[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 55 (Tuesday, April 17, 2012)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2345-S2346]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              BUFFETT RULE

  Mr. REID. Yesterday Senate Republicans once again rejected the idea 
that millionaires and billionaires should contribute their fair share 
to help the country prosper. Republicans sent a message to millions of 
honest hard-working Americans who will file their taxes today: It is 
fair for Warren Buffett to pay a lower tax rate than his secretary. And 
that is not fair.
  Republicans said that it is fair for Mitt Romney to pay a lower tax 
rate than his cleaning lady or his chauffeur. That is not fair. My 
Republican colleagues believe it is fair for hedge fund managers and 
executives to pay a lower tax rate than schoolteachers and waitresses 
and busdrivers. But that is something you do not have to take my word 
for; that is what President Ronald Reagan called a system of 
unproductive tax loopholes that allows some of the truly wealthy to 
avoid paying their fair share.
  In 1985 Ronald Reagan knocked the web of loopholes that allowed 
people making hundreds of millions of dollars each year to pay lower 
tax rates than construction workers or janitors. President Reagan 
called it crazy, and, to his credit, he worked with a couple of 
Democrats--Senator Bradley of New Jersey and Congressman Gephardt of 
Missouri--and came up with the Bradley-Gephardt Tax Fairness Act. It 
worked well for a long time, but we have allowed other things to get in 
the way of that good Bradley-Gephardt legislation. Now we are back to 
what Ronald Reagan was talking about those many years ago.
  This broken system made it possible for millionaires to pay nothing 
while a busdriver was paying 10 percent of his salary. That is what 
President Reagan said. But the same system is in place today, as I have 
just explained, and, as that radical liberal Ronald Reagan said, that 
is just crazy. Those were his words.
  Yesterday my Republican colleagues used some strong words to oppose 
the Democrats' plan to fight the inequality. Republicans called our 
commonsense proposal to ensure that no one making more than $1 million 
a year pays a lower tax rate than a truckdriver, a secretary, or a 
police officer--they called it class warfare. It is not class warfare 
but class welfare--welfare for the wealthy at the expense of the middle 
class. It is class welfare, not warfare.
  Republicans are pushing a budget that would end Medicare as we know 
it--just passed the House--slashing nursing home coverage for the 
elderly, decimating Pell grant funding, and kicking 200,000 children 
out of the Head Start Program.
  They are calling our proposal class warfare. I wish that were the 
most ridiculous thing they have said about

[[Page S2346]]

our proposal to bring a measure of fairness to America's tax system, 
but far from it. One Member of the Senate leadership equated this 
measure to shooting ourselves in the head. The Paying a Fair Share 
Act--the Buffett rule--would have ensured that millionaires and 
billionaires paid at least as much as their secretaries, assistants, 
and even their nannies. Yet Republicans think asking those lucky 
millionaires and billionaires to contribute their fair share is just 
like shooting the country in the head. That is what they said.
  Our legislation would have protected 99 percent of small business 
owners and maintained deductions for charitable giving, and it would 
have been a small but meaningful step to reduce our deficit at a time 
when every penny--in this case, every billion--counts.
  It does not seem radical to me to ask Warren Buffett, who made almost 
$63 million in 2010, to pay a higher tax rate than his secretary. The 
Presiding Office can remember when he came and spoke to a group of 
assembled Democrats. He carried around with him his tax returns for the 
last several years. He is the one who told us how much he made in 2010, 
and he lamented the fact that he was paying the tax rate that he was.
  Well, it does not seem radical to me, it did not seem radical to 
Ronald Reagan, and it does not seem radical to three-quarters of the 
American people who support our legislation. The wealthiest Americans 
take home a greater percentage of our Nation's income than anytime in 
nearly a century. Yet they enjoy the lowest tax rate in more than five 
decades--the lowest tax rate. So it is no surprise that Americans 
believe millionaires should shoulder their fair share. Even two-thirds 
of millionaires and a majority of Republicans around the country agree 
it is time to fix a system rigged to favor the richest of the rich. 
Republicans in Congress are the only ones not on board on this issue.
  If you need evidence that millionaires and billionaires can afford to 
contribute a little more, consider this one simple fact: Last year 
there were 7,000 people who made more than $1 million who did not pay a 
single penny of Federal income tax--not a penny. Thanks to Republicans, 
these lucky millionaires and billionaires can keep gaming the system 
while middle-class workers keep picking up the tab.

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