[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 7]
[House]
[Page 9766]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                    TAX ON DYING SHOULD BE REPEALED

  (Mr. PITTS asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. PITTS. Mr. Speaker, I rise to request truth in advertising.
  Is America not the land of opportunity? Is not the sweat of our brow, 
the work of our hands supposed to be all that is required to succeed in 
this country? Well, that may be the case until the farm or the family 
business is ready to be passed to the next generation.
  A family-owned farm or business stands to lose more than half of 
everything to the Federal estate tax, which is really a tax on death. 
Mr. Speaker, 70 percent of families are forced to sell or abandon 
businesses after one generation because of death taxes. Only 13 percent 
survive to the third generation.
  Farmland is disappearing in America by millions of acres. Mr. 
Speaker, how can we expect the people to work hard and achieve the 
American dream if we are just going to take it from them in the end?
  When a business closes, jobs are lost; on an average, 30 jobs for 
every small business liquidated due to death taxes. Our national 
productivity suffers. On the other hand, 60 percent of business owners 
say they would add jobs if the estate tax was repealed, and that is 
just what we ought to do.
  Mr. Speaker, let us get rid of this terrible tax on dying.

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