Political Quotes

“I appreciate the groundwork that is being carefully laid by Senate Finance Chair Baucus and Ways and Means Committee Chair Camp. It's absolutely essential that we reform a tax code that is hopelessly complex, unfair, and often counterproductive. The system is reaching the point of breakdown. The complex patchwork is difficult to administer, invites tax engineering, if not outright evasion, and is hugely expensive for those who are just trying to meet their obligations. Through mistake and evasion, we lose approximately $365 billion of revenue each year that should be paid to the Treasury--$1 billion a day--and the estimated cost of compliance is $168 billion. With simplification and careful enforcement, we could easily gain tens of billions of dollars of revenue and allow individual taxpayers and businesses to shift resources away from compliance and tax engineering to growing the economy and providing for our families. While we all may disagree with some fundamentals, it would be a mistake to begin with our areas of disagreement. I commend the chairmen for working to build common understanding on a path forward. There is one area that has not been part of the tax reform discussion but is every bit as critical as solving our budget deficit, and that's to deal with our infrastructure deficit.…”