[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 72 (Thursday, June 8, 2006)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1083]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 OPPOSING THE REPEAL OF THE ESTATE TAX

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                         HON. CHARLES B. RANGEL

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                         Thursday, June 8, 2006

  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to repealing the estate 
tax. It is fiscally irresponsible and would drive higher an already 
swelling deficit. Repealing the estate tax lacks rigidity that is 
desperately needed to reduce the national deficit and balance the 
budget. On the heels of passing consecutive tax cuts for the wealthy, 
repealing the estate tax would grant further tax relief to the most 
affluent in our country while the poor and the working class continue 
to struggle to make ends meet. Contrarily, estate tax repeal would save 
the estate of Vice President Dick Cheney between $13 million and $61 
million. It would save the estate of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld 
between $32 million and $101 million. The estate of retired Exxon Mobil 
chairman Lee Raymond would save a comfortable $164 million. 
Additionally, tax relief for the wealthy does not materialize in gains 
for the poorest in America.
  I urge my colleague in the Senate, Jon Kyl, to abandon the pursuit of 
legislation that would permanently repeal the estate tax for the 
wealthiest Americans. If adopted, Sen. Kyl's bill would plunge the 
government into another trillion dollars into the red during the first 
decade (2011-2021) that the legislation would be in effect.
  As boomers are retiring from the market place, Congress should mount 
a concerted effort to preserve Social Security and Medicare rather than 
giving tax cuts to the wealthy who are not demanding them. Health care 
needs are not being met by employers and a growing number of Americans 
are without adequate access to vital care. Repealing the estate tax 
will not bring these services and other needs to the most disadvantaged 
in our nation. Repealing the estate tax is misguided public policy. 
Democrats and Republicans should focus on strengthening education, 
Social Security, Medicare and restoring discipline to budget spending.
  Mr. Speaker, I would like to introduce an op-ed article written by 
Harold Meyerson, titled ``Estate Tax Lunacy'' in the Washington Post on 
May 31, 2006.

                [From the Washington Post, May 31, 2006]

                           Estate Tax Lunacy

                          (By Harold Meyerson)

       Spring has given way to summer's full-furnace heat in 
     Washington, apparently taking with it any scintilla of sense 
     that Congress may yet possess.
       In the House, Republicans who could not even raise an 
     eyebrow at reports that the National Security Agency has been 
     conducting warrantless wiretaps of Americans became instant 
     civil libertarians when the FBI conducted a search of a 
     congressman's office.
       The Senate, meanwhile, is scheduled next week to take up 
     legislation by Arizona Republican Jon Kyl that would 
     permanently repeal the estate tax on the wealthiest 
     Americans. If enacted, Kyl's bill would plunge the government 
     another trillion dollars into the red during the first decade 
     (2011-2021) that it would be in effect.
       Behind the scenes, the action has been on the Democratic 
     side in the Senate, as the party's leadership has sought to 
     dissuade Montana's Max Baucus, ranking Democrat on the 
     Finance Committee, from forging a halfway-house compromise 
     with Kyl that would deplete revenue by only $500 billion to 
     $600 billion during that decade. The Republicans would need 
     Baucus to bring roughly a half-dozen Democrats along with him 
     to reach the magic number of 60 votes required to overcome 
     any filibuster that the vast majority of Democrats would 
     mount to block any such measure.
       Even a paltry $500 billion, of course, is a lot of money to 
     drain from public coffers just when boomers are going onto 
     Social Security and Medicare and the number of employers 
     providing health insurance, if present trends continue, might 
     have dropped to a virtuous handful. To cover those and other 
     needs, Congress will either plunge us deeper into debt or 
     increase some other levies--payroll taxes, say--that will 
     come out of the pockets of the 99 percent of Americans whom 
     the estate tax doesn't touch.
       A decades-long campaign by right-wing activists 
     (brilliantly documented by Yale professors Michael Graetz and 
     Ian Shapiro in their book ``Death by a Thousand Cuts'') has 
     convinced many Americans that the estate tax poses a threat 
     to countless hardworking families. That was always nonsense, 
     and under the estate tax revisions that almost all Democrats 
     support--raising the threshold for eligibility to $3.5 
     million for an individual and $7 million for a couple--it 
     becomes more nonsensical still. Under the $3.5 million 
     exemption, the number of family-owned small businesses 
     required to pay any taxes in the year 2000 would have been 
     just 94, according to a study by the Congressional Budget 
     Office. The number of family farms that would have had to 
     sell any assets to pay that tax would have been 13.
       On the other hand, an estate tax repeal would save the 
     estate of Vice President Cheney between $13 million and $61 
     million, according to the publicly available data on his net 
     worth. It would save the estate of Defense Secretary Donald 
     Rumsfeld between $32 million and $101 million. The estate of 
     retired Exxon Mobil chairman Lee Raymond would pocket a cozy 
     $164 million. As for the late Sam Walton's kids, whose 
     company already makes taxpayers foot the bill for the 
     medical expenses of thousands of its employees, the cost 
     to the government for not taxing their estates would run 
     into the multiple billions.
       The Baucus split-the-difference measure wouldn't repeal the 
     estate tax, but it would still cut the tax rates on the 
     estates of the super-rich by 15 percent. The Montana senator 
     spent much of last week trying to line up a handful of his 
     Senate Democratic colleagues to support his proposal, in the 
     hope of being able to announce an unshakable 60 votes 
     favoring this folly when the debate begins next week.
       Why any Democrat would back such a measure, however, is a 
     deep mystery. From the policy standpoint, it would make it 
     vastly more difficult both to shore up programs that 
     Democrats believe need shoring up--better educating the 
     nation's children, for one--and to get the nation's fiscal 
     house in order. Politically, backing the measure is even 
     wackier. The Democrats are running this year as the party of 
     comparative fiscal sanity and greater economic equity and 
     security. Baucus's compromise would undermine all those 
     premises. Republicans might very well attack Democratic 
     senators up for reelection this year for failing to repeal 
     this hideous death tax, as they call it, but any Democratic 
     senator who can't rebut that charge in what is shaping up as 
     a very Democratic year should probably be in another line of 
     work.
       Last Friday Baucus's staffers assured the Democratic Senate 
     leadership's staff that their boss would back off his 
     compromise campaign. Still, given Baucus's penchant for 
     mischief (it was largely he who rounded up enough Democratic 
     votes to enact Medicare Part D and its Big Pharma giveaway), 
     those assurances have met with some skepticism on Capitol 
     Hill. The Democrats' capacity to undermine themselves has not 
     vanished with the final days of spring.

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