Mark Begich: “I am going to deviate for a moment from my prepared comments. I listened to my good friend and colleague from Utah…”

“I am going to deviate for a moment from my prepared comments. I listened to my good friend and colleague from Utah, Senator Hatch. I respect him greatly. As perhaps the only person who actually runs a small business, I wish to comment on a few things and comment on this important piece of legislation we have in front of us. Small business is defined not by the SBA, which is 500 and below. When I talk to small businesspeople, they wish they had 500 employees. It would be a dream, but it is not a fact. We have to be careful about the numbers, and there are a lot of numbers being thrown around. There was the story about the gentleman from Florida who sold his business and paid more taxes. I will be corrected if necessary, but when someone sells their small business, they pay capital gains tax, which is about 15 percent. So when they make more money when they sell their business--I have sold several of my small businesses over the years, and if someone doesn't reinvest, they pay a certain rate, and when they reinvest, they can bypass it through an exchange afforded through the Tax Code. My friend from Utah sits on the Finance Committee. I am guessing the small businessperson had a pretty good rate, 15 points, which isn't bad. Let me also make sure and be very clear, again, there are a lot of numbers thrown around. The bills are very simple. They both cost money. One costs $930 billion over the next 10 years and one costs $250 billion.…”