[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 37 (Wednesday, March 4, 2015)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1306-S1307]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mrs. MURRAY (for herself, Mr. Reed, Mr. Brown, Mr. Durbin, Mr. 
        Reid, Mr. Schumer, Mrs. Shaheen, Ms. Stabenow, Mr. Wyden, and 
        Mrs. Gillibrand):
  S. 660. A bill to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to 
establish a credit for married couples who are both employed and have 
young children; to the Committee on Finance.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, I come to the floor this afternoon to 
join my colleagues in taking a step back from the partisan bills on the 
floor this week to talk about the ways we should be able to work 
together to grow the economy and help our working families.
  Democrats have an economic theory that we are pretty confident about. 
We believe that real, long-term economic growth is built from the 
middle out, not from the top down. We believe that government does have 
a role to play in investing in our working families and making sure 
they have the opportunity to work hard and succeed, offering a hand up 
to those who want to climb the economic ladder and provide a better 
life for themselves and their families. We believe our government and 
our economy should be working for all families, not just the wealthiest 
few.
  Thankfully we have had the opportunity to put some policies in place 
over the past few years that have pulled our economy back from the 
brink and have started moving it in the right direction. We are not 
there yet, but across the country businesses have added almost 12 
million new jobs. We have had over 59 straight months of job growth, 
including almost 1 million manufacturing jobs. The unemployment rate is 
now under 6 percent. Health care costs are growing at their lowest rate 
in almost 50 years, while millions more families now have access to 
affordable coverage. The Federal budget deficit has been reduced by 
over two-thirds since President Obama took office.
  Although many Republicans seem to keep threatening to bring us back, 
we have been able to move away from the constant tea party-driven 
crises and uncertainty that were really destroying jobs and holding 
back our economy.
  We are headed in a good direction. I am proud of the policies that we 
fought for that helped us to get here, but we do have a whole lot more 
to do.
  The economy has changed over the past few decades, and our Tax Code 
has not kept up. Working families have seen their incomes stagnate 
while the cost of living, health care, and education has continued to 
go up. More and more families have two workers in the workforce, which 
is a good thing for so many women but brings additional expenses, such 
as childcare and transportation and the increased marginal tax rate 
paid by the second worker in the family. That is why I am very proud to 
introduce two middle-class tax cut bills today that will put money in 
the pockets of working families and update our Tax Code for the 21st-
century economy.
  My 21st Century Worker Tax Cut Act would create a new 10-percent 
credit on up to $10,000 of the income of the second earner in a family. 
In other words, qualifying working families can reduce their income 
taxes by up to $1,000, which can go a long way toward offsetting some 
of the additional costs these families bear as they go back to work. 
That tax cut rewards families for more work, and it would especially 
help women who want to rejoin the workforce today.
  The second bill I am introducing today is the Helping Working 
Families

[[Page S1307]]

Afford Child Care Act. This bill will update and reform the outdated 
child independent tax credit to help more working families. It would 
increase the tax credit to keep up with the rising costs of quality 
childcare and would make sure that the credit actually keeps up with 
the times by indexing it to inflation.
  I am very proud to introduce these two bills today, but I am even 
more proud that my bills are just two of the bills Democrats are 
introducing today that will help working families by putting more money 
in their pockets and helping them access more opportunity. My 
colleagues are going to be talking about the bills they wrote, but our 
package of bills also includes, besides what I just talked about, an 
earned-income and childcare tax credit expansion and expansion of the 
American opportunity tax credit to help middle-class families afford 
childcare so they can get back on the job and help them pay for college 
so they can work hard and invest in themselves and their careers.
  We know Republicans like to talk about cutting taxes. Well, with 
these bills we are giving everyone a chance to do exactly that--and not 
with more tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans and biggest 
corporations. Republicans have given that trickle-down theory a try, 
and it failed. Our approach is tax cuts for the middle class, for the 
workers who need it the most, to help them afford the costs they are 
faced with, such as childcare, putting food on the table, getting back 
on the job, and to give them the opportunity to work hard and succeed.
  We want to grow the economy from the middle out, not the top down, 
and we think these middle-class tax cut bills are a very strong step in 
the right direction. We hope Republicans will join us to get these 
done.
                                 ______