[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 20 (Thursday, January 31, 2019)]
[Senate]
[Pages S807-S809]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. SANDERS:
  S. 309. A bill to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to 
reinstate estate and generation-skipping taxes, and for other purposes; 
to the Committee on Finance.
  Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, all across our country--in Vermont, in 
Illinois, in California--all across this country, people are asking a 
very simple question. That question is, How does it happen that in the 
midst of the extraordinary wealth that exists in our country--how does 
it happen that so many people continue to hurt financially and struggle 
desperately to keep their heads above water economically?
  Today, despite unemployment being relatively low, some 40 million 
Americans continue to live in poverty. We don't talk about poverty very 
much here in the Senate, but we have 40 million Americans living in 
poverty. Many of them are struggling to adequately feed their kids. 
Many of them are forced to go, despite working, to emergency food 
shelters just to stay alive.
  Despite the United States having a GDP--gross domestic product--of 
more than $20 trillion, we in this country embarrassingly continue to 
have the highest rate of childhood poverty of almost any major country 
on Earth. We don't talk about that either. Children are obviously the 
future of America, and we continue to have one of the highest rates of 
childhood poverty of any major country, and that includes 29 percent of 
African-American children who live in poverty.
  How does it happen that in a so-called booming economy--and we hear 
from President Trump every other day about how the economy is booming--
the bottom 40 percent of our population does not have $400 in cash in 
order to address a financial emergency? Think about that. The bottom 40 
percent--almost half of Americans--don't have $400 in their pocket, in 
the bank to address a financial emergency. Maybe the car breaks down, 
maybe the kid gets sick, maybe one loses one's job, maybe one undergoes 
a divorce; something happens, and 40 percent of the American people 
don't have $400 in the bank to address that crisis.
  In other words, today--and we saw this in the recent government 
shutdown; today in America, many, many millions of families live 
paycheck to paycheck in order to survive. That should not be happening 
in the wealthiest country on Earth, and it is time we begin to talk 
about that. It is not good enough to talk about a so-called booming 
economy, forgetting about tens of millions of families who are not 
seeing that booming economy but, in fact, are living under incredible 
financial stress.
  How does it happen that, in the so-called booming economy, tens of 
millions of American workers today are working for wages that are so 
low they cannot afford the escalating cost of housing? Some of them are 
spending 40, 50 percent of their limited incomes on housing. For many 
of these people, there is no health insurance available; the idea of a 
vacation for the family is something not even to be thought about; and 
the idea of being able to send one's kids to college is something that 
is also not on the table. By the

[[Page S808]]

way, many of these individuals are working two or three jobs, 50, 60, 
70 hours a week, just to survive.
  This, again, is the wealthiest country in the history of the world. 
Yet 30 million Americans today, as we speak, have zero health 
insurance--no health insurance at all; 41 million people are 
underinsured--which means their deductibles and their copayments are so 
high that even though they have insurance, they still can't afford to 
go to the doctor, and one out of five Americans today cannot afford the 
prescription drugs their doctors prescribe.
  In my view--a view I have held for a very, very long time, and it is 
a view shared by people not only in this country in wide numbers, but 
all over the world--healthcare is a human right, not a privilege. 
Whether you are rich or whether you are poor, you have the right to go 
to a doctor when you get sick, and you have the right to know that if 
you end up in a hospital, you are not going to go bankrupt or suffer 
from financial distress.
  We are an aging population--no great secret there. We are an aging 
population. In this Congress, instead of dealing with government 
shutdowns precipitated by the President, we should be talking about how 
we respond to the reality of an aging population. Yet what we don't 
talk about is that about half of older Americans--half of older 
Americans, those 55 and older--have no retirement savings and no idea 
about how they will retire with dignity.
  Think about what that means. Somebody is 60 years of age, they are 
coming to the end of their work-life, and they have no money--or 
virtually no money--in the bank. Maybe all they are going to get is 
Social Security. They turn on the TV, and they hear folks around here 
talking about cutting Social Security. Talk about why people in this 
country are angry and why they are stressed out.
  Here is the bottom line. We are the wealthiest country on Earth. In 
fact, we are the wealthiest country in the history of the world, but 
despite that wealth, a significant percentage of our population--our 
children, our elderly people, our working men and women--struggle each 
and every day to keep their heads above water economically. Not only 
are they struggling, I think the pain they are feeling has to do with 
the worry they have about the future for their kids because they know, 
as many of us know, that unless we make some bold changes in our 
economy, the younger generation today will have a lower standard of 
living than their parents.
  Imagine that--a so-called booming economy, yet we are looking at a 
situation where the younger generation may well have a lower standard 
of living than their parents.
  I want to also say a word about another reality that currently 
exists. While so many of our people are struggling, while so many of 
our children are living in poverty, while 20 percent of folks on Social 
Security are trying to live on less than $13,000 a year, there is 
another pervasive reality in American society today; that is, the 
people on top--the very wealthiest people in this country--have never 
had it better, and the gap between the very, very rich--I am not just 
talking about the rich; I am talking about the very, very rich--is 
growing wider.
  Here is the simple truth, a truth that we virtually never talk about 
here in the Senate, a truth that is not heard much in the corporate 
media; that is, the United States of America today has the most unequal 
distribution of wealth and income of almost any major country on Earth, 
and that level of inequality is worse today than at any time since the 
1920s, the so-called Gilded Age of American society.
  Today, if you can believe it, the three wealthiest people in this 
country--three--own more wealth than the bottom half of America, 160 
million people. Let me repeat that. The three wealthiest people in this 
country own more wealth than the bottom half of America, 160 million 
people. Today, the top one-tenth of 1 percent--not 1 percent; one-tenth 
of 1 percent--own almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent. 
Today, and since the Wall Street crash in 2008, about 46 percent of all 
new income goes to the top 1 percent. Roughly speaking, half of all new 
income goes to the bottom 99 percent, and half goes to the top 1 
percent, and our great task here in the U.S. Senate is to keep the 
government open while Trump tries to shut it down. Maybe, just maybe, 
we should be talking about those issues. Maybe, just maybe, we should 
be talking about an economy that works for all of us, not just the 
people on top.
  Today, the top 25 hedge fund managers on Wall Street--25 hedge fund 
managers--earn nearly double the income of all 140,000 kindergarten 
teachers in America.
  What all of the psychologists tell us is that the most important 
years of a human being's development are 0 to 4. Those are the most 
impressionable years in terms of how we develop intellectually and 
emotionally, and our childcare workers, our kindergarten teachers play 
a very important role. Does anybody think it makes sense that you have 
25 hedge fund managers on Wall Street who, today, earn nearly double 
what 140,000 of our kindergarten teachers make? By the way, public 
teachers in America are falling further and further behind other 
occupations.
  Having stated that reality--the fact that the middle class is 
struggling and the fact that the people on top are doing phenomenally 
well--I think it is fair to ask what the views are of the Republican 
leadership here in the Senate--Republicans control the Senate--and what 
our Republican President, President Trump, is proposing to address 
these massive levels of injustice and inequality. Three people own more 
wealth than the bottom half of America. What does the President and 
what does Leader McConnell have to say about that? The sad truth is 
that the Republican leadership today wants to make an embarrassingly 
bad situation even worse.
  After passing a $1 trillion tax giveaway for the top 1 percent and 
large corporations last year, Republican leadership is coming back and 
saying: Hey, we only gave 83 percent of the tax benefits to the 1 
percent. That is not good enough. That is not good enough. We have to 
do even better for our billionaires and corporate sponsors.
  This time, the Republican leadership and the President want a tax 
break of hundreds of billions of dollars that would go exclusively to 
the wealthiest of the wealthy. I am not talking about the wealthy; I am 
talking about the wealthiest of the wealthy--the top one-tenth of 1 
percent, the wealthiest 1,700 families in America.
  We have 127 million families in our country--a population of some 320 
million people. As I have indicated, many of these families are 
struggling. Many of these families are hurting. Today, many of these 
families are wondering how they are going to pay their rent, pay their 
mortgage, keep their lights on. Yet the legislation to repeal the 
estate tax that Senator McConnell and President Trump are proposing 
would benefit less than the top one-tenth of 1 percent of them--99.9 
percent would see no tax reduction from the legislation.
  Can anyone actually imagine bringing forward a piece of legislation 
that does not help the bottom 99.9 percent? Can you imagine that? The 
middle class are struggling. The gap between the rich and the poor is 
growing wider. There are 30 million people without health insurance. 
Our infrastructure is crumbling. And they come forward with a piece of 
legislation that is designed to protect and benefit the top one-tenth 
of 1 percent. The legislation would be of no benefit to 99.9 percent of 
the people of this country.
  I think it is clear that when the people of this country look at 
Congress and say ``Those folks in Washington are not representing me. 
They are representing their wealthy campaign contributors. They are 
representing the billionaire class,'' there can be no clearer example 
of that reality than this proposed legislation.
  Once again, with all of the economic problems, all of the inequality 
we face, imagine legislation that comes forward from the Republican 
leadership and the President that benefits the top one-tenth of 1 
percent--the 1,700 wealthiest families in this country.
  It is no secret that our infrastructure--our roads and our bridges, 
water systems, airports, wastewater plants--is crumbling all over this 
country. All over this country, there are major infrastructural 
problems. But I hear over and over again: We don't have the

[[Page S809]]

funding to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure and put millions of 
Americans to work at good-paying jobs rebuilding that infrastructure. 
We just don't have the money.
  Our schoolteachers are underpaid, but we don't have the money to 
provide attractive salaries in order to get the best and the brightest 
to do the most important work in this country; that is, teaching our 
young people.
  Today, we have veterans--people who put their lives on the line--
sleeping on the streets, but we don't have the money to house them.
  Families in America cannot afford childcare, and public schools are 
underfunded.
  We don't have the money to address those crises, but somehow we do 
have hundreds of billions of dollars available to provide tax breaks 
for the top one-tenth of 1 percent.
  We apparently have enough money to provide the Walton family--the 
wealthiest family in America, the folks who own Walmart, the people who 
pay their own employees starvation wages--by repealing the estate tax, 
as Senator McConnell and President Trump would like to do, we have 
enough money to provide the Walton family, the wealthiest family in 
America, with a tax break of up to $63 billion. Veterans sleep out on 
the street, teachers are underpaid, and 30 million Americans have no 
health insurance. We can't address those issues, but we do have 
legislation that would provide up to $63 billion in tax breaks for one 
family.
  We have, apparently, enough money available to provide the Koch 
brothers--a family who spent some $400 million during the midterm 
election to help elect Republican candidates; the Koch brothers, one of 
the wealthiest, most politically active families in America--we have 
enough money to provide them with up to a $39 billion tax break.
  Under this legislation, we can provide a tax break of up to $27 
billion to the Mars candy bar family and up to a $13.4 billion tax 
break to the Cox cable family.
  In other words, at a time of massive needs in this country, we don't 
have enough money available to protect working families and the middle 
class, but we certainly have more money than we know what to do with in 
order to give incredible tax breaks to the richest people in this 
country.
  The estate tax that we are going to be proposing does not give 
massive tax breaks to the wealthiest people in this country--quite the 
contrary. It says to those people that at a time of massive income and 
wealth inequality, instead of repealing the estate tax, we must 
substantially increase this tax on the multimillionaires and 
billionaires of this country and in doing that, not only come up with 
much needed revenue to address the needs of working families but also 
to reduce wealth inequality in America.
  That is why this week I will be introducing legislation for an estate 
tax bill that would do exactly the opposite of what my Republican 
colleagues propose to do. Let me briefly explain what is in the 
legislation I am offering.
  Under my bill, anytime someone inherits an estate in America of $3.5 
million or less, that person will not pay one penny in estate taxes. 
They will get to keep that inheritance tax-free. That population 
includes 99.8 percent of the American people. The legislation I am 
proposing would not raise taxes by a penny on 99.8 percent of the 
American population.
  If you are in the top two-tenths of 1 percent of the population--the 
population that inherits over $3.5 million--your taxes will, in fact, 
be going up, and they should be going up.
  My legislation establishes a 45-percent tax on the value of an estate 
between $3.5 million and $10 million, a 50-percent tax on the value of 
an estate between $10 million and $50 million, a 55-percent tax on the 
value of an estate in excess of $50 million, and a 77-percent tax on 
the value of an estate above $1 billion. In other words, this bill 
begins to create a progressive tax system in America, which is based on 
ability to pay.
  I know some may think otherwise, but the truth is, this is not a 
radical idea. From 1941 through 1976, the top estate tax rate was, in 
fact, 77 percent on estate values above $50 million. Back to 1976, the 
top estate tax rate was 77 percent.
  This bill would also close tax loopholes that have allowed 
billionaire families, such as the Waltons, to pass fortunes from one 
generation to the next without paying their fair share of taxes.
  Under this legislation, the families of all 588 billionaires in our 
country, who have a combined net worth of over $3 trillion, would pay 
up to $2.2 trillion in estate taxes.
  Let me make a confession here. This idea, this approach, was not 
developed by Bernie Sanders. It is not a new idea. More than a century 
ago, a good Republican President named Teddy Roosevelt fought for the 
creation of a progressive estate tax to reduce the enormous 
concentration of wealth that existed during the Gilded Age.
  What is really quite remarkable is that what Teddy Roosevelt talked 
about over 100 years ago during the Gilded Age of the 1920s, when 
little children were working in factories and fields and the wealthiest 
people were enjoying incredible wealth and luxury--the idea Teddy 
Roosevelt proposed then is as relevant today as it was back then. Let 
me quote what Teddy Roosevelt said more than 100 years ago:

       The absence of effective state, and, especially, national 
     restraint upon unfair money-getting has tended to create a 
     small class of enormously wealthy and economically powerful 
     men, whose chief object is to hold and increase their power. 
     The prime need is to change the conditions which enable these 
     men to accumulate power. Therefore, I believe in a graduated 
     inheritance tax on big fortunes, properly safeguarded against 
     evasion and increasing rapidly in amount with the size of the 
     estate.

  That was Teddy Roosevelt over 100 years ago. What Roosevelt said then 
is absolutely true for today.
  From a moral and an economic perspective, our Nation will not thrive 
when so few people have so much wealth and power and so many people 
have so little wealth and power. This wealth and income inequality is 
not only unjust and unfair; the truth is, it is a real threat to our 
economy and our democracy.
  We need a tax system in this country that tells the billionaire class 
that they are going to have to pay their fair share of taxes so that we 
do not have 30 million people without health insurance, so that we do 
not have young people graduating college $50,000, $100,000 in debt, so 
that we do not have an infrastructure that is crumbling, and so that we 
do not see our great country moving toward an oligarchic form of 
society where a handful of families enjoy incredible wealth and power 
at the expense of everybody else.
  In my view, the fairest way to reduce wealth inequality, to invest in 
the middle class and working families of our country, and to preserve 
our democracy is to enact a progressive estate tax on the inherited 
wealth of multimillionaires and billionaires. That is exactly what I 
will be proposing.

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