A Tax Day Pitch From Bush
President Bush made a Tax Day pitch for tax cuts, telling business leaders, "Enough is enough. People in America deserve tax relief."
Addressing the U.S. Chamber of Commerce on Monday, the deadline for filing federal tax forms, the president said government spending has soared while taxpayers have suffered.
He said Washington is taking a bigger share of the U.S. economy in taxes than it did in any year since 1944, when 11.5 million Americans were fighting World War II. "Our country is at peace, but our government is charging wartime prices."
Federal tax receipts represent 20.6 percent of the nation's gross domestic product. The level hasn't been that high since 1945, when it was 20.4 percent.
Many analysts say the increased tax share is largely because of money collected from high-income people, especially capital gains taxes on investments. The Joint Committee on Taxation estimates that families earning between $30,000 and $50,000 pay about 6 percent of their income in federal income taxes and the average for all families is 12.3 percent.
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Mr. Bush also said that government income tax receipts, adjusted for inflation, are twice as much as 1981 levels. "Enough is enough, folks," he said again. "It's time to give our folks some tax relief."
And he joked that the budget is big enough to give every member of Congress tens of millions dollars to spend. "They should be able to get by on that. Even in the Senate," where his $1.6 trillion tax cut plan was trimmed by moderate Democrats and Republicans.
Though aides said the speech represented a different rhetorical formulation for his tax-cut arguments, Mr. Bush traced a familiar path by casting the proposed cut as a boon to middle-class Americans as well as the rich.
"For families with children to raise and debts to pay, tax relief will lift burdens and ease worries," he said.