Ben Cardin: “There is a marriage penalty. Married couples pay some more taxes than they would if they were not married. That is wrong…”

“There is a marriage penalty. Married couples pay some more taxes than they would if they were not married. That is wrong and we should correct it. Fact number two, the conference report that is before us will spend a lot of money that will not go to people who are presently paying a penalty for being married. Let us acknowledge that. The Joint Committee on Taxation has scored the conference report before us. It spends $292 billion over the next 10 years. Half of that relief, $145 billion, goes to taxpayers who presently pay less taxes because they are married rather than more taxes. Fact number three, when $292 billion is added to the other tax bills that have been passed by this body, we are now up to $874 billion in tax bills that we have passed. Now let us put that to the economic conditions in a budget that we are trying to deal with. We have projected surpluses. We have not realized those surpluses yet. We had demographic changes in this country that are going to put real pressure on our Social Security and Medicare system. We all understand that. So passing an $874 billion tax bill is reckless. It is wrong.”