We are now in the final week of tax filing
season. While filing season typically ends on April 15, this year taxpayers
have until May 17 to file or request an extension.
This is also the third filing season under
the tax cuts and reforms Republicans enacted in 2017. For the vast majority of
Americans, this means they are paying significantly less in income taxes than
they were under prior law.
Moreover, thanks to a nearly doubling of the
standard deduction, most American’s are paying less without the headache of itemizing
their taxes.
More importantly, prior to the pandemic,
tax reform contributed to the best economy America had seen in decades.
Unemployment reached 50 year lows and was
at or below 4 percent for 24 consecutive months. Family incomes and workers'
wages experienced robust gains. In fact, wage growth was strongest for low-wage
workers. As a result, we actually saw income inequality decline.
Unfortunately, the current
Administration’s ambitions to use the pandemic as an excuse to pass a big-government
anti-growth agenda threatens our return to a thriving economy.
First came their $2 trillion untargeted
COVID relief bill that focused more on enacting a liberal wish list rather than
pandemic relief. The dangers of passing this untargeted and largely unnecessary
spending are already beginning to weigh on our economic recovery.
Throughout the economy prices are soaring
and job growth is tepid. April jobs growth data fell short of expectations by
more than 700,000 jobs.
This is deeply concerning. I’ve heard first
hand from business after business in Iowa that they are desperate for workers,
but job applicants are scarce.
As my Republican colleagues and I have warned
our Democrat colleagues for months, this is the natural result of their
policies that pay people more not to work then to work.
Yet, despite the obvious overreach of
their liberal agenda, my Democrat colleagues are preparing to double down with
an additional $4 trillion dollar big-government spending spree.
And to finance their progressive dreams,
they are proposing trillions of dollars in job killing tax hikes.
Their proposals to roll back critical
reforms to our corporate tax system would result in the U.S. once again having
the highest corporate tax rate among our major trading partners and incentivize
companies to move headquarters abroad.
Small businesses are also in their cross
hairs. Family run businesses and farms could be decimated by proposals to hike
capital gains taxes and subject paper-only gains in family business assets to
tax immediately upon transfer at death.
My Democrat colleagues’ tax policies would
make the U.S. a less attractive place to invest, erode American
competitiveness, and slow our nation’s post-pandemic economic recovery. That
means fewer jobs and lower wages for middle-class Americans.
Post-pandemic prosperity won’t be achieved
through higher taxes and big government spending programs. It will be achieved
through pro-growth policies and unshackling our economy from stringent pandemic
era restrictions as we move toward a vaccinated world.
