Providing for Consideration of Senate Amendment to House Amendment to Senate Amendment to H.R. 4853, Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Acot of 2020
Floor Speech
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Mr. WELCH. I thank the gentlewoman from New York.
Mr. Speaker, America faces two great challenges: One, we have too few jobs. Over 15 million Americans who are looking for work can't find it. Even millions more are so discouraged, they don't even go out. Number 2, too much debt; approaching $14 trillion, in this bill would add $858 billion more.
Now, President Obama was right in proposing legislation, absolutely right, legislation is needed to revive our economy. And President Obama is right, he is absolutely right, that we should extend those middle class tax cuts for folks up to $250,000. They need the money. We can't shrink their paycheck, and that will help revive the economy.
But this legislation creates too few jobs and too much debt. The cost per job is in the range of $390,000. The cost of this is largely because of the success of the Senate Republicans to insist on $200 million both in estate tax reductions, in high-end tax reductions, that will go to the wealthiest 2 percent of Americans.
This is not about class warfare. This is not about soak the rich. This is about prudent use of taxpayer dollars. If we borrow a dollar, there should be some job bang for that dollar borrowed, and those high-end tax cuts and the estate tax cuts do not generate jobs, but they will be a bill that comes due and must be paid by the middle class and working families of this country.
We have a responsibility to focus on jobs, to focus on economic revival, and to rebuild the middle class. We can do a better job. We could have a bill that extended the Bush tax cuts up to $250,000, and the money saved, put that into reducing the deficit and infrastructure development. We could have a bill that focussed on an estate tax that was less generous than what is being considered in this legislation, and we could have a bill that would protect Social Security. Americans know that we cannot take money out from the revenue stream and expect to have solvency in the long term.
So we have a chance to pass the legislation to revive us economically, to treat the middle class right, but to limit the debt.
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