[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 6]
[House]
[Pages 7897-7898]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                               TAX REFORM

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Illinois (Mr. Quigley) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. QUIGLEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to urge my colleagues to come 
together and improve our broken, misguided, and convoluted tax system. 
The time is right for tax reform.
  We currently spend $1 trillion through the Tax Code each year, all of 
which is off budget, meaning it is not scrutinized each year by 
appropriators. Once a tax break is written into the Tax Code, it 
usually remains, unlike discretionary programs which are reexamined for 
their necessity each year. To put this in perspective, $1 trillion 
would be the single largest government spending program--larger than 
the Pentagon's budget, larger than Social Security, and larger than 
Medicare or Medicaid.

[[Page 7898]]

  As we desperately search for ways to reduce the deficit, we are 
making deep and painful cuts to discretionary spending. All the while, 
we are spending more than $1 trillion through the Tax Code with little 
oversight.
  I have introduced a bipartisan bill with Congressman Renacci, which 
would bring greater transparency and oversight to such expenditures. 
But in addition to greater oversight, we also need reform. While many 
of these tax expenditures incentivize worthwhile behavior, such as 
homeownership and increased savings and investment, there are others, 
such as the yacht interest deduction, which clearly need to be 
reconsidered. We are cutting the funding for the National Institutes of 
Health, Head Start, and Meals on Wheels, while subsidizing yachts.
  Let's put this into perspective. If one of my constituents takes out 
a loan to buy a car to get to work or take the kids to school, the 
interest on that loan is not tax deductible; but if they were to go out 
and buy a yacht, the interest on that loan would be tax deductible.
  Clearly, it's time to reexamine our Tax Code and get our priorities 
in order. I have a bill that would end this tax break for yachts. But 
rather than tackling these tax breaks individually, we need a wholesale 
rewrite of the Tax Code.
  Our Tax Code is the product of years of small tweaks and layers of 
changes. We need to step back and ask ourselves: If we were to start 
over and rewrite the Tax Code today, what would it look like? With such 
limited resources, what do we need? What behavior should we be 
incentivizing?
  Due in part to years of additions and changes, our current Tax Code 
is deeply recessive. According to a report released last week by the 
Congressional Budget Office, the richest 20 percent of households in 
America receive over 50 percent of the tax breaks. The top 1 percent 
benefited the most, receiving approximately 17 percent of all funds 
flowing from tax breaks.
  It's time for a reexamination of our Tax Code: Who benefits from it? 
How much do we spend? What are our priorities?
  Not only is it time for reform because of our fiscal situation; but 
at a time of frequent partisan gridlock, tax reform is one area where 
the two sides seem to agree. Members from both sides of the aisle have 
said tax reform is essential.
  I commend Chairman Camp and his counterpart in the Senate, Chairman 
Baucus, for their efforts to reform our Tax Code. I hope they will 
continue their bipartisan work and give the two Houses a package of 
reforms we can live with.

                              {time}  1010

  I have no illusion this will be simple or that everyone will like 
everything in the package, but that's the beauty of democracy--we don't 
have to agree on everything, but everyone's voice has to be heard. We 
have to compromise, and in the end, we vote. I hope we get to vote on a 
tax reform package that is big, bipartisan and balanced--and soon--
because reforming our Tax Code will save us billions, lower tax rates, 
and help reduce the deficit. As we sit down to address our fiscal woes, 
everything has to be on the table, including the trillion dollars we 
spend each year on tax expenditures.

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