Pro-Growth Budgeting Act of 2012

Floor Speech

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Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Let me start by saying to the chairman of the Budget Committee and all of the members of the Budget Committee that we appreciated the dialogue that we've had on the budget reform bills. There is one bill that I understand we'll take up next week where at least the chairman of the committee and myself were able to find some bipartisan consensus. That's the expedited procedure, legislative line item veto bill where you've got some Democrats and Republicans in favor of it, and some Democrats and Republicans against it.

But with respect to the two bills before us today, Mr. Chairman, I'm afraid they fall far short. In fact, I think they would take us in the wrong direction.

First of all, just to be clear, because we'll probably hear a lot of talk today about the importance of moving the economy forward and jobs: Neither of these bills will do one thing, not one thing to help get our economy moving again. They won't do one thing to create and help create jobs in this country.

Now, with respect to this particular piece of legislation that we're dealing with now, which actually is a step toward requiring some kind of dynamic scoring by CBO and the Joint Tax Committee, it's very misleading. Here's the concern. If you look at the current House rules, current House rules already require that we have an economic analysis for major tax legislation.

What this particular piece of legislation does is say, yeah, we're going to ask for an economic analysis, but it tilts the playing field in favor of one kind of fiscal action. So, for example, it says we're going to consider whether or not tax policy affects the economy. But when it comes to major investments, for example, infrastructure, transportation, investments that we all know have historically helped this country grow, whether it was the highway system, whether it's been investments in other major infrastructure around this country, they've all had major economic growth benefits, but those are specifically excluded to the extent that they're involved in the appropriations process. So we're looking at only one-half of the equation, revenues, not important investments, at least to the extent that they go through the appropriations process.

Now, a word on the revenue piece. What's very curious is the way this bill is drafted. We would not get an economic analysis on one of the most consequential tax changes this body could take in the remaining year. We all know that we face the question of what to do with the expiring tax cuts, the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, both on middle-income Americans, but also the tax cuts that disproportionately benefited the folks at the very top, the top 2 percent.

Now, under current House rules, we get an analysis of any legislation that was designed to extend those tax cuts going forward. But the way this is designed, the statute, we're going to get an answer that says well, we're already assuming the tax cuts for the folks at the very top are going to go on forever. Now, the reason that's very curious is that the Congressional Budget Office has in fact already done analyses in the past of what might happen if we were to extend the tax cuts for the folks at the very top.

And if you look at their analyses, and they did one in September of 2010, you'll find at the end of the 10-year period, they find that those tax cuts will slow down economic growth. Why would that be? Because those tax cuts add to the deficit. That deficit crowds out private investment. That creates a drag on the economy. We had a similar conclusion from testimony that was given by the Joint Tax Committee in September of 2011, just last September. The same conclusion. At the end of the 10-year period, you'd actually have a slowdown in economic growth.

So it's a little perplexing to find out why we're drafting something that would not require a study of one of the most consequential decisions that this Congress might make.

And so for those reasons, Mr. Chairman--one, that we're not even counting the investment side of the equation with respect to the consequences for economic growth, and number two, the fact that this isn't even going to trigger an analysis of one of the biggest revenue decisions this body will make--we have to oppose the bill.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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