Concurrent Resolution on the Budget for Fiscal Year 2005

CONCURRENT RESOLUTION ON THE BUDGET FOR FISCAL YEAR 2005 -- (House of Representatives - March 24, 2004)

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the order of the House of Tuesday, March 23, 2004, and rule XVIII, the Chair declares the House in the Committee of the Whole House on the State of the Union for the consideration of the concurrent resolution, House Concurrent Resolution 393.

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(Mr. NEAL of Massachusetts asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)
Mr. NEAL of Massachusetts. Mr. Chairman, let me give the gentleman a fact since he raised it today, and that is that the chairman's budget does nothing about the Alternative Minimum Tax. That is a fact that we ought to be concerned about here. You can yell about it, you can speak softly about it, but it is a fact.

The President's budget calls for a 1-year patch fix to the AMT. They at the White House prefer to study the issue once again. We ought to take a test around here on issues that we are asked to study and then find out if we will ever bring them up again.

The Bush tax cut of the past 3 years have exacerbated, emphasis on the word "exacerbated," the Alternative Minimum Tax problem, where many middle-income taxpayers are going to see their tax cuts go back to the Treasury by round trip, courtesy of Alternative Minimum Tax. Alternative Minimum Tax no longer affects the highest-income taxpayers; it falls mainly on middle-income taxpayers. If the Bush tax cuts are made permanent, 97 percent of the taxpayers, and listen to this, with two or more children with income between $75- and $100,000 will be affected by Alternative Minimum Tax.

Let me give a quote from Forbes magazine that is an item that Democrats always like to bring up, "Largely as a result of tax cuts in 2001 and 2003, the Alternative Minimum Tax is now poised to devour the middle class in America." Our inability to fund important programs in education, health care, homeland security, veterans and environment, which most citizens, by the way, support, is the result of reckless tax policy which favors the most wealthy Americans while burdening our children and grandchildren with debt. We borrowed the money to pay for tax cuts for high-income Americans.

If the President and Congress saw the need to create a Department of Homeland Security, why are we cutting first responder funding by $648 million? Cuts to port security? Did my Republican colleagues already forget the sacrifices and courage of firefighters, police and other first responders on 9/11?

The President and the Republican leadership in this institution helped to create our current fiscal difficulties, and I might emphasize, nonexistent job growth. What are they going to do to fix it? It takes a bit more creativity than tax cuts for the rich to address this problem.

Let us put the best thoughts of Democrats and Republicans in this institution together and fix the Alternative Minimum Tax. It is threatening tens of thousands, if not millions, of Americans in coming years. And when people after April 15 find out about Alternative Minimum Tax and the inability, or I should say, the attitude of this institution in not dealing with it, there is going to be seething anger across the country.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute. Just to respond to my colleague and say when the Alternative Minimum Tax was passed by Democrats. Republicans warned that it would be not just a tax on the rich but it would be a tax on all income producers.

Mr. NEAL of Massachusetts. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. SHAYS. I yield to the gentleman from Massachusetts.

Mr. NEAL of Massachusetts. That may well be. I do not dispute the inception. I do not dispute the philosophy of Alternative Minimum Tax as proposed. What I do dispute is, you have been in charge for 10 years, opportunity to do something about it rather than talk about it.

Mr. SHAYS. When we tried to eliminate it in the past, we were told we were eliminating it for the wealthy. And, in fact, we were saying, it is not a tax on the wealthy, it is a tax on the middle class.

This tax does need to be eliminated. It was passed, regrettably, by our Democratic colleagues, and it is a heck of a problem to get rid of now, but we need to.

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