Watching Out For America's Job Creators

Floor Speech

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Ms. FOXX. Mr. Speaker, today our Nation is suffering with tremendous economic problems, with unemployment reaching a 26-year high at 9.5 percent. Last month alone, our economy shed 467,000 jobs.

In December 2006, the U.S. had had 54 straight months of job growth, the longest in the history of this country. Democrats took over the Congress in January 2007, and our economy has been going downhill since then. Since January 2009 when President Obama became President and the Democrats continued to control Congress, things have really gone downhill.

Americans of all walks of life are hurting and cutting back as consumer spending slumps and more families find themselves with a breadwinner without work.

What we need to get us out of this slump are policies aimed at helping employers create jobs. When employers create jobs and start hiring, the unemployed can get back to work and rejoin the ranks of the workers that make our Nation great.

And what kind of policies encourage employers to create jobs? Policies that reduce the burden of government mandates and keep the tax man from dipping too deep into the pockets of those who create jobs: small business owners. What we are talking about is cutting back the jungle of red tape and keeping taxes low for the entrepreneurs who always lead the way to economic recovery.

In 1802, Thomas Jefferson put it this way: ``If we can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people, under the pretense of taking care of them, they must become happy.'' He was voicing a common insight into the tendency of government to quickly put burdensome mandates on entrepreneurs and job-creating small businesses under the guise of lending a helping hand. Today we know this syndrome as big government.

Unfortunately for the real engines of job creation in America, the Ways and Means Committee Democrats floated a massive tax hike in the past few days that will fall squarely on small business owners and entrepreneurs. Sure, they will market their $540 billion tax increase as ``a surtax'' on ``the wealthy.'' And you can bet your last dollar that anyone who dares to question this tax will be called a defender of the wealthy.

How about defending the small businesses that will help pull us out of the recession? How about looking out for innovators and risk takers whose ideas and products create jobs and grow our economy. These are the people who will be shelling out for this new $540 billion tax. And they are the very same people who could be hiring the unemployed and creating jobs if we just give them the breathing room they need instead of hiking their taxes one more time.

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