Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, Tuolumne County Alliance for Resources & Environment, known by its acronym TuCARE, was founded in 1988 by a group of concerned citizens who believed forest regulations were dooming rural communities to economic ruin. It has grown in to an effective grassroots organization dedicated to educating the public and legislators about the wise use of our natural resources.

The group emphasizes ``Multiple Use is Wise Use'', meaning the public lands and resources contained therein are intended for a variety of public uses, including timber production, recreation, watershed sources, and biodiversity in habitat.

Officers and members of TuCARE make presentations before legislative bodies and present to public and private organizations on behalf of Tuolumne County natural resource issues. As part of their mission to educate, TuCARE publishes news articles and position papers on topics such as vegetation management including the use of herbicides; ``No Net Loss'' of private lands, wildlife protection overreach, and the development of water storage and mineral extraction on both public and private lands.

TuCARE has engaged on many important land use issues, including opposing the expansion of Yosemite National Park and working tirelessly to keep the Stanislaus National Forest a multiple use forest. The group also worked to promote the Clavey River Project that would have increased county water supplies and generated electricity through hydro projects and supported the continuation of Forest Reserve Funds that guaranteed local communities a share of the receipts from timber harvests from local public lands.

Over the years, TuCARE has continued to press for reduced restrictions on private property owners, including the elimination of severe ESA, CEPA and NEPA regulations that discourage a vibrant local economy and negatively affect the ability to manage resources.

During the past 30 years, TuCARE has held countless natural resource tours and summits for the public, including legislators, decision makers, educators and the public, both young and old. Since the tours began, TuCARE has had the privilege of educating over 30,000 individuals about the wise use and management of our natural resources. Nearly 300 dedicated men and women have volunteered untold hours to respond to the resource education needs of the public as part of TuCARE's extensive list of past (and present) Board of Directors. These individuals share a passion for the need to educate so others can make better, informed decisions about our resources. TuCARE volunteers are working to ensure the perpetuity of our resources for future generations and to help local economies prosper despite restrictive environmental rules and regulations.

TuCARE's members have consistently supported the organization's efforts both financially and physically--attending 30 years of annual resource summits, annual dinners and responding to ``boots on the ground'' needs for rallies and public displays of support. It has been a true group effort, with men and women from all walks of life joining together to ensure the promise of life, liberty and prosperity.

Mr. Speaker, Frederic Bastiat, the great 19th century economist, posed a simple question that we need to think about carefully as we consider tariffs and trade wars.

What is better: abundance or scarcity?

The answer might seem self-evident, but protectionists down through history just don't seem to grasp it.

Suppose widgets cost $1 in Canada, but $2 in America. That means you can buy twice as many Canadian widgets by importing them. That is called abundance.

But some say that is not fair. We need to slap a $1 tariff on Canadian widgets to level the playing field. That means we can only afford to buy half as many. There is no more perfect way to turn abundance into scarcity than by levying a tariff on imports.

Yet that is what was precisely proposed for steel and aluminum. By slapping a tariff on foreign steel imports, the amount of steel Americans can afford will diminish as the price rises, so, too, the price of everything we make from steel, from cans to cars.

We are told this is necessary to save American steel jobs. Well, Bastiat would tell us that what we cannot see is just as important as what we can. We see the American steel jobs the tariff has saved by blocking foreign competitors. What we don't see as clearly are the jobs that disappear in every American industry that uses steel as their prices rise and demand for their products falls.

Remember, every producer in a society is also a consumer. No consumer benefits from higher prices, and no producer benefits from scarcer materials.

Every country that has cried protectionism has suffered terribly, including ours. Thomas Jefferson thought high tariffs could fund the government and promote domestic manufacturing. That caused a devastating recession that nearly destroyed our fledgling economy. Herbert Hoover responded to the recession of 1929 with the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act. It didn't end well.

Trade is simply the exchange of goods, and both parties have to benefit from the trade or it just doesn't happen. If I pay you $1 for a cup of coffee, I am telling you that your coffee is worth more to me than my dollar, and you are telling me that my dollar is worth more to you than your cup of coffee. When we make that exchange, we both take away something of greater value than we had.

But what happens if we slap a $1 tariff on that cup of coffee. Only two possible things: I am either going to buy less coffee, or I am going to buy less of other things to afford the tariff. Neither is good for the economy.

True, some governments subsidize their exports, and that puts our producers at a great disadvantage. In effect, these governments are picking up part of the tab for the stuff that we buy. As Milton Friedman observed, that is simply foreign aid to American factories and consumers, paid for by the unfortunate taxpayers in the exporting countries. The appropriate response for us is to say, ``thank you.''

Yes, that hurts the 140,000 American jobs that produce steel. But the other 6.5 million Americans who manufacture products using steel can make more of their products, causing their producers to hire more workers and to pay them more. Jobs will disappear in the steel mills, but they will reappear as better jobs in industries that can now obtain more steel at lower prices.

What would happen if we had a war?

Bastiat answered that question 150 years ago. He said trade, by its very nature ``is a reciprocal dependence. We cannot depend on the foreigner unless the foreigner depends on us.'' If war clouds should gather between Canada--our biggest foreign supplier of steel--and the United States, we might face the prospect of losing their steel, but Canada would lose all of the American resources and products that their steel exports buy. Trade reduces the risk of war because it increases the value of peace.

Bastiat marveled at how much we spend to build ports and harbors, railroads and highways, all for the sole purpose of surmounting the obstacles to trade that nature has created. What

sense does it make to erect artificial barriers to replace the natural ones that we have overcome?

By that same token, President Trump has set the stage for rapid economic expansion by reducing the tax and regulatory burdens that were crushing our economy, and the economy is responding. What sense does it make to ruin that progress by replacing the taxes and regulations we have shed, with new ones?

Mr. Speaker, the City of Rocklin, California celebrates its 125th Anniversary on February 24, 2018. The city was incorporated on February 24, 1893, becoming the 95th city in California.

Rocklin has a vibrant history. Through grit, determination and hard work, the City built a foundation on granite mining and railroads. Rocklin was first recognized as a destination on the transcontinental railroad in 1864, about the same time granite mining began. By 1910, 22 quarries were operating and shipping nearly 2,000 carloads of granite. Rocklin granite was used to build the state capitol and many buildings in San Francisco.

In 1908, Southern Pacific announced that the railyards would be moved to Roseville, causing many residents to abandon their homes and follow the company. The granite industry also declined precipitously. The citizens persisted by starting small businesses, granite operations, agriculture, and a friendly, communal environment until the 1950s, when signs of growth began again. The construction of Highway 80 beginning in 1958 began to expand the City's potential for development. The Rocklin Sierra College campus was completed in 1961, and suburban expansion led to growth in the housing market during the late 1950s and 1960s.

Rocklin realized the benefits of a low cost of living and land that drew high technology firms and other industries to the region. This resulted in an expansion of commercial and residential development, including Stanford Ranch, a 3,000 acre planned community. By 2016, it was the fourth-fastest growing city in California. In 2016, the city completed an $11.3 million interchange at Highway 65 and Whitney Ranch Parkway, providing increased access to nearly 200 acres for development.

Abundant parks, trails, and open space make Rocklin that much more enjoyable. The City protects its natural resources and recently completed the purchase of approximately 184 acres of land that was previously the site of the Rocklin Golf Club. This green space at the heart of the city will provide an oasis for outdoor activities and opportunities for expansion of recreation, parks and trails systems.

I am excited to celebrate Rocklin's 125th Anniversary, and look forward to the continued successes of the city.

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record the following op-ed, written by Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, the elected President of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, in support of the Iranian quest for freedom, printed in the Wall Street Journal on January 9, 2018.

These Iranian Protests Are Different From 2009

Then, the cause was a rift within the regime. Now, the

people are demanding an end to the regime.

The protests in Iran send a cogent message: The clerical

regime stands on shaky ground, and the Iranian people are

unwavering in their quest to bring it down. Slogans against

velayat-e faqih, or absolute clerical rule, called for a real

republic and explicitly targeted the regime's Supreme Leader

Ali Khamenei and President Hassan Rouhani. This dispels the

myth, still harbored by some governments, that Iranians

distinguish between moderates and hard-liners in Tehran. It

also undercuts flawed arguments depicting a stable regime.

Millions of Iranians live in poverty. Yet Tehran has spent

upward of $100 billion on the massacre in Syria, according to

reports obtained by the National Council of Resistance of

Iran. The chants of ``Death to Hezbollah'' and ``Leave Syria,

think about us instead'' clearly demonstrate the people's

opposition to the regime's belligerent regional schemes.

The country's official budget this year allocates more than

$26.8 billion to military and security affairs and the export

of terrorism. This is in addition to the $27.5 billion in

military spending from institutions controlled by Mr.

Khamenei and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The

budget for health care is a mere $16.3 billion. Weak and

vulnerable, the regime spends such astronomical sums on

regional meddling as part of its strategy for survival.

Skeptics might point out that Iran has faced protests

before. What makes the current uprising different from the

2009 protests?

The 2009 protests were sparked by rifts at the top of the

regime. The current protests--which began in Iran's second-

largest city of Mashhad and quickly spread across the

country--were motivated by rising prices, economic ruin,

widespread corruption and resentment toward the regime. This

systemic economic mismanagement has its roots in the

political system, and it grows worse every day. That is why

the demand for regime change surfaced almost immediately. It

seems to be the only conceivable outcome.

Another major difference: The 2009 uprising was initially

led by the upper middle class, with university students at

its core and Tehran as its center. The recent demonstrations

span a much broader swath of the population--the middle

class, the underprivileged, workers, students, women and

young people. Nearly all of society has been represented on

the picket line.

Nor is the current uprising tied to any of the regime's

internal factions or groupings. There are no illusions about

reform or gradual change from within. One of the popular

slogans in Tehran is ``Hard-liners, reformers, the game is

now over.'' This is yet another sign of the certainty of

overthrow. As an Iranian expression goes: Maybe sooner or

later, but definitely certain.

The final differentiating factor is the pace of events. In

less than 24 hours, the protesters' slogans shifted from

economic woes to rejection of the entire regime. The

establishment has been caught off guard and is scrambling to

find a unified solution. The IRGC declared victory over the

protests on Sunday, but this reflects its hopes more than the

reality on the ground.

The regime has issued strong warnings against joining the

leading opposition group, Mujahedin-e Khalq. One after

another, low-ranking and senior officials, joined by the

Friday prayer leaders across the country who toe the regime's

line, blame the MEK for the protests. The torrent of

statements by regime officials reflect their panic at the

expansion of the nationwide uprising and the rising

popularity of the MEK and the National Council of Resistance

of Iran.

The religious dictatorship has resorted to extensive

suppression to confront protesters. The IRCG has killed at

least 50 people and wounded hundreds. By the end of the ninth

day of protests, at least 3,000 had been arrested, according

to our sources in the country. Numerous reports indicate that

security forces literally knock on people's doors and warn

them against attending demonstrations. The net of suppression

has been cast as wide as possible.

In light of this brutal repression, the international

community must not remain silent. The United Nations Security

Council must adopt punitive measures against the regime's

crimes. This has long been the demand of the Iranian people

and opposition. We must not forget that the perpetrators of

the horrific 1988 massacre of 30,000 political prisoners are

still in power today, holding senior executive and judicial

positions while engaging in the murder of protesters in the

streets.

Perhaps the final difference between the 2009 protests and

the recent uprising will be that the latter succeeds in

overthrowing the reviled theocracy in Iran. The people of

Iran fervently hope so.

Mr. Speaker, last month we concluded an intense debate over tax reform, and I want, again, to

thank Chairman Brady for heeding the concerns of those of us from overtaxed States like California.

By allowing greater flexibility in deducting State and local taxes and by lowering all tax rates, the final measure assures that virtually every family will be paying lower taxes even though losing much of their State and local tax deductions. In fact, in my district, the average household will see a tax cut of $1,900 as a result.

Yet I still receive many calls from constituents who fear their taxes will go up and their standard of living will go down. They believe this because this is what they have been told by the Democrats and by the media.

Now that the bill is in effect, I think people are about to see their paychecks grow, their job prospects brighten, and their family finances improve. Indeed, the day that President Trump signed the bill, companies across America began announcing bonuses, pay raises, and major new investment plans in the American economy, and those announcements just keep coming.

A variety of tax calculators are already available on the internet so that every family can see for themselves how they personally benefit from the tax cuts. I would recommend a Web site called taxplancalculator.com. There, people can input their own tax figures and see how much their family will save.

In February, withholding tables will reflect the newer, lower rates, and the take-home pay for the vast majority of Americans will jump even before accounting for the surge in wages that always accompanies an economic expansion.

By spring, most economists expect a significant burst of economic growth. As tax barriers come down, capital stranded offshore is already coming home. This morning, Apple announced it is bringing back most of its quarter trillion dollars of capital now stuck offshore.

Immediate expensing reforms will accelerate equipment purchases, and an internationally competitive corporate tax rate will mean new investments in making products, once again, in America.

If The New York Times poll from yesterday is any indication, the American people are already beginning to see the truth. That poll tracked an 18-point swing from disapproval to approval of the reform in just 1 month.

The scare-mongering by congressional Democrats went further than claims that the tax reform would produce only middle class misery and economic malaise. They also claimed that millions of Americans would lose their health insurance because of it. How so? Because this bill removes the stiff tax penalties that are levied against 6\1/2\ million American families who choose not to purchase overpriced ObamaCare policies. It is a minimum of $2,100 of penalty for a family of four. These families will now have that money available to meet their own needs, including purchasing inexpensive policies available on the private market.

This begs two questions: If ObamaCare is so wonderful, why do we have to force families to buy it? And, if 6\1/2\ million families already prefer paying the stiff penalty to buying the insurance, what does that say about the signature achievement of the Obama Democrats?

The Democrats have seized on projections that the reform will add $1.5 trillion of new debt over the next 10 years based on their assumption it will produce no economic growth. Yet, when Ronald Reagan cut the top marginal tax rate by half, income tax revenues doubled. Several prominent economists are predicting an additional $2 trillion of new tax revenues to all levels of government solely due to economic expansion from this law.

The final line of attack is that the personal income tax cuts will expire in 8 years, leaving many Americans worse off. Well, that is perhaps the most dangerous argument for the Democrats to make because every American understands the answer to that question depends upon who controls Congress.

Democrats have made it clear that, if they are returned to office, the tax cuts are over, and Republicans have made it just as clear that our unfinished business is make take those cuts permanent. Let the people decide.

Ronald Reagan asked a simple question both in 1980 when he ran against the economic malaise of the Carter policies and again in 1984 after he had implemented the same progrowth policies we now see under President Trump: Are you better off today than you were 4 years ago?

No politician or pundit can spin the answer to that question. Every individual American knows that answer precisely in their own lives. And I am looking forward to asking that question again as the tax reform takes effect.

Mr. Speaker, I opposed the House version of the tax reform bill because the loss of broad-based deductions like State and local taxes would have caused significant tax increases on many of my middle class constituents in the high-tax, high-cost State of California. It actually increased the marginal tax rate on high-

income earners and abolished lifeline deductions such as casualty loss, medical expenses, and student interest. I urge that we should leave no taxpayer behind.

I thank Chairman Brady, the Republican leadership, and the conference committee for heeding these concerns. Their final product exceeds my expectations and, on behalf of California taxpayers, I can now offer my enthusiastic support.

The new version leaves the casualty loss, medical expense, and student interest deductions intact. No family needs to fear being ruined by taxes after a major disaster or illness, and graduates can continue to plan their lives knowing that interest on their student loans will not be taxed.

The new bill eases the proposed limit on mortgage interest deductions and allows up to $10,000 of State and local taxes to be deducted, all important changes for California. But most importantly, the lower tax rates in this bill now more than compensate in almost every case for the remaining limits on State and local tax and mortgage interest deductions. Even taxpayers who lose tens of thousand of dollars of deductions will still end up paying lower taxes than they do today.

For example, a couple earning $60,000 with a $300,000 home and three adult dependents would have paid $200 more in taxes under the old bill. But under this new version, they will save $340.

A couple earning $150,000 with a $750,000 home--that is a high-end tract home in California--and one child would have paid $1,200 more in taxes under the old House bill. But under the new bill, that same family will save $720.

The business tax provisions are especially important because they will restore American workers to an internationally competitive position. According to economists ranging from Martin Feldstein to Arthur Laffer, these provisions alone will produce $5 trillion of new economic activity over the next decade. That is $40,000 per household, including $2 trillion of new tax revenues to all levels of government.

Last Friday, I toured AMPAC, a local company making the active ingredient in several cancer and epilepsy drugs. Their product is then shipped to Ireland to make the actual medicine solely because the corporate tax in the United States is 35 percent, and in Ireland it is just 12.5 percent.

Their CEO, Aslam Malik, told me that, if they gave their product away for free, the final medicine could still not be competitively manufactured in the United States solely because of our taxes. He expects their local company will grow dramatically because of this tax reform, employing hundreds more families both directly and indirectly as they expand everything from payroll to infrastructure.

You see, that is what the Marxists just don't understand. Businesses don't pay business taxes. Businesses collect them from just three sources: from consumers through higher prices, from employees through lower wages, and from investors through lower earnings, usually pension plans and IRAs.

We have the highest corporate tax rate in the industrialized world, and commerce and capital simply move around it, leaving our workers behind. That is one of the reasons we averaged just 1.5 percent economic growth under Obama--worse than any President since Herbert Hoover--and lost an entire decade of prosperity.

The Marxists tell us that this is just trickle-down economics and it has never worked. Well, in fact, it has always worked. It worked when Warren Harding did it in the 1920s, when John F. Kennedy did it in the 1960s, when Ronald Reagan did it in the 1980s, and, lest we forget, when Bill Clinton approved the biggest capital gains tax cut in American history.

Concerns over the deficit are legitimate and must be addressed by spending reforms in the coming year. We must always remember that taxes and debt are driven by just one thing: spending.

The proof of these policies will manifest itself over the coming year, and every American will be able to decide for themselves if this has made them better off. I think that is why the left has pulled out all the stops to defeat it. Their arguments are exactly the same economically illiterate attacks filled with class envy that they made against Reagan.

When the American people awakened one day to find it was morning again in America, the left was discredited for a generation. Let history repeat itself, beginning today, with this vote.

Mr. Speaker, I opposed the original House bill because it severely limited or abolished broad-based deductions, resulting in higher taxes for many families in high-tax, high-cost States like California.

Thanks to Chairman Brady's leadership, this bill has largely addressed these objections and, in combination with much lower rates, it assures that nearly every California taxpayer will pay lower taxes. More important still is the higher wages and better jobs it means for all Americans.

Last Friday, I toured a local company that makes the active ingredient for certain drugs, yet the actual medicine is not produced here. It is produced in Ireland.

Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

Mr. Speaker, I was saying that the actual medicine, the ingredient is produced here, but the actual medicine is produced in Ireland, solely because of our uncompetitive corporate tax.

Because of this tax reform, the company plans to grow dramatically here at home, employing hundreds of new workers. That is what the Democrats mean by tax breaks for the wealthy.

The proof of these policies will come over the next year, and every American will be able to decide for themselves if they are better off because of it. I am now highly confident their answer is going to be a resounding ``yes.''

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to express my gratitude to my chief of staff, Igor Birman, who will be leaving the House of Representatives on December 5 to begin a new career in financial management. He and his wife, Kim, are expecting their first child in April and will be moving to New York.

Igor Birman's story sums up the best of America and is testimony to the exceptionalism of American founding principles, how they beckon to oppressed people around the world, and how much those who come here legally bring to our Nation.

Igor was born in Moscow to parents who desperately yearned for the fundamental rights they were denied in the Soviet Union. At the time, they were called refuseniks, Russian Jews persecuted for their religious beliefs and denied exit visas because of their technical knowledge.

Finally, after many years, as the Soviet Union began to collapse, glasnost opened an opportunity for the Birmans finally to realize their dream. Igor remembers hurriedly learning English on borrowed phonograph records. A week before their departure, the family returned to their tiny apartment to find the place upended by a last-minute KGB raid. Igor's mother comforted her children by saying: ``In a few weeks, we will be in America, where this can never happen.''

Igor was 14 when they arrived in California to begin a new life. He entered UC Davis, where he quickly rose to public prominence after a column he had written expressing his libertarian views was censored by the politically correct apparatchiks on the campus newspaper. The irony wasn't lost on anybody, and it became a prominent story on northern California talk radio.

That is where I first became aware of Igor, and that year, I was fortunate to have him work in my State senate office as an intern. He left to attend law school, and when he returned, he did an amazing job as my finance director in a hard-fought campaign for Congress in 2008. Hiring him as my chief of staff was the easiest decision I have ever made in my years in public office. He came to Washington at the age of 28--I believe the youngest chief of staff then serving.

He has ably run my congressional office for nearly a decade, and during those years, he has assembled the most competent team I have ever had the honor to serve with. I have found his judgment impeccable, his insight keen, and his honesty and integrity spotless.

Charles de Gaulle famously observed that the cemeteries are filled with indispensable men, but General de Gaulle had never met Igor Birman. I can say definitively some people truly are indispensable, and Igor is one of them.

I am obviously not the only person to hold this opinion. The founder of Cablevision saw these same qualities in him and, beginning next week, he will be placing his operations and foundations in Igor's capable hands.

Igor once ran a very credible race for Congress himself, and I hope that he will not give up on his ambition to serve our Nation. I believe a time may be coming when Americans may lose the memory of freedom and they will need to turn to leaders like Igor for a passionate reminder of just how valuable a commodity is our freedom.

``There is a time to every purpose under Heaven,'' and for now the time has come for Igor and Kim to enjoy their new family, to enjoy the fruits of their new labors, and to embark upon a promising future together. I wish them the very best in their many happy years ahead.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in recognition of Celia McAdam and her upcoming retirement after decades of service in the 4th Congressional District of California.

Celia McAdam has devoted herself and her career to helping her community through transportation planning. She first began her career in transportation in the early 1990s when she served as Senior Planner for the Placer County Transportation Planning Agency (PCTPA). In 1998, she was chosen to serve as the Executive Director of the PCTPA, a position she still holds today. Additionally, Celia has served as the Executive Director of the South Placer Regional Transportation Authority since its creation in 2001.

A leader in the field of transportation funding, Celia has been hailed as ``[one] of the most important transportation officials in Northern California'' by the Sacramento Bee for her ability to navigate the bureaucratic and technical obstacles associated with infrastructure planning. Her creativity in planning enabled her to design and fund vital infrastructure projects such as the I-80 Bottleneck Widening, Lincoln Bypass, I-80/Sierra College Boulevard Interchange, I-80/Douglas Boulevard Interchange and numerous other transit and rail projects.

Celia McAdam's successful career has not gone unnoticed by the transportation community and her talents have earned her numerous accolades in recognition of her contributions to California's infrastructure. In 2012, Celia was named Woman of the Year by the Women's Transportation Seminar and she received the planning profession's highest honor by being inducted as a Fellow of the College of American Institute of Certified Planners in 2016.

Placer County Transportation Planning Agency has received numerous awards under her leadership, including Organization of the Year by the California Transportation Foundation and Agency of the Year by the Sacramento Area Council of Governments.

Mr. Speaker, I am proud to honor and congratulate Celia McAdam for her commitment to transportation planning and public service.

Madam Speaker, in the last four national elections, Americans made it clear that we won't accept the economic stagnation that we have suffered during this past decade.

Mr. Obama's policies of higher taxes and regulatory burdens suppressed economic growth to a dismal 1\1/2\ percent annual average. That is about half of the post-war growth rate of 3 percent.

President Reagan averaged 3\1/2\ percent annual growth by reducing the tax and regulatory burdens crushing the economy. The result was one of the greatest economic expansions in American history.

The Trump administration has made significant progress on regulatory relief, as attested by rising wages, employment opportunities, and growing consumer confidence. But tax relief is vital to finish the job.

The imperative should be clear. The American corporate tax rate of 35 percent is the highest in the industrialized world. I know there are lots of special interest loopholes that go to politically connected companies that bring the effective rate down to 18.6 percent.

But that is precisely the problem. Many companies that haven't gotten these breaks have simply fled the country, taking trillions of dollars and possibly millions of American jobs overseas. By closing the loopholes and lowering the rate to an internationally competitive 20 percent, economists tell us that we can add $5 trillion to the American economy over the next decade. That averages about $40,000 per family.

Those who dismiss this as tax cuts for wealthy corporations don't understand the dirty little secret of corporate taxation: corporations do not pay corporate taxes. They only collect them.

There are only three possible sources from which they can collect them. The only people who pay corporate taxes are consumers, through higher prices; employees, through lower wages; and investors, through lower earnings. That is your pension and 401(k).

Lowering the corporate tax rate not only means restoring America's global competitiveness, but it invariably translates into lower prices, higher wages, and greater returns on savings and investments.

The personal income tax side is also important, and this is where I become concerned that we are getting wrapped around the axle.

We have had several unpleasant surprises this past week: the 46 percent bubble bracket and now the Joint Committee on Taxation report that, over time, many in the middle class may end up paying higher income taxes.

Yes, the average taxpayer will pay less, but this raises the mystery of the 6-foot man who drowned in a pond whose average depth was 5 feet. It is now clear that some--perhaps many--families will see tax increases now, and more over time.

As desirable as tax simplification is, I wonder if it is a bridge too far, given the timetable we are on, the hyper-partisan political environment we are in, and the complexities of the Tax Code that are certain to continue to yield unpleasant and unintended consequences.

I urge our leadership and our Ways and Means Committee to consider leaving the personal income tax structure intact, but using the budget authority instead to provide a permanent, uniform, across-the-board reduction in the rates for all tax brackets.

Our back-of-the-envelope estimate is that, using the current framework, we can reduce tax brackets by a full 1 percent, averaging about $600 of tax savings for joint filers. If we included the repeal of the individual mandate in ObamaCare, we could reduce all tax brackets by 1.35 percent, averaging about $800 of lower taxes for joint filers.

I think there are four principal advantages to this approach:

First, it leaves no taxpayer behind. Whatever your circumstances, whatever the deductions you claim, you can be sure that your overall tax bill will go down.

Second, by reducing all marginal rates, it will increase the economic growth potential of the reform. Productivity depends on how much your next dollar is taxed.

That is the marginal rate. We can bring down the top marginal rate under this reform; whereas, under the current proposal, it not only stays where it is, but in the bubble bracket, it increases to 46 percent.

Third, these reforms can be communicated easily to the American people.

Fourth, it will remove a vast portion of the opposition that we are seeing among various business groups that imperils the entire bill.

Madam Speaker, the tax reform bill that emerges from these deliberations will ultimately be judged by the prosperity that it produces and the relief that it brings to all American families.

If it is done right, the tax reform bill now taking shape in Congress can deliver us to that day. But if it is done wrong, we will have squandered the most important chance the American people have given us to materially improve their lives.

I remember the Reagan era. Wages rose, opportunities for better jobs abounded, and everywhere you could sense the optimism that comes with prosperity and abundance. I want my kids to know what it is like when morning dawns again in the American economy. It is up to us in this Chamber to make it happen, so we must.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 7 o'clock and 57 minutes p.m.), under its previous order, the House adjourned until tomorrow, Thursday, November 9, 2017, at 9 a.m.

Mr. Chairman, 45 years ago, Congress enacted laws, such as the National Environmental Policy Act, that promised to improve the health of our forests. They imposed what have become endlessly time-consuming and, ultimately, cost-prohibitive restrictions on our ability to properly manage our national forests so that we can match the tree density with the ability of the land to support it.

I think after 45 years of experience with these laws, we are entitled to ask: How are our forests doing? The answer is damning. Our forests are now catastrophically overgrown, often carrying four times the number of trees that the land can support. In this stressed and weakened condition, our forests are easy prey for drought, disease, pestilence, and fire.

There is an old adage that excess timber comes out of the forest one way or the other--it is either carried out or it burns out. When we carried it out, we had resilient, healthy forests and a thriving economy, as excess timber was sold and harvested before it could choke our forests to death. In the years since then, we have seen an 80 percent decline in timber sales from our Federal lands and a concomitant increase in acreage destroyed by forest fire. I would remind my friend from Oregon that timber sales used to generate us money, not cost us money.

The direct revenues and spin-off commerce generated by these sales provided a stream of revenues that we could then use to improve our national forests and share with the local communities affected.

The Resilient Federal Forests Act begins to move us back towards sound and scientific forest management practices. It requires forest managers to consider the cost of no action alternatives; it streamlines fire and disease prevention programs and ensures that fire-killed timber can be quickly removed to create both revenues and room to restore fire-damaged lands; it ends the practice of raiding prevention funds to fight fires; it streamlines onerous environmental review processes without sacrificing environmental protection; and it provides our forest managers with alternatives to resolve frivolous lawsuits.

Provisions that streamline the environmental reviews were already signed into law last year for the Tahoe Basin, and the Forest Service regional manager told me that is going to take their revenue processes from 800 pages down to 40 pages and allow them to get their forest there back to a sustainable level.

We made some very big mistakes 45 years ago, and our forests have paid the price. This bill starts the long process of correcting those mistakes and recovering our national forests, and I urge its adoption.

Mr. Chairman, I include in the Record two letters, one from the South Tahoe Public Utility District, and the second from the Public Lands Council and the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, in support of

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, unsustainable government spending drives both taxes and debt.

The budget resolution sets the spending architecture for the fiscal year. The House version provided for $200 billion of enforceable mandatory spending reductions over 10 years and balanced within the decade. The Senate amendments gut these provisions, squandering the one opportunity Congress has each year to bring mandatory spending under control, taking us another year closer to a sovereign debt crisis. This is tragic, and I condemn it in the strongest terms.

The Senate, though, has retained just one key provision from the House budget. It makes tax reform possible this year. Tax reform is essential to economic growth, and economic growth is essential to confront our debt.

Many are alarmed that it provides for $1.5 trillion of additional debt, but this is due solely to the Senate's rules that require tax cuts to be scored only as revenue losses without taking into account economic expansion.

During the Obama years, our economy grew at an average of 1\1/2\ percent, annually. That is about half the average rate since World War II. Reagan averaged 3\1/2\ percent. Reagan did this by reducing the tax burdens that were crushing our economy. He slashed the top income tax rate from 70 percent down to 28 percent, and income tax receipts nearly doubled because of the economic expansion he unleashed.

Taxes driven by spending are the greatest threat to our economy today, and debt driven by spending is the greatest threat to our future. Controlling spending is currently impossible in the Senate. So it is obvious that we can't balance the budget and reduce our debt without significantly increasing economic growth; we can't increase economic growth without tax relief; and we can't get tax relief without the provisions in the Senate budget.

Arthur Laffer, the architect of the Reagan tax policy, forecasts that the corporate tax reform alone will increase GDP growth at a rate that should generate a temporary bump of 5 percent, settling down to an average of 2.6 percent over the decade. This will add $5 trillion to the American economy and directly increase revenues to all levels of government between $1.8 trillion and $2 trillion.

We have tried a static approach to tax policy during the Obama years. The economy stagnated and the debt doubled.

I remember what it was like in the Reagan era. Wages were rising and opportunities for better jobs were everywhere. There was a sense of optimism that comes with prosperity and abundance. When we abandoned these policies, we lost that prosperity to a decade of despair.

I want my kids to know what that sense of relief and optimism was like, what it feels like when morning dawns again on the American economy. This resolution starts that transformation, and I urge its adoption.

Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 3\1/2\ minutes.

Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to present the Republican Study Committee's 2018 budget, Securing America's Future Economy.

This proposal combines savings that have been proposed by the Congressional Budget Office, many RSC members, and public policy think tanks, including The Heritage Foundation, Citizens Against Government Waste, and the National Taxpayers Union. It is based on a simple principle that government should spend its money as carefully as families spend what they have left after they have paid their taxes.

By restraining the growth of spending and refocusing resources on core government responsibilities, adopting commonsense reforms, and placing Medicare and Social Security back on sound financial footing, we believe there is still time to save this country from financial and economic ruin. But time is running out.

On our current course, the Congressional Budget Office warns that, within 4 years, our deficits will balloon to $1 trillion annually, adding about $8,000 a year to an average family's debt that they will have to pay off in future taxes. Two years after that, interest on

the national debt will reach $654 billion. That is more than we currently spend for the entire defense establishment.

Let me repeat that so it sinks in. Six years from now, we will spend more than our current defense budget accomplishing nothing but renting the money that we have already borrowed and spent. Three years later, Medicare will collapse. Six years after that--if we get that far-- Social Security runs out of money.

This approaching crisis can be described with just three numbers: 26, 35, and 49. Once you understand those three numbers--26, 35, and 49-- you can plainly see the root of our problems.

Twenty-six percent is the combined population and inflation growth over the past 10 years. Thirty-five percent is the growth in Federal revenues. Clearly, this is not a revenue problem. The problem is that third number. Forty-nine percent is the growth in spending--nearly twice the rate of inflation and population combined.

We are about to hear about the draconian cuts from the opposition. Let me emphasize, the RSC budget continues to grow the Federal Government every year. I repeat, the RSC budget spends more every year.

Over the decade, we have provided for more than $1 trillion of government growth. Only in Washington can that be described as a cut. The RSC budget merely restrains the growth of spending over the next decade to give families the time and room to catch up.

By doing so, we can arrest the ruinous spiral of debt and interest costs that now threaten the very solvency of our Nation.

This budget gores a lot of sacred cows, because we want to point out the wide range of savings available to achieve. But I would ask the opponents of this budget to consider one thing as we race toward the looming fiscal crisis just 4 years down the road: you cannot provide for the common defense or general welfare or do all of the other things our government is called upon to do if you cannot pay for them. Our mountainous debt, driven by out-of-control spending, now threatens our ability to do so.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Walker), the chairman of the Republican Study Committee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield an additional 1 minute to the gentleman from North Carolina.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I would remind my friend from Kentucky that Ronald Reagan reduced the Federal income tax rate from 70 percent down to 28 percent, and income tax revenues doubled.

He is correct that we expect things from our government. We have seen a 49 percent increase in spending in the last decade. Have we seen a 49 percent increase in the quality of education or a 49 percent increase in our infrastructure or our defense capability?

What we have seen is a 49 percent increase in bureaucracy and government.

I would remind the gentleman that when we squander the people's money, we rob them of the means to meet the disasters and unforeseen circumstances that confront our country.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Flores), my friend and former chairman of the Republican Study Committee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman from Texas.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Palmer).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Ryan), the Speaker of the House.

Mr. Chairman, I include in the Record letters of support of the Republican Study Committee budget from the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, the Council for Citizens Against Government Waste, FreedomWorks, and Heritage Action for America.

Committee for a Responsible

Federal Budget,

September 8, 2017.

Hon. Mark Walker,

Washington, DC.

Dear Representative Walker: I am writing you to express our

appreciation for the fiscally responsible budget released by

the Republican Study Committee.

Your budget would make important progress by putting debt

on a downward path as a share of GDP, reducing it from 77

percent today to 56 percent by 2027--instead of letting it

rise to 89 percent as under current law.

By calling for spending cuts and entitlement reforms, your

budget helps to keep the national debt on a sustainable path.

We applaud the Republican Study Committee for your serious

contribution to the ongoing budget debate.

Sincerely,

Maya MacGuineas,

President, Committee for a Responsible

Federal Budget.

Mr. Chairman, Just a few steps from this Hall, Thomas Jefferson addressed his first inaugural address. After listing all of the blessings that our country enjoys, he asked what more do we need to maintain a happy and prosperous society. He said: ``Still one thing more, fellow citizens. A wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government. . . .''

We have it within our power to restore that wise and frugal government and the prosperity and happiness that free societies always produce the moment we summon the political will to do so. The Republican Study Committee seeks that shining city on a hill and today offers this map to get us there.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Chair, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding, and I thank her for her leadership on this important issue.

Mr. Chairman, for the first time in many years, this budget uses reconciliation for the purpose it was intended: to bring mandatory spending under control.

The appropriations that dominate so much of the debate comprise less than one-third of our total spending, and that is called discretionary spending. The budget sets a level; the appropriations process spends to that level. That is everything from general government to defense.

We have actually been able to bring that under control, but the other two-thirds of spending is called mandatory spending. It is beyond the annual control of Congress. It continues automatically until and unless the statutes that call for it are actually changed.

It is the mandatory spending that is eating our country alive. Mandatory spending is supposed to be controlled by reconciliation. Instructions are sent to the various authorizing committees to make whatever changes are necessary in current law to stay within our means. But this powerful fiscal tool has been ignored or squandered in past budgets, and this neglect is undermining the solvency of our country.

For the first time in many years, the House budget finally restrains mandatory spending by instructing our committees to find at least $200 billion in savings over the next decade. That means this budget will get us back to balance within the decade, and this is why it is so important.

If the Democrats had their way and we maintain our current path, the Congressional Budget Office warns that in just 4 years, in 2022, our deficits will surpass $1 trillion a year. That is where economists warn we run the risk of damage or even loss of our access to credit, a sovereign debt crisis.

If you want to know what that looks like, Venezuela is going through it right now, and within our own territory, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico--pension systems implode, basic services falter, the economy collapses.

Two years after that, in 2024, 6 years from now, the CBO warns that the annual interest cost on our debt will reach $654 billion. That is more than we currently spend on defense.

I would remind my friends on the left that you cannot provide for the common defense or promote the general welfare if you can't pay for it, and the ability of our country to do so is being undermined by our spending trajectory.

At the same time, we charge the highest corporate tax rate in the industrialized world, sending trillions of dollars of capital and hundreds of thousands of jobs to other countries. In the last 8 years, we have averaged only half of our postwar economic growth.

I remind my friends that corporations do not pay corporate taxes. Corporate taxes can only be paid in one of three ways: by consumers through higher prices, by employees through lower wages, by investors through lower earning. Cutting corporate taxes means lower prices for consumers, higher wages for employees, and higher earnings for investors.

Tax relief is absolutely vital to reviving the economy, but experience does warn us that revenue growth only partially offsets revenue lost to tax reductions. Indeed, when we are told that the choice is between taxes and debt, those are two sides of the same coin.

Taxes and debt are the only two possible ways to pay for spending. Once we have spent a dollar, we have already decided to tax it. We either tax it now, or we borrow it now and tax it later. Either way, it is entirely driven by spending. By restraining spending, this budget makes possible the tax relief that our economy desperately needs to grow.

Frankly, we could do much more if we summon the political will, and I will be presenting such a budget tomorrow on behalf of the Republican Study Committee.

But this budget moves us a long way in the right direction. It sets in motion the policies that Presidents from Calvin Coolidge to John F. Kennedy to Ronald Reagan have all used to revive and expand our economy. It brings us closer to that day when families will awaken to a new and prosperous morning for America.

Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 3 minutes.

Mr. Chairman, even though I disagree heartily with the budgets advanced by

the Progressive Caucus, they do us an invaluable service in the budget debate by bringing into sharp relief the two very different visions of governance advanced by the two parties.

The Progressive budget is a sincere and bold document. Unfortunately, it is also wrong. It would hike taxes by $10.1 trillion over the next 10 years relative to the Republican budget.

Now, think of every trillion dollars that we throw around here as $8,000 from an average family, because that is what it comes to. So $10.1 trillion in new taxes ultimately translates as $81,000 from an average family over the next decade taken either as direct taxes or as tax-driven price increases or as lower wages or as lower earnings as businesses pass on their burdens to consumers or employers or investors. Remember, investors are largely your 401(k) or your pension plan.

It also runs up $2.6 trillion more in debt than the Republican budget over the next 10 years. That means another $21,000 of debt added to that family's obligations that they will have to pay as future taxes just as surely as if it appeared on their credit card statement this month. And they have got to pay that back before they pay back their credit card statement. The IRS can get very insistent that they do.

And don't believe for a moment that only the rich will pay these taxes. It turns out that the so-called rich people aren't rich and they aren't even people. Many are struggling small businesses filing under subchapter S, small businesses that create two-thirds of the jobs in our economy.

We are told: ``Don't worry. We are using that money to create wealth and jobs.'' Well, the problem is government does not create jobs because it cannot create wealth. Government cannot inject a dollar into the economy until it has first taken that dollar out of the same economy.

As Bastiat warned, we see the job that government creates when it puts the dollar back in the economy. What we don't see as clearly is the job that is lost when government first takes that dollar out of the economy. We see those lost jobs as stagnating wages and workers giving up and leaving the job market, or as it is also known, the Obama economy.

Here is what government can do and what the Progressive and Democratic budgets propose. It can transfer jobs from the private sector to the public sector by taxing one and expanding the other. It can transfer jobs from one sector of the private market to another by taxing one and subsidizing the other. That is precisely the difference between Apple Computer and Solyndra. It is the difference between FedEx and the post office. It is the difference between the Reagan recovery and the Obama recovery.

Reagan, like Coolidge and Kennedy before him, reduced the tax and regulatory burdens on the economy and produced one of the longest economic expansions in our country's history. It truly felt like morning again in America. That is the Republican approach, and it works.

Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, my friend reminds me of a story when Ronald Reagan was pushing his tax reductions a generation ago that produced the biggest expansion in our Nation's history. He was approached one day by a working class fellow on a stop that the President was making, and the man looks at him and says: Mr. President, the Democrats say that you Republicans want to cut taxes on the rich. Is that right?

Reagan says: Well, that is what they say.

And the man says: Well, you go ahead and do that, Mr. President, because a poor person never gave me a job.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Woodall).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Palmer), a former director of the State Policy Network.

Mr. Chairman, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman from Alabama.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Grothman), my friend and colleague.

Mr. Chair, I am prepared to close when the gentleman from Arizona is finished, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chair, have my friends on the left learned absolutely nothing over these past 8 years? If massive government spending, higher and higher

taxes, and deeper and deeper debt produced economic growth, the Obama years should have been the golden age of our economy. Instead, we suffered prolonged stagnation. We averaged 1.5 percent annual growth, only half the average economic growth that our Nation has enjoyed in the postwar era. The Progressive and Democratic budgets promise more of the same.

We choose a different path, the Reagan path that produced an average of 3.5 percent growth year after year, higher wages, better jobs. Not just a Republican policy, John F. Kennedy did the same thing. He reminded us that a rising tide lifts all boats. These are the policies that create prosperity.

The government cannot create jobs because it cannot create wealth, but what it can do is create the conditions where jobs multiply and prosper or where they stagnate and disappear. That it can do very well. We have very consistent experience with the policies that create these conditions.

If you increase the burdens on the economy as the Democrats again propose, the economy contracts. If you lighten the burdens on the economy, it grows and prospers. No nation has ever taxed and spent its way to prosperity, but many nations have taxed and spent their way to economic ruin and bankruptcy.

We know what works and we know what doesn't work because we have tried both paths many times before. The House Budget Committee's budget follows principles that have, time and again, consistently and rapidly produced economic expansion and prosperity.

The House Democrats' budget and the Progressive budget before us now double down on policies that have impoverished and bankrupted nations wherever they have been employed down through history.

That is the choice before us today. Let us choose wisely. Our future depends on it.

Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.