Dianne Feinstein: “I rise to oppose this bill. With an $8.4 trillion national debt, a budget deficit that will exceed $300 billion this…”

“I rise to oppose this bill. With an $8.4 trillion national debt, a budget deficit that will exceed $300 billion this year, a looming entitlement crisis, and a mounting alternative minimum tax problem, full repeal of the estate tax at this time is simply not responsible. We have until 2010 to make decisions about the estate tax. In doing so, time will afford us the opportunity to make more informed choices, with a more complete picture of our Nation's fiscal health. We are talking about eliminating nearly $1 trillion in Federal revenues here, during a time of war. Now is not the time to place the interests of a small number of millionaires ahead of millions of working families. The estate tax is already being gradually phased down under current law. By 2009, only estates valued at more than $7 million per couple-- $3.5 million per individual--will owe any estate tax at all. This means that only 3 of every 1,000 people who die would have an estate large enough to owe any Federal estate taxes. Permanently eliminating the estate tax would cost $402 billion over the next 10 years, 2007 to 2016, though it is important to note that this figure only captures the cost of 5 years of full repeal, from 2011 to 2016. When all costs are included, nearly a trillion dollars will be lost in the first decade following repeal, from 2012 to 2021. Included in this staggering figure is $213 billion in increased interest payments on the national debt.…”