Political Quotes

On the recordDecember 16, 2010
When most people borrow money--and go into debt--it's either for survival or for an investment that will pay off in the future. Borrowing $114 billion from China to give massive tax breaks to the wealthiest Americans meets neither of those goals. Over the last ten years, while economic growth has stalled and middle class wages have stagnated, the wealthy have been doing just fine. In fact, two-thirds of all the income gains made in this country over the last ten years have gone to the wealthiest one percent. And the top one percent now owns more financial wealth than the bottom 90 percent. They clearly don't need any more help to get ahead. This $114 billion tax giveaway to the rich is not an investment in our economy. Just look at what happened in the decade that followed the passage of these cuts in 2001. Even if you exclude the beginning of the recession, we saw the slowest economic growth since World War 2: fewer jobs created, fewer businesses started, fewer dollars injected into our economy. So where did all that money go? Into the bank accounts of the wealthiest few. When their taxes were cut, they banked three times as much money than before. More money was stashed away rather than--as some would have you believe--put into business expansion or job creation. That's why the Congressional Budget Office ranked an extension of these tax breaks LAST among the options we have to help grow the economy and create jobs.
Said by
John Yarmuth
Democratic · Kentucky

Editor's note · Context

Yarmuth criticizes tax breaks for the wealthy and their impact on the economy.

Share

More from John Yarmuth

Jun 13, 2022

It is imperative that every person that has been sent to Washington to serve their communities, their districts, that they do the right thing when it comes to saving lives.

congress.gov
Jun 13, 2022

We have 2 million people in the United States, 2 million people who should be getting Medicaid coverage that provides comprehensive coverage including mental health coverage, acute, and long-term care, they should be getting Medicaid and…

congress.gov
Jul 19, 2022

The fact is that the Clinton-Gingrich budgets worked, they reduced the inflation rate, they reduced the tax rate, they created jobs.

congress.gov
Jun 13, 2022

Nobody has said you can't drill--that they can't drill.

congress.gov

Other voices in this conversation