[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 45 (Tuesday, April 11, 2000)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2517-S2520]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




           MARRIAGE TAX PENALTY RELIEF ACT OF 2000--Continued

  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I appreciate the members of the minority 
allowing me to speak for a moment on this important piece of 
legislation. It is legislation I cosponsored when Congress convened 
earlier last year. It was Kay Bailey Hutchison's bill to repeal the 
marriage tax penalty. Since that time, the legislation has been adopted 
to provide for an essential repeal for most Americans. That is the 
pending business before us. I have supported similar measures ever 
since I came to the Senate in 1995, and I am very pleased the majority 
leader has attempted to schedule a vote on this prior to tax day.
  As we have just seen, it may not be possible for the Senate to 
actually vote on repealing the marriage tax penalty prior to tax day, 
but it would certainly be our hope that that could be accomplished 
immediately thereafter, if not before.
  This will be the third time in 5 years we have acted to mitigate the 
marriage tax penalty. In 1995, Congress passed legislation that would 
have provided a tax credit to married couples to partially offset this 
penalty. President Clinton vetoed that bill. In 1999, Congress again 
approved a measure to provide married couples with some relief.

[[Page S2518]]

Last year's bill would have set the standard deduction for couples at 
twice the deduction allowed for singles. It also would have set the 
lowest income tax bracket for married couples at twice that allowed for 
single taxpayers. Again, President Clinton vetoed that last September.
  According to the nonpartisan Tax Foundation, the total tax burden 
borne by American taxpayers dipped slightly in 1998. That is the good 
news. The bad news is Americans still spent more on Federal taxes than 
on any of the other major items in their household budget. For the 
median-income two-earner family, for example, Federal taxes still 
amounted to 39 percent of the family budget, more than what they spent 
on food, housing, and medical care combined. One of the reasons why 
they paid so much is the continuation of the marriage tax penalty that 
exists in the Nation's Tax Code.
  According to the Congressional Budget Office, nearly half of all 
married taxpayers--about 21 million couples--filing a joint return paid 
a higher tax than they would have if each spouse had been allowed to 
file as a single taxpayer.
  The marriage tax penalty hits the working poor particularly hard. 
Two-earner families making less than $20,000 often must devote a full 8 
percent of their income to pay the marriage tax penalty. Eight percent 
is an extraordinary amount for couples who count on every dollar to 
make ends meet.
  I will give an example of the marriage tax penalty at work. In this 
example, the penalty comes about because workers filing as single 
taxpayers get a higher standard deduction and because income tax 
bracket thresholds for married couples are lower than the thresholds 
for singles. Consider a married couple with each spouse earning about 
$30,000 a year. They would have paid $7,655 in Federal income taxes 
last year. By comparison, two individuals earning the same amount but 
filing a joint return would have paid $6,892 between the two of them. 
That is a marriage tax penalty of $763, about a 10-percent penalty 
simply for being married.
  The average penalty paid by couples is even higher than that--about 
$1,400 a year, according to the Congressional Budget Office. Think what 
families could do with an extra $1,400. They could pay for 3 or 4 
months of day care if they chose to send a child outside the home, or 
make it easier for one parent to stay at home and take care of the 
children if that is what they decide is best for them. They could make 
four or five payments on a car or minivan. They could pay their utility 
bill for 9 months.
  The bill reported by the Finance Committee is the most comprehensive 
effort yet to eliminate the marriage penalty. It will increase the 
standard for couples filing jointly to twice the deduction allowed for 
single taxpayers. It will widen the 15-percent and 28-percent tax 
brackets. It will allow more low-income married couples to qualify for 
the earned-income credit and preserve the family tax credits that are 
currently phased out by the alternative minimum tax.
  Unlike President Clinton's so-called relief bill, the plan Chairman 
Roth brings to us today does not neglect married couples who choose to 
have one parent stay at home to raise their children. It gives them 
relief and, in so doing, it let's them know we value the choice they 
have made to stay home and raise a family.

  Unlike the Clinton plan, which would preserve the penalty for many 
couples, our plan would eliminate the marriage tax penalty in its 
entirety. Sure, that means revenue loss associated with this 
legislation is greater than the President proposed, but the smaller 
cost of providing relief under the Clinton plan is also indicative of 
just how little it would do to solve the problem. We should not be 
stingy when attempting to ensure fairness in the Tax Code.
  Passage of this legislation will continue the good progress we have 
made this year in making the Tax Code fairer. First, we passed the 
measure to repeal the Social Security earnings limitation, a tax that 
has unfairly penalized seniors for more than 60 years simply because 
they wanted to earn extra income to supplement their monthly retirement 
checks. The measure is now law.
  Hopefully, the marriage tax penalty repeal bill will pass with a 
strong bipartisan majority, and President Clinton will rethink his 
opposition and sign it when it reaches his desk.
  Another thing we can do to make the Tax Code fairer is eliminate the 
death tax. Although most Americans will probably never pay the death 
tax, overwhelming majorities still sense there is something terribly 
wrong with a system that allows Washington to seize more than half of 
whatever is left after someone dies--a system that prevents hard-
working Americans from passing the bulk of their nest eggs to their 
children or grandchildren.
  We can debate the merits of any number of changes in the Tax Code--
whether a flat tax is preferable to a sales tax; whether tax rates 
should be reduced across the board; or whether we should make the Tax 
Code more conducive to savings and investment. There are legitimate 
points to be made on all sides. But when it comes to fairness, we need 
to do what is right. The marriage tax penalty, as the earnings limit 
and the death tax, is wrong; it is unfair; and it is time to put it to 
rest.
  I thank Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison from Texas for her hard work. I 
thank Chairman Roth for bringing it forward. I appreciate the work of 
the majority leader in getting this matter before the Senate for a vote 
so we can finally end the marriage tax penalty.
  I again thank Senator Hutchison for deferring to me for my remarks.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Smith of Oregon). The Senator from Texas.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator from 
Arizona for making a wonderful statement about the importance of the 
marriage tax penalty and tax relief in general for the hard-working 
people of our country. He is absolutely right; people are paying a 
higher rate of tax than they have ever paid in peacetime.
  I am concerned that there seems to be a problem with taking up this 
bill and debating amendments. I am very concerned about what appears to 
be an effort to not take up this bill and have relevant amendments 
considered.
  We are going to disagree on the merits of the marriage tax penalty. I 
hope we come to a conclusion that will significantly lower the marriage 
tax penalty for most of the 21 million American couples who now pay 
that penalty just because they are married.
  I hope the distinguished minority will allow us to go forward with 
the debate. I hope my colleagues will allow us to talk about our 
differences on this issue.
  I want to be clear; the questions we have just heard in the last hour 
appear to be related to offering amendments which are not relevant to 
the marriage tax penalty and could, in fact, kill the marriage tax 
penalty bill. If it is the Democrats' strategy to kill the marriage tax 
penalty bill for 21 million Americans in the name of other amendments 
they want to offer that are not relevant, I hope they will think about 
that.
  We all want to address Medicare and prescription drugs. We have 
addressed minimum wage. There are many issues on which we can disagree, 
but I hope we can all agree that those are not relevant to the marriage 
tax penalty, and that we will not let our disagreements on issues such 
as minimum wage or the way we want to provide prescription drugs to 
interfere with a very simple concept, a very clean bill that gives 
marriage tax penalty relief to 21 million American couples, which is 
exactly what the bill before us does.
  In the Finance Committee, Republicans and Democrats of good will 
debated the marriage tax penalty. They passed a bill out of their 
committee, and it deals with the marriage tax penalty. It did not deal 
with extraneous issues because, in fact, the President asked us to send 
specific bills to him so that he could make his decision on what he 
would sign and what he would not, one tax cut at a time.
  We will be able to test the President and his commitment to giving 
marriage tax penalty relief. We sent him marriage tax penalty relief 
last year. We sent significant marriage tax penalty relief to the 
President last year, and the President vetoed the bill.
  The President said: Oh, you have the marriage tax penalty relief in 
conjunction with all these other tax cuts. We had across-the-board tax 
rate cuts that

[[Page S2519]]

would have helped every American paying taxes. We had significant cuts 
in the inheritance tax. We had other tax cuts for small businesspeople. 
The President said: That is too much. In fact, I think he said it was 
reckless to give people that much of the money they earned back to 
them. I believe he said it was reckless.
  The President said: Give me smaller tax cuts. So that is exactly what 
we are doing. We are trying to give him a significant cut in the 
marriage tax penalty. We are trying to say to the President: We want 
marriage tax penalty relief. You have said you are for it. We are going 
to send you a bill that includes marriage tax penalty relief, that 
deals just with marriage tax penalty relief.
  I would think the Senate would be able to come to an agreement on a 
marriage tax penalty bill--with relevant amendments of any type--and go 
forward to discuss our differences on the merits on marriage tax 
penalty relief.
  That is what the majority leader offered the Democratic minority. He 
offered them the ability to have relevant amendments and disagreements 
on the merits of this bill. That is fair. We all understand that. We 
have a little different approach on marriage tax penalty relief. We can 
debate those issues--if we have the chance. But it seems the Democrats 
do not want us to have that chance. It seems they do not want to be 
required to have relevant amendments so we can discuss this and give it 
to the President to sign.
  I hope it is not the Democrats' view that we should put this off. I 
hope they are not going to require that we not pass marriage tax 
penalty relief this week before we go into recess for a week to spend 
Easter with our families. I certainly hope that is not the result we 
are going to see here. I hope the result will be reached of a good 
marriage tax penalty relief bill before we leave for a week of recess 
over the Easter holiday. I think we owe that to the people of this 
country.
  I have received some mail from my constituents.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. Mr. President, I wonder if the distinguished Senator 
from Texas will allow me to ask a question of her.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. I would be happy to answer a question from the 
Senator from Kansas who, by the way, has been one of the leaders in 
seeking marriage tax penalty relief. He is a cosponsor of the bill 
before us today, along with myself. He was a cosponsor of the bill we 
sent to the President last year. He has talked on the floor about this 
issue perhaps more than any one of us.
  I would be happy to answer a question by the Senator from Kansas.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. I thank my distinguished colleague from Texas.
  My question simply deals with an issue I have been raising now for 3 
weeks on this floor, saying that when we get to the time of being able 
to actually pass marriage tax penalty relief--and we are there, and it 
is on the floor--let us not have a bunch of extraneous amendments that 
are irrelevant to the issue, that do not pertain to the issue of the 
marriage tax penalty. For 3 weeks I have been coming to the floor 
saying, let's not get to that point in time or let's not have the great 
Democratic Party saying, we are for marriage penalty relief, and then 
block us with other nongermane amendments.

  My simple question to the Senator from Texas is, it appears from what 
she is describing now, we are actually at that point where we could 
pass marriage tax penalty relief before April 15, and we are being 
blocked by nongermane amendments of the Democratic Party. Is that the 
correct situation we are actually in now?
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. I would just say, the distinguished Senator from 
Kansas is making a very good point. He has raised this point for the 
last 3 weeks. That is, are the Democrats going to block consideration 
of a real marriage tax penalty relief bill by requiring that extraneous 
amendments that have nothing to do with marriage tax penalty relief be 
offered as a condition for bringing this bill to the floor? I think the 
distinguished Senator from Kansas is exactly right.
  I have to stand up for my majority leader. I am so proud of our 
majority leader for standing on the floor and offering the Democrats 
every single option that would keep this floor open for debate. He 
offered them the option of going forward on their prime amendment. He 
offered them the option of offering any relevant amendment. He offered 
them the option of just having morning business so that anyone can come 
to the Senate floor and talk about their issues of concern. That is 
exactly what our majority leader did. He did exactly what he should be 
doing to move the business of the Senate along.
  I have to say, in response to the Senator from Kansas, I think it is 
very important it be known that the majority leader has allowed any 
amendment to come before the Senate. Just last week, on the budget, 
many of us had amendments that were knocked off--just knocked off the 
budget--by an objection from a distinguished Member on the Democratic 
side because he did not want to vote on those amendments en bloc. There 
were many amendments from both sides of the aisle that were just 
knocked off.
  The distinguished majority leader did not do that. He allowed them 
all to come in. I think he has been the most open he could possibly be 
in allowing every single amendment of every possible conception to be 
offered on many of the bills we have had before us this year and, most 
recently, last week on the budget bill. We have taken a position on 
every single controversial issue that has been brought up in our 
country since the session started in January.
  The distinguished majority leader today is asking that we be able to 
debate marriage tax penalty relief, with any number of amendments that 
are relevant, because the distinguished majority leader believes we can 
have differences in approach.
  We passed a marriage tax penalty relief bill last year to which we 
all agreed. It was overwhelmingly passed. We sent it to the President, 
and it was vetoed. The President said: The tax cut is too much. We 
don't want to give that much money back to the people who worked so 
hard for it. Send me something smaller.
  That is exactly what the Finance Committee is doing. The Finance 
Committee voted a bill out--smaller, but it does give relief to every 
single married person in this country. It gives total relief to people 
in the 15-percent bracket and the 28-percent bracket. It increases the 
earned-income tax credit for the poorest working people in our country. 
That is what the bill does. So why wouldn't we be able to take the bill 
to the floor and debate it?
  I think the Senator from Kansas is on to something. The Senator from 
Kansas is saying, why would the Democrats want to kill marriage tax 
penalty relief with extraneous amendments?
  We have had sense of the Senates.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. Mr. President, I wonder if my distinguished colleague 
from Texas would yield for another question.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. I am happy to yield to the distinguished Senator from 
Kansas for a question.
  Mr. BROWNBACK. I thank my colleague from Texas. I appreciate her 
leadership and the work she has done on this particular issue.
  I guess what is troubling to me about the issues that are being 
raised now on the floor is that we actually have a chance to get this 
done. It is not a sense-of-the-Senate resolution. This isn't a policy 
statement by any of the various parties. This is an actual chance for 
us to pass the bill.
  The bill has cleared through the House. We could pass it in the 
Senate. We could get it to the President. The President has said he 
wants to be able to have a smaller tax cut. Here is one that would deal 
with the marital tax penalty.
  We are getting it blocked. It seems to me the President ought to step 
in now and call on the Democrat Members of the Senate to say, no, let's 
let this bill clear on through. This is similar to the disaster relief 
issue. I remember a couple years ago--my colleague might--we had a 
supplemental bill come through and people wanted to have some budget 
constraints in that bill. There was an emergency need for that 
supplemental, some disaster relief; some flooding was taking place. The 
Democratic Party said: We have to have this supplemental for this 
emergency relief and really hammered on a lot of people about that 
issue until we passed it so that people could get disaster relief.

[[Page S2520]]

 And we should have given that disaster relief.
  Here you have virtually the same situation. We have a chance to 
actually do it--no more sense of the Senate; no more talking about it; 
no more just saying we ought to do it. With this bill we do it. We are 
actually being blocked by a parliamentary maneuver on the Democrat side 
of the aisle.
  I hope the President will enter into this debate and call on Democrat 
colleagues of ours to say, no, let's have a vote. Let's debate the 
different sides of this issue of marriage tax penalty relief. There are 
different policy ways to handle it. Let's have that good debate, but 
don't tie it up with endless amendments or with what is taking place 
now, where we are virtually shutting the floor down because we can't 
get agreement. This is too important to play that sort of politics.
  I hope my Democrat colleagues are actually for eliminating the 
marriage tax penalty. Let us have a spirited debate about their 
different ideas. I appreciate my colleague from Texas carrying this 
issue forward. We have to deal with this now. Ahead of the April 15 
deadline would be the time to do it. This is the point in time to do 
it. People filling out their forms are seeing the marriage tax penalty 
they are paying. Let's tell them hope is on the way; we will be able to 
get this dealt with.
  I appreciate my colleague doing this. I hope we can get the President 
involved in calling some of our Democrat colleagues to say, let's pass 
a bill and let's look at this issue on the merits. I know my colleague 
from Texas will continue to press that issue on the floor and 
everywhere else she can.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. I thank the Senator from Kansas for making a very 
good point. He is saying maybe now it is time for the President to step 
in and show his commitment on this issue. Maybe he can work with the 
distinguished Democratic minority in saying, I think this is something 
we ought to do, such as an emergency.
  I guarantee Kervin and Marsha Johnson believe it is an emergency, as 
they are filling out their tax forms this week. Kervin is a D.C. police 
officer. His wife is a Federal employee. They were married last July. 
This year they will pay $1,000 more in taxes because they got married 7 
months ago.
  I guarantee that Eric and Ayla Hemeon believe this is an emergency. 
Eric is a volunteer firefighter and works for a printing company. Ayla 
works for a small business. They have been married for 2 years and are 
expecting their first child in about a month. Last year they paid 
almost $1,100 in a marriage tax penalty just because they got married 
and that they would not have paid if they were single. They are filling 
out their tax forms right now, and they would like to see the Congress 
give them relief from paying that $1,100 next year so they can buy 
something for their new baby.
  Lawrence and Brendalyn Garrison believe this is an emergency. He is a 
corrections officer at Lorton prison. She is a teacher in Fairfax 
County, VA. Last year we estimate they paid nearly $600 in a marriage 
tax penalty. They are really upset about it. When I talked to them last 
week, they said: We have been married 25 years and we think you should 
pass marriage tax penalty relief and make it retroactive.
  I think they have a good point. They have been paying the penalty for 
25 years. This is an error in the Tax Code that must be corrected.
  Jerri Dahl of Arlington, TX, believes this is an emergency. He wrote 
me a letter and said:

       It is tax time again, and I am not going to let it go by 
     without attempting to do something about what I feel is a 
     terrible injustice to working people. I am not joking when I 
     tell you that my husband and I are seriously contemplating 
     divorce in order not to be penalized financially next year.

  I think we have a number of people in this country who believe this 
is an emergency, who, as they are writing the check to the Government, 
believe the Senate should act on a bill that would give them relief 
from a payment they should not have to make. Most people in our country 
believe they owe a fair share of taxes to the Government. They love 
this country and they want to do their part, but most people don't want 
to do more than they think is fair. When a single person in an office 
is sitting next to a married person in an office and they have the same 
job and make the same salary and the married person has to pay more in 
taxes than the single person sitting at the next desk making the same 
salary, that doesn't pass the test of fairness.
  I commend the majority leader for attempting to bring this bill to 
the floor. I commend my colleague, the Senator from Kansas, the Senator 
from Missouri, Mr. Ashcroft, the Senator from Michigan, Mr. Abraham, 
and the Senator from Delaware, Mr. Roth. They have been working on this 
legislation for a long time. Senator Roth brought the bill forward last 
year. The President vetoed it and said it was too much. Senator Roth 
came back this year. He originally had a different bill--it was a 
doubling of the 15-percent bracket--but he listened to many of us who 
said, let's go to 28 percent so people in that middle-income bracket 
can get relief. That is the middle-income couple who needs that money 
to be able to do more for their children or to buy their first house or 
to pay for the car.

  The working people of our country deserve better government than they 
are getting today. They deserve better government than the Democrats 
shutting down the Senate because they don't want open debate on 
marriage tax penalty relief.
  I hope tomorrow they will change. I hope they will change and say it 
is OK to discuss this issue. It is OK to have disagreements, but let's 
keep our eye on the ball. Let's come together, Democrats and 
Republicans, and correct the inequity in the Tax Code in this country 
that says a married person and a single person in the same job making 
the same salary should pay the same taxes.
  That is what we are seeking today. I hope the Democrats will come 
back fresh tomorrow and say: We agree with you. Now is the time to do 
the responsible thing. Let's correct the Tax Code to say every person 
working in this country should pay their fair share of taxes but no 
more. Let's give tax relief to the hard-working married couple who has 
been paying a penalty for 6 months or a year or 25 years. Let's correct 
it now because now is the time we can.
  As the majority leader said about the gas tax reduction that we also 
tried to give people today: If not now, when? If not this, how?
  Let us be a little more forthcoming in creativity when it comes to 
helping the hard-working people of this country have the marriage 
penalty relief they deserve.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.
  Mr. FITZGERALD. Thank you, Mr. President. I compliment my friend and 
colleague from the State of Texas for all of her hard work and 
leadership in trying to correct the marriage tax penalty. It is an 
unfair quirk in our Tax Code that we hope we can finally bring to an 
end at some point this year.
  (The remarks of Mr. Fitzgerald pertaining to the introduction of S. 
2398 are located in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced 
Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')
  Mr. CLELAND addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Georgia is recognized.
  Mr. CLELAND. I thank the Chair.
  (The remarks of Mr. Cleland pertaining to the introduction of S. 2402 
are located in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills 
and Joint Resolutions.'')

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