Unfair Taxation of Unmarried Americans -- Congressman Doggett

On March 30, 2001, AASP received the following letter from Congressman Lloyd Doggett.

Thank for sending information on your organization. While we may disagree on some items, I certainly support your goal to eliminate the unfair taxation of unmarried and single Americans. For your information, I attach a recent floor speech which better explains my position.

Lloyd Doggett
328 Cannon House Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515
(202) 225-4865, (512) 916-5921
www.house.gov/doggett

Congressional Record

MARRIAGE PENALTY AND FAMILY TAX RELIEF ACT OF 2001

(House of Representatives - March 29, 2001)

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, there is broad bipartisan support in this House for correcting the marriage tax penalty. Indeed, this is a measure that could have been approved the week after President Bush's inauguration. In fact, there is such broad bipartisan support, it could have been approved last year. Or it could have been approved back in 1995 when the gentleman from Washington (Mr. MCDERMOTT) offered it in the Committee on Ways and Means to implement the Republican contract on America by correcting the marriage tax penalty.

But our Republican colleagues at that time had higher priorities: they preferred tax relief for corporations rather than couples; and they rejected his proposal. Last year they had a higher priority than relief for married couples, which was to try and win an election by preserving this as a campaign issue instead of coming together to agree on genuine marriage tax penalty relief.

Married couples in this country should and could have had this penalty corrected years ago. Yet, today, we find ourselves together, not in bipartisan agreement, but in disagreement, because once again our Republican colleagues offer a proposal that offers more relief to those who have no marriage tax penalty than those that do.

Any Member of this body, who believes that President Bush got it right in his campaign last year with his proposal for marriage tax penalty correction, needs to vote against the Republican proposal. They brought, as their principal witness to our Committee on Ways and Means, a gentleman who testified that President Bush's proposal on marriage penalty relief was worse than doing nothing at all. Yes, that is correct, as difficult as it is to believe. The Republican witness came and said President Bush had it all wrong last year in the campaign and that we ought to reject his proposal.

I actually happen to think that the President came a lot closer to getting it right on this issue than the House Republicans with their old proposal that they have revised here, which is designed to shower benefits on those who have no penalty instead of focusing relief on those who have a legitimate complaint.

Let us be sure we understand what this bill does in that regard. Anyone in this House who believes we should not discriminate against single people ought to vote against this proposal, because that is exactly what it does by focusing more relief on those who incur no marriage penalty than those who do.

In fact, under this proposal, if someone has the misfortune to become a widow or a widower, on their income after this bill passes, that individual may well face a tax increase. I guess you might call it a ``death tax'' or the ``single's discrimination tax''. On the same amount of earnings that say a retired couple might have, a surviving spouse will face a higher rate filing individually--a single's tax discrimination. The same applies to the abused spouse who separates from her husband. The same applies to any single individual out there, who is penalized under this bill.