[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 9]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page 13154]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




 H.R. 3393 THE STUDENT AND FAMILY TAX SIMPLIFICATION ACT AND H.R. 4935 
                  THE CHILD TAX CREDIT IMPROVEMENT ACT

                                  _____
                                 

                             HON. RUSH HOLT

                             of new jersey

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, July 24, 2014

  Mr. HOLT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to H.R. 3393 the 
Student and Family Tax Simplification Act and H.R. 4935 the Child Tax 
Credit Improvement Act.
  These bills that come before the House this week continue the weekly 
pattern of picking and choosing which tax extenders to make permanent. 
Instead of looking at all of the tax extenders comprehensively 
Republicans are again picking the extenders that many Members may find 
easy to support and making them permanent while failing to pay for 
them. I find it ironic that Representative Camp has continued to bring 
permanent extenders to the floor, some of which he chose not to extend 
at all when he released his plan for comprehensive tax reform earlier 
this year.
  H.R. 4935 expands the tax credit for families making as much as 
$160,000, families for which the tax credit is not essential. This 
legislation also changes the nature of the tax credit and will result 
in a family making as little as $14,500 to receive no tax credit, a 
credit that they desperately need. We should be expanding tax credits 
for low income families, not eliminating them.
  H.R. 3393 seeks to lessen the burden on students and families seeking 
a higher education. While this is a noble goal, it does nothing to fix 
the underlying issue of paying for higher education, student loan debt. 
The class of 2012 graduated with an average of $29,400 in student loan 
debt; this legislation does nothing to address this. Instead of giving 
a tax break on tuition and other expenses we should reduce the need for 
student loans. We should double Pell Grant Funding. We should 
permanently extend and double Perkins funding. We should allow students 
to refinance student loan debt. Any one of these would do more good for 
student and families than this tax credit.
  This Congress cannot continue blindly to pass permanent tax breaks. I 
have seen firsthand what happens when we take that approach. We did 
that under President Bush and went from budget surpluses to budget 
deficits. Deficits that have pushed Congress to reduce investment in 
our country in recent years.
  I look forward to Congress addressing the tax extenders that require 
action by the end of the year in a serious way, not the way in which 
they have been brought before us thus far.

                          ____________________