Max Baucus: “just outside this Chamber is a bust of President Theodore Roosevelt. When I walk past it, I am often reminded of one of…”

“just outside this Chamber is a bust of President Theodore Roosevelt. When I walk past it, I am often reminded of one of my favorite T.R. quotes, which is, ``Far and away the best prize that life has to offer is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.'' For the past 3 years, I have been working with my colleagues on the Senate Finance Committee on comprehensive tax reform. It has been hard work, but it has certainly been work worth doing. We have had more than 30 hearings. We have heard from hundreds of experts about how tax reform can simplify the system for families, help businesses innovate, and make the U.S. more competitive. Our efforts have been ramping up over the past several weeks, and we are starting to build momentum. Senator Hatch and I have been working very closely with members of the Finance Committee on a series of 10 discussion papers, examining key aspects of the Tax Code--each of the discussion papers on a different aspect of the Code. We began back in March, with a discussion on simplifying the system for families and businesses. There have been nine others. We then met as a full committee every week the Senate has been in session to go through different topics, presenting a range of options, and sitting around a table asking questions of staff, what about this and that, and asking questions of each other.…”