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Contact: Laura Sheehan
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Dingell Favors Democratic Estate Tax Proposal that Immediately Benefits The Everyday Working Man Rather than America’s Wealthiest
Dingell set to Vote Against GOP Legislation to Repeal Estate-Tax
Washington, D.C. - In an effort to combat the GOP estate tax repeal legislation and provide real relief to working families unduly burdened by the tax, Congressman John D. Dingell, D-Mich., has put his support behind a Democratic proposal that will immediately and wisely benefit all working class Americans and protect family farms.
“With the promise of untold bounty, my Republican colleagues have sowed seeds of misrepresentation in the minds of our farmers and small business owners,” Dingell said. “They would have them believe the Republican tax cut will benefit them, but it will not. Rather it will serve as a windfall to the very richest, while everyone else is left to twist in the wind.”
Today, the U.S. House of Representatives will debate and vote on a GOP measure to gradually repeal the estate tax over the next ten years at a cost of $105 billion. Once phased out the proposal would incur even more cost, an estimated $50 billion annually beginning in 2010. Further, the measure would provide one hundred percent of its benefits to the wealthiest two percent of Americans. The everyday working family, particularly farmers and small business owners, would not receive a single dollar under the measure.
To combat the GOP measure, Democrats have introduced an alternative proposal that would provide more immediate relief at a cost of $22 billion over ten years. The Democratic proposal would reduce the current tax by twenty percent in 2001 and also raise the existing exemption for individuals from $675,000 to $1.1 million in 2001 and to $1.2 million in 2006. Further, it would repeal the credit for state estate taxes but allow a deduction for federal income tax purposes.
Congressman Dingell fully supports the Democratic proposal and will fight to secure its passage.
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