[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 1]
[Senate]
[Page 404]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                          REELECTION CAMPAIGN

  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, President Obama is campaigning for reelection 
on a ``soak the rich'' kind of platform. He argues that income 
inequality and economic fairness are the defining issues of our time. 
In his narrative, the more prosperous and fair society requires more 
balance or redistribution.
  Unfortunately, for the President, polls suggest Americans aren't 
lining up behind this politics of resentment. For example, a Gallup 
poll reports that just 2 percent of Americans rank the divide between 
rich and poor as the most pressing economic issue facing our country, 
that Americans are now less likely to view U.S. society as divided 
between the haves and have-nots than in 2008, and that only 46 percent 
believe reducing the wealth gap is extremely or very important; 
whereas, 82 percent say that about accelerating economic growth.
  Despite the class-warfare rhetoric they hear on a daily basis, most 
Americans instinctively understand that adopting progrowth policies to 
boost mobility is wiser than adopting antigrowth policies to curb 
inequality. They realize if Washington increases tax rates, for 
example, and the size of government to achieve greater economic 
balance, the result will be less job creation and less opportunity for 
everyone.
  Americans don't want the Federal Government to penalize success. They 
want the Federal Government to make it easier for them to succeed on 
their own. As American Enterprise Institute President Arthur Brooks 
wrote in his book, ``The Battle,'' earned success is the key to true 
human happiness and flourishing. Here is how he put it:

       If we know we have the possibility of earning success, we 
     know we can improve our lives and our lot.

  Most Americans, he notes, support principles that aim to ``stimulate 
true prosperity, not treat poverty.''
  If we are looking to expand opportunities for earned success and 
prosperity, the best place to start is with a sweeping overhaul of our 
very inefficient Tax Code. Progrowth tax reforms would make the system 
fairer and simpler. Right now, it functions as a mechanism to deliver 
wealth to favored constituencies rather than a means to pay for 
government. In fact, syndicated columnist George Will recently noted 
the Tax Code has been tweaked 4,500 times in the last 10 years. Most of 
these tweaks, he wrote, have benefited ``interests sufficiently strong 
and sophisticated to practice rent-seeking.'' In other words, to get 
special benefits for themselves.
  A fairer and more growth-oriented Tax Code would feature permanently 
lower rates--rates that would flatter but still be progressive. Such a 
Tax Code would benefit small business owners and entrepreneurs, who are 
America's biggest job creators. Many small businesses currently have 
the cash to invest, to innovate, to expand, and to create jobs, but 
they are sitting on the cash because of the threat of higher taxes.
  Cutting the corporate tax rate would also fuel stronger growth and 
greater mobility. The statutory U.S. rate is now the second highest 
among advanced economies, and it has damaged American competitiveness 
while holding down wages. Indeed, the most recent Global 
Competitiveness Index from the World Economic Forum ranked the United 
States now fifth, behind Finland, Sweden, Singapore, and Switzerland. 
In 2008, America had the top ranking.
  Coca-Cola's CEO Muhtar Kent recently underscored this development 
when he said China now has a more business-friendly environment than 
America. Kent cited tax policy as a particularly large hindrance. His 
experience may be different from a lot of others, but even for a major 
CEO to talk in these terms suggests we have more to do at home.
  Beyond tax reform, policymakers must also stop shackling 
entrepreneurs with more and more regulations. The explosion of new 
highly complex rules over the last 3 years has spawned a new class of 
bureaucrats entrusted with decoding and enforcing thousands of 
regulations that will affect American businesses.
  My Republican Senate colleague Susan Collins of Maine has introduced 
a bill I have cosponsored that would impose a temporary moratorium on 
new regulations that adversely affect jobs and the economy. It would 
also help if we could repeal the Obama administration's two signature 
laws, the Affordable Care Act and the Dodd- Frank Act, both of which 
have dramatically increased regulatory uncertainty and created new 
economic distortions.
  Obviously, Republicans are not against all regulations, and we 
support a strong social safety net. But we are against economically 
damaging regulations that fail a simple cost-benefit test. Both the ACA 
and Dodd-Frank would fail such a test, as would the 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley 
law. In late 2008 and early 2009, the Securities and Exchange 
Commission surveyed publicly traded firms affected by section 404 of 
Sarbanes-Oxley and it found that ``a majority felt that the costs of 
compliance outweighed the benefits. This was especially true among 
smaller companies.''
  While President Obama pays lipservice to economic growth on the 
campaign trail, many of his policies have undermined that goal. It is 
hard to create jobs at the bottom when you are obsessed with attacking 
people at the top.
  The case for growth and success-oriented policies is not just 
practical, it is moral. The biggest economic favor policymakers can do 
for Americans is to support policies that make more opportunity, 
mobility, and the possibility of earned success.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from New Mexico.

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