Congressional Record, Volume 158 Issue 161 (Thursday, December 13, 2012)

[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 161 (Thursday, December 13, 2012)]
[House]
[Pages H6799-H6802]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

{time} 1420
TAX BURDEN IN AMERICA

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 5, 2011, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from Georgia (Mr.
Woodall) for 30 minutes.
Mr. WOODALL. I appreciate my colleagues for their take on where we
are, and I wanted to offer kind of an alternative view on that. And
it's not an alternative view in that it is one that's not commonly
shared. It's a bipartisan view. But we hadn't heard it much in this
particular debate.
I want to take you back, Mr. Speaker, to John F. Kennedy. He's a
revered President for a whole variety of reasons. I come from a rock-
solid, hard-core conservative district in the State of Georgia, but I
absolutely see the wisdom of so much of what President Kennedy was
trying to do for the country. He said this:

It's a paradoxical truth that tax rates are too high and
tax revenues are too low, and the soundest way to raise the
revenues in the long run is to cut the rates now. The purpose
of cutting taxes now is not to incur a budget deficit but to
achieve the more prosperous, expanding economy which can
bring a budget surplus.

John F. Kennedy, November 20, 1962.
Those words are as true today as they were then, Mr. Speaker. But we
have a different kind of budget challenge today than we had then. The
largest budget deficits in your and my lifetime, Mr. Speaker, were run
up during the George W. Bush administration. Again, I come from a hard-
core red State, Republican through and through in our part of the
world, and I can tell you the largest budget deficits in the history of
this country were run up during a Republican Presidential
administration. And those record-setting deficits have now been
surpassed.
We're not running 100 percent of those deficits today. We're not
running 200 percent of those deficits today. We're not running 300
percent of those deficits today. Mr. Speaker, the deficits today are
almost four times larger than what was formerly the largest budget
deficit in American history. We've got to get a handle on that.
There are revenue components, there are spending components, but it
seems like this town is obsessed with the tax side of that ledger. I
want to talk about that because, for Pete's sake, I didn't come to
Congress to be a Congressman; I came to Congress to make America
better. I came to Congress to solve the problems that plague my family
and my neighbor's family and the families surrounding us in the
community. I came to Congress to make a difference.
So it's whatever we need to do here, Mr. Speaker, to make a
difference. And I don't mean just to change things. Change for change's
sake has no constituency with me. I mean to make a difference so that
our children's lives and our grandchildren's lives are better than they
would be otherwise.
Let me go again to John F. Kennedy and how he was trying to make a
difference. He said this:

Mr. Speaker, he was right. He was right then. Ronald Regan was right
when he said it. President Clinton was right in the tax cuts that he
presided over, as was President Bush. It's absolutely true. I'll say it
again:

Lower rates of taxation will stimulate economic activity
and so raise the levels of personal and corporate income as
to yield, within a few years, an increased--not a reduced--
flow of revenues to the Federal Government.
It is a paradoxical truth that tax rates are too high and
tax revenues are too low, and the soundest way to raise
revenues in the long run is to cut the rates now.

Why do I bring this up? Is there anybody in Washington, D.C., who's
talking about cutting tax rates? And the answer is no. There's really
not. There's not one person in this Chamber who comes to the floor and
talks about cutting tax rates. We might like to, but we're in a tough
economic crisis right now and folks are concerned about the revenue
side of the equation. What folks are talking about, though, is not
raising tax rates. And for some reason, for reasons that I can't
understand, Mr. Speaker, the President has gotten wrapped around the
axle on an insistence that actual rates go up. Speaker John Boehner
offered him revenue. He said, If you just want the money, we'll find a
way to get the money through taxes. It doesn't have to be through
higher rates. We can do it by broadening the base, by reducing
exceptions and exemptions, by eliminating loopholes and deductions. The
President said, No, I want actual higher rates.
President Kennedy talked about the damage of those higher rates, Mr.
Speaker. It's as true today as it was then. When we're not talking
about higher rates from the White House, Mr. Speaker, we're talking
about fairness.
And I've got to tell you, Mr. Speaker, you and I are freshmen in this
body. We came with the largest freshman class in modern times. And we
came not from folks who had dreams of being a Congressman one day, but
folks who were from families back home that were struggling and people
were running for Congress then because they wanted to find a better
way. Folks did not come to be Congressmen; they came to be agents of
change, to make a difference for America, to make sure the promise of
America continues for another generation. And yet we find ourselves in
this debate about whether now is the right time to raise taxes on
family-owned businesses, whether now is the right time to raise taxes
on American job creators.
Milton Friedman is one of my favorite economists. He's a Nobel Prize-
winning economist. He passed on from this Earth, but his words remain
with us today. He said this about taxes, and I think it's profound. He
said:

There is all the difference in the world, however, between
two kinds of assistance through government that seem
superficially similar.

Two kinds, superficially similar.

The first, when 90 percent of us agree to impose taxes on
ourselves in order to help the bottom 10 percent.

That happens all the time. It happens all the time. I love the
generous spirit of the United States of America. And I've got to tell
you I know, Mr. Speaker, folks are from all parts of the world--I'm
from Georgia and you're from California--but the people in Georgia,
their generosity is second to none, and I love being part of that
community. And Milton Friedman says it's one thing when 90 percent of
us in America agree to tax ourselves, agree to bear the burden
ourselves in order to help 10 percent who are struggling, that's one
thing. Or, second, he says:

The other thing is when 80 percent vote to impose taxes on
the top 10 percent to help the bottom 10 percent.

Hear that. It's one thing when 90 percent of us agree that we need to
bear the burden such that the least fortunate among us can prosper--
that's the American way, and I love that about this Nation--but it's
something else altogether, Milton Freidman says, when 80 percent decide
they want to tax the top 10 percent so that they can help the bottom 10
percent. That is not who we are in America. That is not who we have
ever been in America, where we let someone else carry the burden.

[[Page H6800]]

What makes this country great is the shared burden. I heard the words
``shared burden'' from my friends on the other side of the aisle. I
hear the words ``shared sacrifice'' from my friends on the other side
of the aisle, and I see proposal after proposal after proposal that
exempts most of America from bearing any part of that burden and
continuing to place the burden on someone else.
Milton Friedman goes on to say this: ``The first way may be wise or
unwise''--talking about the 90 percent of us taxing ourselves to help
the 10 percent--``that could be unwise, it just depends on why you're
doing it and what the purpose is you're doing it for. It could be
effective or ineffective as a way to help the disadvantaged. But it is
consistent with the belief in both equality of opportunity and
liberty.''
The second way, Milton Friedman says--that's the way where 80 percent
of the folks agree that they're going to tax the top 10 percent so that
they can help the bottom 10 percent--that second approach seeks
equality of outcome and is entirely antithetical to liberty. When we
all come together to agree to help one another, that is consistent with
a belief in equality of opportunity and liberty, but when we try to
amass enough votes in this Chamber or enough votes across the Nation so
that we can take from one group to give to another group, that is
entirely antithetical to liberty.
And so, Mr. Speaker, I come to the floor today not as a defender of
the 1 percent. I'm not in the 1 percent. I do hope one day I'll be
fortunate to have those opportunities. I think that's what all kids do
in America; you try to work hard, apply yourself, good work ethic, good
ideas, you want to be successful one day. But I'm not in the 1 percent.
But I recognize the immorality of passing on bills to our children and
our grandchildren in the form of debt because we, the 80 percent,
refuse to take on that burden and, instead, we try to thrust that
burden off on someone else.

{time} 1430

We have burdens in this country, and it falls to every citizen of
this country to shoulder those burdens.
Mr. Speaker, because I do think it's a moral case, I think folks need
to understand what it is the President is proposing and why he's
proposing it. I have two sets of figures here, Mr. Speaker. One is the
percent of the income that each kind of strata of American income
earner earns. I've got the lowest 20 percent of income earners, the
second 20 percent, the middle 20 percent, the fourth 20 percent, and
the highest 20 percent--in fact, I have the top 1 percent pulled out on
the side because they seem to attract so much attention these days.
I also have the share of the individual income tax burden that each
of these groups are paying. How many times, Mr. Speaker, have you heard
the President of the United States say he just wants the top 1 percent
to pay a little bit more; he just wants the top 1 percent to do their
fair share? How many times have you heard ``fair share,'' Mr. Speaker?
I've heard it more times than I can count.
This is what I see: For the most recent year for which the
Congressional Budget Office has numbers, the top 1 percent of all
income earners earned 13.4 percent of all the income in America. I'll
got to tell you they're doing well, there's no doubt about it. They are
1 percent of the population and they are earning 13 percent of all the
income in America. That's impressive. They can afford to pay. They can
afford to pay. You won't get any argument from me.
But today, Mr. Speaker, again, with the most recent numbers the
Congressional Budget Office has available, that top 1 percent--that's
earning 13.4 percent of the income in this country--is paying 38.7
percent of all the burden. I ask you, Mr. Speaker, what incarnation of
fairness leads you to believe that when you earn 13 percent of the
money and you're paying 38 percent of the bills that you need to do
more to do your fair share? Mr. Speaker, if you think for a moment that
you might fall into that category let me take you to the other end of
the spectrum, where the ``we'' are. I'm not trying to put the burden on
someone else, I'm trying to take the burden on myself.
Mr. Speaker, we passed a bill in this Congress that gave a payroll
tax break to every single Member of Congress--well, in fact, it gave it
to every single member of America. Every citizen in America got this
payroll tax break. This was a payroll tax break. As you know, payroll
taxes are dedicated to Social Security and Medicare. All they do is
fund those important programs. Every man, woman, and child in America
knows those two programs are going bankrupt, but this President and
this Congress, in their wisdom, passed a bill to give every American a
tax break in that category, reducing the amount of tax dollars going
into that trust fund. I voted no, but I lost and I got a tax break--
didn't want one, didn't need one. I have obligations to contribute to
the survival of this economy and this Republic, but I got one anyway.
Look at what's happening here, Mr. Speaker. If you're in the bottom
20 percent of all income earners, we want you to succeed. Mr. Speaker,
if you're in the bottom 20 percent of all income earners, we develop
every single Federal program around the idea that if you apply
yourself, if you put your ideas to work, if we can give you enough of a
helping hand here, a hand up there, that you will be able to change
your economic future, you will be able to improve your income lot
tomorrow relative to today.
In the Tax Code, Mr. Speaker, today, if you're in the bottom 20
percent of all income earners--in fact, if you're in the bottom 40
percent of all income earners the Tax Code pays you money. You get
every penny of your pay back. It pays you money. I ask you, Mr.
Speaker, what's becoming of our Republic? How are we defining ``fair
share?''
There is no, no, no constituency in this Nation that wants to extend
a helping hand more than my constituency does back home. And you know
where that comes from--and you see it right now in the tax rates, Mr.
Speaker--folks are saying let me give away all the money I can right
now because the Tax Code is going to change. I'm not going to give away
money next year because I'm going to get punished for it; I'm going to
give away money this year instead. Folks who can give do give. Folks
who can support this country do support this country.
Mr. Speaker, the top 20 percent of all income earners in this country
earn 50 percent of all the income. The top 20 percent of all income
earners earn 50 percent of all the income. We can talk about whether or
not that's right, we can talk about where those jobs come from, we can
talk about why we can't get more high-paying jobs, why the highest
corporate tax rate in the world is driving all those high-paying jobs
overseas, we can talk about all of that. But the fact is that 20
percent of Americans earn 50 percent of all the money. So, what's a
fair burden of the bills for them to pay, Mr. Speaker? Top 20 percent
earn 50 percent of the money, so they should certainly pay 50 percent
of the bills. In fact, they should pay more than their fair share,
right? They should pay 60 percent of the bills--maybe even 70 percent
of the bills.
Mr. Speaker, the top 20 percent of income earners today in America
pay 94 percent of all the bills--94.1, in fact. What that means, Mr.
Speaker, then is that the other 80 percent of us, the other 80 percent
of us, families here in this Chamber, 80 percent of America is only
paying six percent of the bills.
When you're in a Republic, Mr. Speaker--a lot of folks say democracy;
of course we're not a democracy, we're in a Republic--but when the
people rule, what becomes of you when 80 percent of the people are only
paying 6 percent of the bills. What kind of decisions do I make? I know
the answer to that, Mr. Speaker, because I love things that are free
with rebate. I don't know if you read the CVS and Walgreens ads on
Sunday like I do, Mr. Speaker--in fact, I look them up online on
Saturday night just so I know what to pick up on the way home from
church. If toothpaste is free with rebate, I don't care if I have 12
tubes of toothpaste in the closet at home, I'm going to go by and pick
it up because it's free. We make decisions based on how much things
cost us.
Right now, if you think government is too big in this country, if you
think we waste government dollars in this country, if you think we tax
you too much in this country, understand that

[[Page H6801]]

when we go to the voting booths, I get to vote for 100 percent of
government benefits and I only have to pay for 6 percent of it. That's
true for everybody in the 80 percent, Mr. Speaker. Is it American, is
it who we are as a people that 80 percent of us who all get to vote are
not asked to shoulder the burden of today's bills?
The thing is, Mr. Speaker, it's not as if they're getting a free
ride, it's not as if we're getting a free ride. We are passing the
burden on to our children and our grandchildren. You may not have to
pay the bill today, your family might not have to pay the bill today,
but your children and your grandchildren are going to have to pay that
bill tomorrow. It's immoral. It's immoral.
I say that to my conservative colleagues back home in Georgia. I say
if someone is willing to spend your money and they're not willing to
raise your taxes, don't you dare applaud them because you're just going
to have to pay those taxes later when the debt comes due. We either
need to stop the spending or we need to pony up the money to pay the
taxes. But Mr. Speaker, don't you dare let it be said, the top 1
percent, they earn 13 percent of the income, they're paying 40 percent
of the bills, and the President of the United States thinks that's not
enough, they need to pay more.
Be very careful, Mr. Speaker, about changing who has skin in the game
in this country. When we don't have skin in the game as voters, we make
bad decisions. What has always made America great is there has been
more that unites us than that divides us, and one of the things that
has always united us is that we all have skin in the game. The changes
that have been made to the Tax Code are changing that, Mr. Speaker.
You know, I'm not the first one to come up with this idea. A man much
wiser than I am, much earlier in this country's history, Benjamin
Franklin, observed that very same thing. He's cited to have said this:
``When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will
herald the end of the Republic.'' One of the great thinkers of his
time, Mr. Speaker. What he observed is not rocket science, it's common
sense, but it's worth restating. That is, when you're in a Republic,
when you're in a democracy, 51 percent of the people can get together
and say I don't want to shoulder any of the burden, I want to put it
all on the 49 percent and let's live life that way. That signals the
end of the Republic. It's always been true, it always will be true.
What unites us as a country is that we are not shirkers of
responsibility, we are acceptors of responsibility, and we want skin in
the game.

{time} 1440

Mr. Speaker, I don't want to let it be said that the President today,
President Obama, is the first President to have ever come up with the
idea that wouldn't it be neat if none of the voters have to pay for
anything except for the top 1 percent, wouldn't that be a good plan.
That has actually been the plan of every American President in my
lifetime and every Congress in my lifetime. Why? Because folks want to
get elected. Folks want the voters back home to think nice things about
them. And guess what. When I go home and I tell people they have to
actually pay for government, they're less excited than when I tell them
it's free.
In 1979, the last President from the great State of Georgia, Jimmy
Carter, when he took office, the bottom 80 percent, most of us, 80
percent of Americans paid 35 percent of the bills. Eighty percent of us
paid 35 percent of the bills in 1979. The top 1 percent at that time
were paying 18 percent of the bills.
Look what's happened in my adult lifetime, Mr. Speaker. This red line
represents the burden that we placed on the 1 percent. The blue line
represents the burden that we placed on the 80 percent. And it is so
changed today that, again, the bottom 80 percent of us, middle class
America, the bread and butter of this country, are paying 6 percent of
the bills.
Mr. Speaker, we owe America better than that. Folks need to make
informed decisions at the voting box, and government isn't free. We
spend $3.8 trillion--trillion dollars--a year in this government. When
you are paying 6 cents out of every dollar, you may think you're
getting your money's worth, but if you were paying 10 cents out of
every dollar, or 50 cents out of every dollar, or even $1 out of every
dollar, you begin to view your responsibilities for ensuring that
government dollars are spent wisely differently.
I just asked you, we are in control of our own destiny. I tell the
kids I talk to in schools all the time that what's so great about this
country is they're going to run it one day, and it's going to look
however it is they want it to look within the bounds of the United
States Constitution.
Is this the kind of country you want to live in where, when times get
tough, when burdens have to be carried, when bills have to be paid,
more and more often we say, Do you know what? Don't tax me; tax him.
He's the one who should shoulder the burden.
It's a dangerous, dangerous precedent.
There's no question that the wealthy should pay more in this country.
They earn more; they should pay more. They have more disposable income.
I've never had a wealthy man or woman come to me and say, Rob, I don't
want to pay my fair share. In fact, folks come to me all the time and
say:
Rob, I'm willing to pay more, except I think you're going to throw it
down a rat hole like you threw the last bit I sent to you down a rat
hole. And if you guys in Congress ever get your act straight and put us
on a path to a balanced budget, I'll be happy to pay a share in order
to make that happen. I love this country--love this country.
This is not the country that you and I grew up in, Mr. Speaker. So,
why is it, then, if we're talking so much about taxes, why aren't taxes
the problem or the solution? The truth is, and you know this, Mr.
Speaker, if we tax everything in America not at 10 percent, not at 20
percent, but at 100 percent, if we took everything from every family in
America, if every man, woman, and child had all of their income
confiscated, if we sold your clothes, your house, and your possessions
on the auction block, if we liquidated every single company in America
and we put all that money into a bank account in present value, we
still wouldn't have enough money to pay for all the promises that this
Congress, past Presidents, past Congresses, and this President have
made.
This is what I have here, Mr. Speaker. I have a chart of revenue
versus spending. This green line is revenue in this country. As a
percentage of the size of our economy, it turns out that wealthy people
are pretty smart. And so if you start taxing part of their income at 90
percent and part of their income at 20 percent, they just move all
their income from the 90 percent category to the 20 percent category.
That's what happens here. No matter what the tax rates have been over
the history of this country, the modern history of this country,
Americans are willing to give about 18 percent of GDP in tax revenue.
It's just the way it's been. Tax rates have been as high as 90 percent;
we were only paying 18 percent. Tax rates have been as low as 28
percent; we were paying 18 percent.
The red line represents spending. And that's what I want to point
out, Mr. Speaker. Spending, historically, has been flat, as well. The
red line comes up above the green line, which shows you all the budget
deficits that we've been running. It's been a common occurrence in the
history of this country. But we are spending today--these are the
promises. If we close Congress today, Mr. Speaker, if we never make one
new promise, not one new promise in this country, this red line
represents the costs of all the promises we've already made.
Spending, not taxes, is the problem. We are in a spending-driven
crisis. If you don't believe it, Mr. Speaker, I have another chart
here.
The green line, again, this one only goes from 2006 out to 2041, but
the green line represents the current taxes that are on the books. The
red line represents the spending that we've already promised out of
this body. And the blue line represents the tax increase that the
President is proposing, the tax increase on small businesses, on
family-owned businesses, a tax increase that economists agree is going
to lead to slower growth in the jobs market and less hiring. This blue
line represents the sum total of that tax increase.

[[Page H6802]]

Now, Mr. Speaker, I know enough to know that if I'm bringing in this
much money and I'm spending this much money, when I add this blue line
to it, I still don't have enough money.
This chart is labeled #SpendingIsTheProblem, Mr. Speaker. Folks can
tweet it out. Spending is the problem. It's not a revenue problem.
We're bringing in about the same revenue that we've always brought in
in this country. The President can raise taxes all he wants to; he'll
never be able to pay for the spending promises that he has made--never.
There is not enough money to do it. Spending is the problem.
Current taxes, the President's tax increase and the President's
spending plan don't come to balance.
Mr. Speaker, we can do better. In fact, here's the President's 10-
year budget plan, Mr. Speaker. The President raises taxes by $2
trillion in his 10-year budget plan, and he doesn't lower the projected
debt by one penny, not by one penny from its projected levels in 2013
or 14 or 15, not in 16 or 17 and 18, not in 19 or 20, but just a little
bit--and I blew it up so everybody could see it because you can't see
it, Mr. Speaker, as it is on the chart. If you raise--if you agree to
the President's budget and you raise taxes by $2 trillion, he predicts
that way out in 2021, things will be just a little bit better for
America--just a little bit better. Not $2 trillion better, just a
little bit better.
It's not the right plan, Mr. Speaker. Do you know what is the right
plan? The one that we've passed here in the House. And by the one that
we've passed here in the House, I mean the one we've passed here in the
House in a bipartisan way. And by the one that we passed here in the
House in a bipartisan way, Mr. Speaker, I mean the only budget in the
entire city of Washington, D.C., that has been passed. It doesn't just
make a little bitty change that you can't see 10 years from now, Mr.
Speaker. It takes us from this red path, our current spending path, our
current debt and deficit path, and it puts us on the road to balance,
on the road to balance; not just on the road to eliminating our annual
deficits, but on the road to finally paying all the bills back.
Taxes can't do it, Mr. Speaker. They can destroy the economy, but
they cannot pay the bills.
Spending is the problem. We can take that challenge on, Mr. Speaker.
We have, in this House, with our budget, passed in a bipartisan way, we
have taken on those tough challenges.
I say to the President again, Mr. Speaker, I know he wants to raise
taxes. He's been talking about it for 2 years. Where are his spending
cuts? They asked the folks in the Presidential debate, Mr. Speaker,
Republicans, would you agree to a $1 tax increase if we'd cut spending
by $10, and everybody said no.
Mr. Speaker, I challenge the President to give that a whirl. Take all
these tax increases he wants to create, the ones that have absolutely
no chance at all of solving the problem, take those tax increases and
couple them 10 to 1 with spending cuts, couple them 9 to 1 with reforms
and programs, couple them 8 to 1 with things that will actually matter
to American families and send that bill to the Congress. Send that
bill. Call our bluff. Are we serious about solving the problem or are
we not? The budget that we passed in this United States House says that
we are, Mr. Speaker, and I challenge the President to be equally
serious.
In 4 years of his budgets, we've never once seen him introduce one
that was balanced. We've never once seen him introduce one that ever
comes to balance. We've never once seen him introduce one that pays
back even a penny of our national debt.
The bipartisan budget we passed in this House does all of those
things. And I would love to see the President's proposal for achieving
that very same goal, which is absolutely critical for the American
economy, for American families, and, I dare say, Mr. Speaker, for the
American way of life.
With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

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