[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 98 (Tuesday, July 21, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8597-S8600]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  ELIMINATION OF THE MARRIAGE PENALTY

  Mr. ASHCROFT. Mr. President, we are here this morning--myself and 
several other Senators--because the American people should experience a 
tax cut before Congress gets its funding for the year.
  We are here this morning to oppose cloture on the legislative branch 
appropriations bill. On Friday, Senator Brownback of Kansas, and I 
attempted to enter into an agreement to offer the marriage penalty 
elimination amendment to the legislative appropriations measure.
  Marriage penalty elimination means that we simply want to stop 
penalizing people, tax-wise, because they are married. A cloture motion 
was filed because the Democrats would not allow us to offer that 
amendment to this bill. Therefore, a vote against cloture is a vote for 
eliminating the marriage penalty tax. If we are not going to be able to 
offer this amendment to the bill, we will be back on other pieces of 
legislation, because this issue of providing equity to people who are 
married, and returning the hard-earned money of American taxpayers is 
too important to ignore.
  In 1948, President Harry Truman called the Republicans in Washington 
a ``do-nothing Congress.'' Now the President and Senate Democrats are 
resurrecting Truman's phrase. I don't worry about being called a ``do-
nothing Congress.'' We have done plenty of things. But if we tried to 
do nothing about taxes, that label just might stick.
  Last April, a group of like-minded Senators and I stated our 
intentions to oppose the Senate budget resolution unless meaningful tax 
cuts were included. We were promised that eliminating the marriage 
penalty would be the Senate's top tax priority for 1998. Mr. President, 
today, the 21st day of July, there are less than 40 legislative days 
left in this session of the Congress; yet, we are no closer to giving 
the American people the tax cuts than we were 3 months ago.
  We stand here in mid- to late-July with the real possibility that 
Congress will not pass a budget reconciliation and will not deliver on 
the tax cut promise that was made to the American people. I think we 
ought to put this into context. This isn't a situation where cutting 
taxes would be a strain or be difficult. To add insult to injury, last 
week the Congressional Budget Office indicated that there would be $520 
billion of surplus over the next 5 years. Now, the $520 billion of 
surplus over the next 5 years would be $63 billion of surplus in this 
year alone.
  We have not asked for the Moon. We have asked for a modest 
opportunity to cut and eliminate the marriage penalty. It would not 
take $520 billion. It would not take $420 billion. It would not take 
$320 billion. It would not take $220 billion. It would take about $1 
out of every $5 that is to be provided in surplus, according to the 
Congressional Budget Office. So we are just asking that the American 
people have the opportunity to have, in return, $1 out of every $5 of 
surplus. This isn't asking that we have massive, Draconian cuts, or 
that we displace some Government program--although there are plenty of 
Government programs I would be happy to seek to displace. We are merely 
saying that, over the course of the next 5 years, some fraction--a 
minority fraction, as a matter of fact, not the major portion of it--of 
this rather substantial surplus be devoted to providing equity on the 
part of our taxation program, which is an insult to the values of 
America. I don't know of anyplace in the country you could go, or any 
group of individuals you could talk to that would not tell you that the 
families of America are simply fundamental, that if we have strong 
families in the next century, we are very likely to have a strong 
country. If we don't have strong families, it is going to be very 
difficult for our country to survive.

  I believe that when moms and dads, as families, do their job, 
governing America is easy. If moms and dads can't do their jobs, if we 
pull the rug out from under families and make it tough for them, 
governing America could well be impossible. The truth of the matter is 
that families mean more to America than Government means to America, 
because the fundamental restraints of a culture, the values and 
precepts, are taught in families.
  Government can try to do all those things. We have tried to replace 
families with Government before. The tremendous failure of the social 
experiment called the ``Great Society'' of the 1960s and 1970s told us 
that checks and Government programs weren't substitutes for moms and 
dads. They didn't work. What we need to do is make it possible for the 
culture to survive and to thrive, for the culture to prevail and to 
stop penalizing the most important institution in the culture--the 
family. Durable marriages and strong families are absolutely necessary 
if we are to succeed in the 21st century.
  Starting in the sixties is when the marriage penalty became 
prevalent. For about 30 years, we have systematically penalized 
millions of people. The truth of the matter is that there are 21 
million couples--about 42 million taxpayers--who collectively have paid 
$29 billion. It is so easy to forget how much money a billion dollars 
is. A billion dollars is a thousand millions. Now, these 42 million 
taxpayers have collectively paid ``29-thousand-million-dollars'' more 
than they would have paid had they been single. That is an average 
marriage penalty of about $1,400 per family. Think of that. We go into 
a family and, simply because the mom and dad happen to be married 
instead of single, we take $1,400 off their table; we take $1,400 out 
of that family's budget. These are not pretax dollars, these are 
aftertax dollars. It would go right to the bottom line.
  Think of what a family could do with an extra $130 or $125 a month. 
Think of what it means to the family, the capacity of that family to 
fend for itself and to be able to survive as a family. We are attacking 
that family. The policy of America is attacking the principles of the 
American people. And it's easy. We can do it. CBO has told us that we 
are going to have five times as much money, or four times as much--a 
lot more money--well, $520 billion extra. We said we have to have a 
minimum

[[Page S8598]]

$101 billion to begin this relief. That is five times as much as we 
have asked for. Yet, we are so focused on providing for the Congress, 
so focused on providing for the legislative branch, and we are ignoring 
the people of America. The families of America are more important than 
the legislative branch of Government.
  As much as I think our country needs the House and Senate, why we 
should provide all the funding the House and Senate need and not 
provide any of the relief that we have promised to the American family, 
why we should continue to attack the American family, is beyond me. 
Discriminating against Americans who wish to engage in marriage is--
well, it is just against everything we stand for.
  The penalizing of income at the median- and lower-income levels is 
greatest for married households with dependent children. The obligation 
to file a combined income means that the one spouse working to earn the 
second half of the income is working largely to feed Government 
coffers. Often the couple would pay a lower percentage of their income 
to the Government if one of its spouses was not employed outside the 
home. The marriage penalty is a grossly unfair assault on the bedrock 
of our civilization--married couples.
  Does the Tax Code really influence people's moral decisions to 
prevent couples from getting married? Unfortunately, there are 
individuals who simply have gotten divorced, set aside their marriages, 
in order to avoid the penalty that we impose for being married. Some 
couples even divorce and remarry to avoid paying the penalty.
  The Senator from Kansas brought up an example last week of two 
economists who divorce and remarry every year to avoid paying the 
higher taxes. The facts point to tragic instances of where couples 
simply cannot afford to get married because the Government is going to 
charge them $1,400 for the privilege of being married. Sharon Mallory 
and Darryl Pierce of Connorsville, IN, were ready to get married when 
they learned from their accountant that it would cost them $3,700 more 
a year. The amount results from the forfeiting of a tax refund check of 
$900 and an additional $2,700 to be owed to the IRS as a married 
couple. A growing number of married couples are in a similar position 
according to a recent study by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget 
Office.
  (Mr. SMITH of Oregon assumed the Chair.)
  Mr. ASHCROFT. Now, the incentive effects of the current Tax Code were 
not intentional. I have to say this. I do not believe that the Congress 
ever set out----
  Mr. BROWNBACK. Mr. President, will my colleague from Missouri yield 
for a question?
  Mr. ASHCROFT. I would be most pleased to yield for a question from my 
colleague from Kansas.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. Last week when we put forward this notion of doing 
away with the marriage penalty, one of my Democrat colleagues said, ``I 
would be willing to do that if you offset it by doing away with the 
marriage bonus.'' He raised the question of the marriage bonus in the 
Tax Code. I told him I am not about raising taxes. But I wonder if the 
Senator has thought about this issue. Is there a marriage bonus that is 
in the Tax Code? Is that something that should be addressed?
  Mr. ASHCROFT. Our Tax Code has and still operates in some instances 
to allow combining, by having a joint return, combined return, to have 
a lower tax for married people, and that really results from the 
conscious decision we make to recognize the value to our culture of a 
stay-at-home spouse. It focuses attention on the children and says we 
ought to give some benefit taxwise for doing that. And you do that by 
allowing the spouse who works to attribute some income to the stay-at-
home spouse.
  I don't think there are very many of us who are married who, when one 
or the other has had to stay at home, doesn't realize that the one who 
focuses on the homeplace and undertakes that responsibility is really 
responsible for income and is responsible for the benefit of the 
family.
  I believe that the ability to split the income so that you get to the 
lowest tax bracket is something that should be provided to everybody in 
marriage. I wouldn't call it a bonus as if it were giving something 
out. It is a recognition of the value of the spouse who stays at home 
and the contribution that spouse makes, not only to the marriage and to 
the family but the contribution they make to the country.
  Most of the data we are seeing now about children--and I am sure my 
friend from Kansas agrees with this data and has witnessed the articles 
and all the expounding--indicate that when one of the spouses can stay 
at home and spend a lot of time with the children, it is a big 
investment in the children and it results in children having lower 
incidences of bad health and lower incidences of school failure, 
dropout, lower incidences of juvenile delinquency and all. So that kind 
of attention from the family really is a social benefit to the entire 
culture, because if there are fewer dropouts, it means that your 
education system works better; if there is better health, it means the 
cost of the benefits of the health providers are lower; and if there is 
lower juvenile delinquency, it certainly means we benefit.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. If my colleague will yield for another question, it 
seems the bonus is to America; it is not necessarily to the married 
couple that we are talking about in this.
  The other thing I would ask my colleague about is, the marriage 
penalty that we are talking about affects nearly 21 million American 
families, most of them young, starting families. These are all families 
that make between $20,000 and $70,000 a year. They are two-wage-earner 
families. So you are really talking about that group of young Americans 
just getting started, both working, both struggling, both trying to 
make this family go, and we actually penalize them on an average of 
$1,400 per year. My colleague is familiar with that. Also, this is a 
relatively new tax. We have only put it on since 1969. That was the 
year of Woodstock. I don't know if there is a significance to any of 
that, but perhaps this is now the time that we should get away from 
that sort of penalty.

  I just was curious; I know my colleague knows of those statistics and 
the importance of trying to help those struggling young families that 
are just now getting a foundation started for their families.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. I am aware of that. I thank the Senator from Kansas for 
the question. I am desperately aware of it. This is the time when the 
stress on families is the hardest. If you look at the things that break 
up families, if you go to data that tells us whether or not a family is 
going to make it past the threshold and be able to persist as a strong 
family with the kind of durability that has the capacity to really help 
our culture with the lasting relationships of support that families 
bring, one of the biggest items is financial problems.
  So here we have tender families at the very beginning, when they are 
struggling, they have kids, they are torn between responsibilities at 
the homeplace and the workplace, and what do we do? Instead of easing 
that financial burden, we zero in. It is almost like these families are 
staggering under the load they are bearing, because children are 
expensive, we know that--it costs a lot of money to clothe them, feed 
them, provide for them --and as they are struggling under that load, we 
come in and take another $1,400 a year off their table, out of their 
budgets, out of their capacity to provide for their children.
  It is an anomaly. It certainly wasn't something that I think the 
Congress ever intended. I have absolutely every faith the Congress of 
the United States did not intend to hurt families with the Tax Code. 
But it has kind of grown this way, and here is where we are. The 
question is not what we intended. The question is what we are going to 
do about this. Are we going to, at a time of $520 billion of surplus, 
decide we would rather feed the bureaucracy than relieve the families 
of America of this burden? That is plain and simple. Are we going to 
have new programs and more Government or are we going to have stronger 
families with less tax burden?
  Mr. BROWNBACK. If my colleague will yield, I would also note the 
individuals who have contacted various offices around here signing on 
to this very issue. This is a lady from Indiana who said this:

       I can't tell you how disgusted we both are over this tax 
     issue. If we get married, not

[[Page S8599]]

     only would I forfeit my $900 refund check, we would be 
     writing a check to the IRS for $2,800. Darryl and I would 
     very much like to be married, and I must say it broke our 
     hearts when we found out we can't afford to get married.

  This is from Indiana.
  This gentleman from Ohio said:

       I have been engaged to be married. My fiancee and I have 
     discussed the fact we will be penalized financially. We have 
     postponed the date of our marriage in order to save up and 
     have a running start in part because of this nasty unfair tax 
     structure.

  Those are just two. And I have a number of other letters of people 
saying: ``What is this? You guys are talking about family values and 
you penalize us for getting married.'' And particularly the youngest 
couples just getting started.
  All we are asking for today is to let us vote on this issue, and we 
are being blocked. I am asking people not to vote for this cloture 
motion, in order that we can vote to do away with this extraordinarily 
bad tax that is taxing those fundamental family-building units, the 
marriage institution that we need so much to be so much stronger.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. I have to answer the question of the Senator from 
Kansas in the affirmative. I understand that. I am aware of it, and I 
really think that we have a chance to say to the American people: Look, 
we want to give you a wedding present. We would like to say to you that 
we are no longer going to make it tough on you if you do the most 
important thing to sustain this culture in the time to come.
  I am a little distressed that this body does not want to let us 
confront that issue--I mean, there are Members of the body who do not--
and that cloture would keep us from being able to make a priority the 
well-being of America's families, so we do not take care of ourselves 
in the legislative appropriations bill and ignore the families of 
America with the elimination of the marriage penalty tax. I hope 
Members of this body will vote against cloture. Let us vote so we have 
the possibility of addressing the needs of American families.
  I, for one, commend the Senator from Kansas for his outstanding 
effort in this respect. At some point we simply have to stop business 
as usual, continuing to tax these families, taking an average of $1,400 
a year off their tables, out of their budgets. When they sit down to 
figure out, ``What can we spend this year,'' $1,400 is more than a 
vacation. Lots of families can take a little time off. But it may be 
school books, it may be school clothing, it may have to do with whether 
they can--well, I am sure there are many things that individuals look 
at, for $1,400 a year.
  It is time for us simply to say: Before we continue to balloon 
Government, before we consume this $520 billion surplus, before we rush 
to governmentalize that, we should say at least some portion of this, a 
modest portion, far less than half, far less than a third, could 
sustain total relief for America's families by eliminating the marriage 
penalty--and it ought to be done. It should provide individuals the 
opportunity to say, ``We will be married, we will have durable 
families,'' and it should stop taking from families who are staggering 
under the tax load, it should stop those families from being further 
injured when the Government comes and says, ``We simply think we are 
more important than you are,'' especially as it relates to the surplus 
money that is supposed to be here--as a result of the hard work of the 
American people. I started to say this money is coming as a result of 
the Congressional Budget Office's estimation. What arrogance that would 
be. We do not bring money to Washington. Money comes to Washington 
because people work hard, because they are entrepreneurs, because they 
get up early and stay up late--take care of their kids.
  I thank the Senator from Kansas. I know there are others here wishing 
to speak. I just say eliminating the marriage penalty is important to 
the future of the United States of America. We should vote against 
cloture because we need to have the opportunity to provide this relief 
to America's families.
  Mr. GRAMS addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.
  Mr. GRAMS. Mr. President, I rise this morning to support, in a small 
way, the efforts of my colleagues from Kansas and from Missouri, 
talking about how to abolish the marriage penalty and help instill 
American values into the U.S. Tax Code. I applaud them for their 
continual efforts to bring this issue to the floor, to continue to talk 
about the need for us to take a very hard look at this and hopefully 
create the means of eliminating this very unfair tax on American 
families.
  Since the founding days of this Nation, the family has always been 
considered to be the bedrock of American society, the first unit of 
Government. Strong families make strong communities, and strong 
communities are what has made a strong America. For generations, our 
ancestors built this country on that very foundation, and the 
Government respected that tradition by ensuring that its laws did not 
usurp the family role.
  Then how do we explain the existence of the marriage penalty, a piece 
of Government tax trickery that actually penalizes couples who choose 
to commit to a family through marriage? Let me read to you, this 
morning, from a study of the marriage penalty prepared by the National 
Center for Policy Analysis.

       Prior to 1948, the Tax Code made no distinction between 
     married couples and individuals. In that year, Congress 
     changed the law to allow income splitting. In effect, couples 
     were taxed like two single taxpayers even if only one had 
     earned income. The result was to sharply lower taxes for 
     married couples. In short, a de facto subsidy for marriage 
     was created.
       By 1969, the magnitude of this subsidy had grown to such an 
     extent that it was possible for a single person to pay 40 
     percent more in taxes than a married couple with the same 
     income.
       This led Congress to create, for married and unmarried 
     people, separate tax schedules [that were] designed to reduce 
     the subsidy to no more than 20 percent.
       An unintended consequence of the 1969 law change was to 
     create a marriage penalty for the first time.

  Mr. DURBIN. Will the Senator yield for a question?
  Mr. GRAMS. Go ahead.
  Mr. DURBIN. It is my understanding that there are more couples who 
benefit from the Tax Code when they get married than those who are 
penalized, is that correct?
  Mr. GRAMS. I am not sure, but when you look at couples across the 
country who are unfairly paying $29 billion or 21 million couples 
across the country who are unfairly paying about $29 billion a year in 
taxes--if there are some discrepancies, we should look at all of it. 
But what we should not do is penalize those families who are paying an 
average of $1,400 a year more, just because of the way the codes are 
set up.

  Mr. DURBIN. So, let me ask the Senator a question. If the code, in 
fact, benefits more families who get married--in other words, their 
taxes go down--than those who are penalized by getting married, the 
Senator from Minnesota is not suggesting that we want to change the 
code and make it so that it will be the opposite, is he?
  Mr. GRAMS. No, I am not. What I want to do is reduce the tax burden 
on families all across the board, but to start right away with what is 
the most unfair tax.
  Mr. DURBIN. I say to the Senator, I certainly support that. I think 
we did vote--did we not vote on this when it came to the tobacco 
legislation? Didn't Senator Gramm, from Texas, offer an amendment on 
this marriage penalty?
  Mr. GRAMS. Yes, it did pass.
  Mr. DURBIN. It did pass. And we have already had a vote on this 
question. And that became one of the burdens carried by the tobacco 
bill, if I am not mistaken, was it not?
  Mr. GRAMS. That was part of that legislation.
  Mr. DURBIN. I would just say to the Senator as well, that I have 
listened carefully to the speeches and I marvel at the suggestion that 
there are people who are so much in love and ready to get married, and 
next check that with accountants and decide not to. I haven't run into 
those folks, but I am sure there are some out there like them. But I 
thank the Senator.
  Mr. GRAMS. When my colleague says he hasn't run into those folks, I 
have, and I concur with what the other Senators said, that they have. I 
have had a number of couples come up to me, whether at airports or at 
meetings or at other times, and tell me exactly the same thing the 
other Senators have said. They have actually planned around this, 
whether they have delayed

[[Page S8600]]

the marriage for a year--I even had one elderly gentleman tell me he 
called his wife from the accountant, he was 79 years old, and he said 
to his wife, ``I think we need to get a divorce.'' She was kind of 
shocked by it and she said, ``Why?'' And he said, ``Because we would be 
much better off if we were filing single.'' And then he went through 
the explanation.
  So this is not something that has gone by Americans, and especially 
families, and especially dual-income families. So I think there are 
many out there who are aware of this. When it comes to a difference of 
$3,500 a year, for those first years I think a lot of families are 
thinking very strongly about it.
  But just briefly, I want to wrap this up and give a couple of minutes 
to my other colleagues here. But I just think, when we look at the 
numbers, Washington created this ``unintended consequence'' within the 
Tax Code, that, as I mentioned, penalized some 21 million American 
couples to a tune of about $29 billion a year. I remember President 
Clinton saying at a news conference not too long ago that he agreed 
this was an unfair tax, but he also had to put in a qualifier, ``But 
Washington cannot do without money. This $29 billion is too important 
for Washington to give up.'' In other words, we are willing, bottom 
line, to impose an unfair tax on many of our American families just so 
Washington can have a few additional dollars--if you count $29 billion 
as a few additional dollars--to have that at the end of the year.
  According to the CBO, couples at the bottom end of the income scale 
who incur penalties paid in, on an average, nearly $800. When we talk 
about low income and we want go give them a tax break--they paid an 
additional $800 in taxes. That represented about 8 percent of their 
income. Repeal the penalty and those low-income families will 
immediately receive an 8-percent increase in their income.
  So my constituents have been very clear on this issue. As I 
mentioned, many have come and talked to me. Many have written letters. 
One wrote:

       This tax clearly penalizes those who marry and are trying 
     to possibly raise a family by working two jobs just to make 
     ends meet. Our tax laws need to give the proper incentives 
     encouraging marriage and upholding its sacred institutions.

  Mr. President, I couldn't agree more.
  Also, we began to add some real reform last year with the passage of 
a $500-per-child tax credit. It is a small step, but in the right 
direction. This Congress should do everything in its power to promote 
family life, to return the family to its rightful place as the center 
of American society. Whether lawmakers intended it or not, Congress 
created the marriage penalty and it rests on Congress to take it back.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kansas?
  Mr. BROWNBACK. Mr. President, how much time is remaining?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kansas has 57 seconds.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. I want to explain to Members what is taking place 
here. Yesterday I filed an amendment to the legislative appropriations 
bill that would eliminate the marriage penalty we have been talking 
about this morning. My amendment, which is being cosponsored by several 
Senators, would reinstate income splitting and provide married couples 
who currently labor under this Tax Code with some relief. I tried to 
offer my amendment last Friday with spending legislation that was 
originally supposed to be debated. However, because of objections from 
the Democrat side of the aisle to the unanimous consent request that 
would have guaranteed a vote on eliminating the marriage penalty, we 
have not been able to get a vote on the elimination of the marriage 
penalty.
  Later in the day, another UC was propounded that would have allowed 
the Senate to move forward with the legislative branch appropriations 
bill but without my amendment, and to that UC I objected. Subsequently, 
the cloture motion was filed to bring debate about tax relief to a 
close and move forward with this legislation.
  I am asking my colleagues today to vote against this cloture motion 
so we can consider the marriage penalty that is being objected to by my 
colleagues on the other side of the aisle. Thank you, Mr. President.

                          ____________________