just because our psychiatric hospitals are better than us by hospitals better medical results than us after she wrote it

it is not in the agreement it's nice so for these centers we are just little information that the necessarily political arena next we focus on pennsylvania state where gambling is illegal that is it was until recently one state legislator was discovered that they had voted to make it legal by mistake it happened with a bill designed only to a man the state's liquor code when nobody was looking award was inserted that opened the door heretofore close as to bar owners and would be a

gambler isn't the state begins a carpenter of pennsylvania public television picks up the story from there las vegas nevada know atlantic city new jersey wrong again try philadelphia pennsylvania just blocks from city hall of kavanaugh as irish bar and grill customers are lining up every monday and friday for a beer and blackjack it's slow enough for those or they can relax over time and they're going to get back and tried again or like a second class for a twenty dollar entry fee customers at forty seven a table and play a shoe six car datsun a dispenser players wager chips and whoever holds the most when the shoe is emptied wins a prize up to eighty dollars for first thirty dollars for second the house keeps the rest about fifty to sixty dollars a table across town at mars a posh nightclub the stakes are higher and so were the prizes the dealers are licensed prose imported from atlantic city even

the chips bear the club's logo it sure looks like gambling but you don't see anything it looks like a duck and talks about philadelphia district attorney edward rendell says he had no idea this activity was legal until last november when some local tavern owners called him up and said listen if we start gambling under this new bill will be a project manager you are restless and i said what new bill this new bill senate bill seven thirty which passed the state house and senate in april nineteen eighty four but even pro gambling state senator vincent fort mile of south philadelphia says he never dreamed that this would do or eventually i didn't know i'm saying i would bet that very few people know somebody had to know somebody had appointed him well that's because it shouldn't happen state representative joseph the teacher thought he was voting for abilities in

pennsylvania's tough sunday liquor laws he was once the bill got to a house senate conference committee the beer industry added a provision allowing sporting tournaments in bars for such games as boeing billiards schaeffer bird rings and that and carts there are listed there were cards was inserted at the last minute by a state senator from the pocono resort region frank o'connell he's not talking about why he put a damn but the point is when the conference committee report came up for a final passage no one bothered to take it out the scenes of erotic confusion about exactly what was said that they now honestly i did not hear anything about two elements but at some point i don't know how it's how cruz's but some point somebody said that records is forecast again a spokesman for governor dick thornburgh who prides himself on close scrutiny of every built across his desk says the governor's saw the word card but didn't think it could possibly overturn the state's anti gambling statute and indeed for months nothing happened not a poker chip and gambling

table inside until philadelphia district attorney edward when doubt who also happens to be running for governor carter may i call him back and i said it's good news bad news story the good news is that i came out were arrested because the law is clear the money's black jack torrance the bad news is i think it's a horrible piece of legislation and i'm a try to get it repealed nothing happened in pennsylvania who was la for six months until it when del went public and said gee we have this problem it was an improbable you created that's all of them and also for us that his news conference was like the total and then everybody next week started there were there was no absolutely improper was there some tavern owners are racing the clock against almost certain repeal of the law which politicians aside from being embarrassed considered to be the worst of both worlds not only does the bill allow gambling but the state can collect a nickel in taxes and there are no controls on shady operators are organized on the bar owners have been eyeing nearby atlantic city's

profits with envy say fine let's attacks it lets regulated because eventually usually do more and legislators will it be science represents or leadership board ministration have to face reality and surveys one example and are never gonna stop and you just might as well read about efforts to prevent another atlantic city alex next weekend when the pennsylvania legislature returns from recess they're expected to try and repeal the gambling provision lots of luck jim again the major stories of this day a deal on farm credit was apparently struck like the second avenue and a senate filibuster or in the wake of the debate and vote on edwin meese's nomination to be attorney general new figures say the us economy grew at a healthy rate last year than originally thought and president reagan hold his first news conference of the new year tonight and i tried i did it and that's the newshour for

tonight we'll be back tomorrow night and charlayne hunter gault of the night the macneil lehrer newshour is funded by at and t reaching out in new directions the corporation for public broadcasting and the station and other public television stations or maybe it's been

the pope nice butt transcripts and two dollars