By Congressman Michael McCaul
Job creation & strengthening our economy remain our top priorities. You may have seen that Februarys national unemployment rate is still hovering at just below 10 and another 36000 Americans lost their jobs.
It should be clear to everyone by now that the Presidents policies to stimulate the economy have not worked and that we must change course.
We must create jobs instead of stifle them. And we must stop acting as though we can spend our way to prosperity.
Unfortunately last week we saw three examples over the course of two days of how the administrations policies are hindering the economy rather than helping it:
Increased Debt: The non-partisan General Accounting Office (GAO) warned that absent policy changes we face an unsustainable growth in debt" and that debt held by the public as a share of GDP could exceed the historical high reached in the aftermath of World War II by 2020 ten years sooner than our simulation showed just two years ago."
Increased Spending: The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) warned that the Presidents 2011 budget pushes spending to a record $3.8 trillion widens
this years deficit to $1.5 trillion and raises taxes by another $1.8 trillion over the next ten years.
Increased Taxes: The House narrowly passed a bill that increases taxes by $10 billion by double-taxing companies that do business overseas. This will have a direct impact on Dell and other companies in our technology and energy sectors and damage our ability to compete in a global economy.
Instead we need to cut spending and eliminate job-inhibiting federal tax increases.
Last week fellow House Member Anna Eshoo (D-CA) and I as co-chairs of the
House High Tech Caucus gained significant bipartisan support to reinstate the R&D tax credit which expired at the end of last year. We must lower the corporate tax rate to stop driving businesses overseas cut the rate on capital gains taxes which worked under both Kennedy & Reagan and we should reform our unemployment system to help those out of work find jobs.
I will continue to offer common-sense solutions that are proven to generate economic growth.
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