Jack Kingston: “with all the discussion about balancing the budget and providing tax relief, people are concerned. Well, why is it…”

“with all the discussion about balancing the budget and providing tax relief, people are concerned. Well, why is it necessary and is it even consistent to give tax relief while we are trying to balance the budget? After all, people are paying taxes, more revenues are coming in, and it is easier to balance the budget that way. But there is a part of that argument that I think is overlooked if we look at just first glance. What I am speaking of is, if we give people tax relief, we are going to have economic growth, we are going to have more jobs, more people working, more people paying tax revenues, and this growth will decrease the deficit faster than just mere cutbacks in spending. We need to have both, but spurring economic growth is the key part of deficit reduction. Let us look at the picture of taxes. In the 1950's, the average middle-class Federal tax burden was about 6 percent. In the 1970's, it was 16 percent. In 1994, it was 23 percent. But by 1995, the total tax burden was up to 39 percent, 24 percent of that being in Federal income tax alone. That is up from 5 percent in the 1950's. Mr. Speaker, I believe that the higher the tax rate of middle-class Americans, the less time they have together as families, because when we had a 39-percent tax burden, what that is saying is that the second income of the family just goes to pay taxes. Mom and dad are both working.…”