Providing for Consideration of H.R. 6169, Pathway to Job Creation Through a Simpler, Fairer Tax Code Act of 2012; Providing for Consideration of H.R. 8, Job Protection and Recession Prevention Act of 2012; Providing for Proceedings from August 3, 2012, Through September 7, 2012; Providing for Consideration of Motions to Suspend the Rules; and Waiving Requirement of Clause 6(1) of Rule XIII with Respect to Consideration of Certain Resolutions
Floor Speech
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Mr. WELCH. I thank the gen tle lady.
Madam Speaker, let's first of all define what these two bills are.
Number one, the Democratic bill would provide tax relief to 100 percent of Americans: 98 percent would get tax relief on every dollar of income; 2 percent would get tax relief on up to $250,000 of income. Above that, they would be going back to the Clinton rates.
The Republican bill would provide 100 percent of Americans tax relief, including those top 2 percent. At what cost? A trillion dollars added to the debt, number one. Number two, higher taxes on military folks and low-income folks who would be hammered by the tax increases in the Republican bill.
Why is that? There's two reasons:
One, the underlying philosophy behind the Republican bill is that trickle-down economics works. It is a proposition that says that the tax cuts that go to the 2 percent, the highest-income Americans--who don't need them--will benefit 98 percent of Americans who don't get them. There's absolutely no evidence to back that up. Secondly, there's a total doubling down on supply-side economics, trickle-down economics.
Our bill basically has two propositions:
Number one, if we're going to work ourselves out of the biggest recession that we've had since the Great Depression, we have to increase employment and we have to increase demand. That's why we've got to give purchasing power to the vast majority of low-income and middle Americans. That's why we sustain the tax breaks that we've had in place since the Bush tax cuts were passed.
Number two, we have to pay down on the debt and have money to invest in things like infrastructure, science, and education. That's a trillion dollars that would be made available by going with the Democratic approach.
We've been here before, trickle-down economics versus middle class commitment.
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