Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick: “In the early seventies when the earned income tax credit was started, it was a Republican initiative, and the reason…”

“In the early seventies when the earned income tax credit was started, it was a Republican initiative, and the reason they put it forth and it was adopted is because they said if we give people who earn income, low income, I might tell my colleagues, with children, $34,600 and less, with children, if they will remain working, we will give them an earned income tax credit so that they can keep working and not go onto the welfare rolls. That was the reason for the earned income tax credit as it passed this Congress in the early seventies by Republican initiatives, and I think it was good then and it is certainly good now. As the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Cooper) states, this is a hit at those who can least afford it. Statistics show that this may recoup some $9 billion, and we need to go back for that. We need to go and look for the $9 billion for those people who have used the earned income tax credit and are not to get it, that they do not take that from the Treasury. We do need to go back on that, and I think we all feel that. We also ought to go after the $132 billion that individual taxpayers cheat on their tax forms with.”