Political Quotes

“when we start debating tax legislation on the floor, I hope our debate will be governed by a few basic principles. Let me state those questions which are most important to me personally. Each of these questions needs a satisfactory answer. Are the tax benefits spread evenly across all income levels? Is the tax legislation consistent with the budget agreement? Does the tax package undermine a balanced budget after 10 years? We need answers which meet basic standards of fairness and sound public policy. These are the standards I think we should use to judge any tax bill that comes to this floor. Today, I would like to talk a little more about the first concern I have mentioned how evenly the benefits of the proposed tax bills will fall across income levels. A distribution table put out by the Senate Finance Committee claims that 74 percent of the tax benefits in the proposal pending before that Committee go to those making under $75,000; 74 percent. That sounds pretty good. On the other hand, our analysis shows that 43 percent of the benefits go to the wealthiest 10 percent, and two-thirds of the benefits go to the top 20 percent.”