Grassley: Senate Proposal Played Politics With Jobs

Press Release

Senator Chuck Grassley said the bill that Senate leaders tried to sell as somehow having the potential to create American jobs would, in fact, "have resulted in a net decrease in American jobs."

"The legislation that was defeated in the Senate today would make U.S. companies pay an extra tax, of up to 35 percent, compared to foreign competitors, and really hit companies like John Deere, where they have big overseas markets," Grassley said. "The reality of the consequences for manufacturing jobs in the United States was cast aside to create a debate for political demagoguery."

In Iowa, John Deere employs more than 15,000 workers and has 13,000 retirees. As of 2008, roughly one of every three agricultural tractors produced at Deere's Waterloo (Iowa) plant were exported to customers across six continents.

Grassley said it also was ironic that the Senate Majority Leader pushed for a $1 billion payroll tax holiday while failing to give small businesses certainty about taxes by putting off action on legislation to prevent a job-killing tax rate increase. That small business tax rate increase is over 50 times the supposed tax benefit, designed for big and small businesses, in the bill proposed by Democratic leaders of the Senate.

"Uncertainty is terrible for the economy. Seventy percent of new jobs come in small businesses, and they don't hire people when they're in limbo, wondering if they'll get hit with a tax increase," Grassley said. "The continued delay is reckless and irresponsible. One party has control of the White House and both houses of Congress and still can't get the people's business done."

Grassley said the real issue with taxes on American companies that have foreign subsidiaries is that "corporate tax rates in the United States put U.S. employers and, in turn, our workforce at a competitive disadvantage." President Obama's own tax reform panel, led by Paul Volcker, said in its recent report, "The growing gap between the U.S. corporate tax rate and the corporate tax rates of most other countries generates incentives for U.S. corporations to shift their income and operations to foreign locations with lower corporate tax rates to avoid U.S. rates."

Grassley said the Democratic leadership's lack of interest in job-protecting amendments during debate on the Reid-Durbin-Dorgan legislation revealed that consideration of the overall bill was motivated by politics rather than policy.

Grassley filed two amendments to try to make sure qualified American workers are first in line for job openings. His first amendment would have prevented any company engaged in a mass lay-off of American workers from importing cheaper labor from abroad through temporary guest worker programs. The second would have taken aim at fraud and abuse of the H-1B and L Visa programs, while making sure Americans have the first chance at high-skilled jobs in the United States. Both amendments were being blocked by the Democratic Senate Majority Leader.

"Despite the number of Americans without a job, companies are still allowed to import thousands of foreign workers with little or no strings attached. My amendments would make it possible for qualified Americans to fill the vacant positions first," Grassley said.

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