What’s wrong with the latest tax bill? It’s a litany of broken promises and bad leadership. It’s an attack on workers everywhere.
The GOP promised that if they got the majority they would have the backs of working families and small businesses. I would never trust my back to Washington right now. This bill is unfair to small businesses, working families, and rural regions across America. It represents irresponsible leadership. In fact, to call what transpired over the last week “leadership” is an oxymoron.
Below are a few major examples of broken promises and bad leadership.
- Passed in the dead of night when no one could possibly know all they were voting on. It’s a 515 page piece of legislation not published by the Senate Finance Committee until just 7 days before the Finance Committee voted on it. The final version was voted on in the Senate just a few days later in the middle of the night. It passed at the 11th hour because of backroom deals scratched illegibly in the margins. Lobbyists and special interest groups were at the table for the final edits. Were workers, small business owners and rural regions really represented in this whole process?
- Corporate tax cuts are permanent and individual tax cuts are temporary, ending in a mere 8 years, and the bill adds $1.5 trillion to the country’s deficit over the next ten years. We need to look at these together because they are among the clearest indications that lawmakers have lost touch with reality, are wholly beholden to big money interests, and don’t care about anyone but themselves.
GOP lawmakers say that what corporations will save in taxes they’ll use to create jobs and raise wages. Over the last 30 years, we’ve seen quite the opposite. We’ve seen record increases in mergers and acquisitions, CEO compensation packages and corporate profits, while wages have remained stagnant.
Try and find one indication that something will be different this time. Not one corporation has stepped up to explain how they will turn the savings into good paying jobs. Boards will pocket the savings in a variety of ways, including dividends to themselves and other shareholders and bonuses to their executives.
After promising us fiscal responsibility, the GOP is saddling our children and grandchildren with an ever-increasing massive amount of debt. If ever the debt is paid for, it will be at the expense of public education, workforce training, heating assistance, and other services that give hard-working Americans a hand up.
GOP deficit hawks say that this bill will pay for itself, but there is not one piece of evidence that such is the case. They have produced no document demonstrating this, yet it is their biggest justification for increasing the deficit. And, the bipartisan review of the bill says not only will this add to the deficit, economic growth over the next decade will be a mere 0.8%.
- Our region depends upon small businesses, and they need substantive tax breaks. The GOP promised to help small businesses, yet the best they can come up with is a pass-through sham that has been tried and proven to fail.
We are in a winner-take-all environment, and based on who was at the table for the negotiations – politicians and lobbyists funded by millionaires and major corporations – working class families and small business owners are losing big time. When GOP leaders point to parts of the bill they say is a win for us, they are simply diverting our attention away from the bigger picture of broken promises and failed leadership.
We need a representative who has our back, who calls this out, and who stands up to her fellow lawmakers.
Despite her words, the incumbent is a member of the inner circle in Washington. We have not seen her on our streets since the last election season parade. We need someone visible in our communities, someone who sits and hears about our needs and visions. Someone who calls out fellow lawmakers for hurting her constituents. If she were doing this, she would have a lot more to say about the House and Senate tax bills than a single line about the elimination of SALT exemptions.
Small businesses, working families and rural America need a voice in Washington who advocates for our interests. My work in economic development in our area, my commitment to small businesses, and my track record of building partnerships with people regardless of background or party is what this region needs.
I would be honored to be our voice in Washington.
Emily Martz resides in Saranac Lake and is a Democratic candidate for Congress in NY-21. As an economic development professional, she has helped create jobs and expand businesses throughout the North Country, particularly in farming, clean energy, and artisan fields. She earned her doctorate in economic history and has served her community as a community organizer, a professor at Paul Smith’s College and at Clarkson University, and also as a member of the Downtown Advisory Board for the Village of Saranac Lake.