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Bush Plan: Giveway to Super Rich that Squanders Opportunity to Invest In America
Statement by CWA President Morton Bahr:
We have an historic opportunity to use federal budget surpluses to invest in America's future and fix an array of social needs, and yet President Bush is determined to pursue a massive tax cut program that will eat up the surplus through a giveaway to the super rich.
CWA members and other working families did not vote for, and don't want, huge tax cuts at the expense of meaningful efforts to address our ailing public school systems, provide health care for growing millions of workers and children without coverage, and shore up our vital Medicare and Social Security programs.
Bush's proposed tax cut is irresponsible in its scope, and it's grossly unfair in its design. The richest 1 percent of households would get about half the tax cut, receiving an average of about $46,000 a year in tax breaks-or about 1,000 times what the bottom 20 percent of families would receive. More than a quarter of families, including a third of America's children-half of these minorities-would get nothing from the tax cut.
While proposing to devour our national prosperity dividend with a mammoth tax cut, we understand the administration is looking at cuts in worker protection programs overseen by the Labor Department-cuts that would affect job training, safety and health enforcement and other programs important to working people.
Coupled with the president's support for a resolution to rescind the OSHA ergonomic standard, which addresses the single biggest and most crippling occupational health issue, the Bush tax-budget proposal signals that this is an administration of and for wealthy and corporate interests at the expense of working families, the poor and the most vulnerable.
We call on responsible members of Congress from both parties to seize the opportunity to apply the surplus toward vital education, health care and retirement security needs, balanced by a more reasonable tax cut that benefits the families who need it most.
We have an historic opportunity to use federal budget surpluses to invest in America's future and fix an array of social needs, and yet President Bush is determined to pursue a massive tax cut program that will eat up the surplus through a giveaway to the super rich.
CWA members and other working families did not vote for, and don't want, huge tax cuts at the expense of meaningful efforts to address our ailing public school systems, provide health care for growing millions of workers and children without coverage, and shore up our vital Medicare and Social Security programs.
Bush's proposed tax cut is irresponsible in its scope, and it's grossly unfair in its design. The richest 1 percent of households would get about half the tax cut, receiving an average of about $46,000 a year in tax breaks-or about 1,000 times what the bottom 20 percent of families would receive. More than a quarter of families, including a third of America's children-half of these minorities-would get nothing from the tax cut.
While proposing to devour our national prosperity dividend with a mammoth tax cut, we understand the administration is looking at cuts in worker protection programs overseen by the Labor Department-cuts that would affect job training, safety and health enforcement and other programs important to working people.
Coupled with the president's support for a resolution to rescind the OSHA ergonomic standard, which addresses the single biggest and most crippling occupational health issue, the Bush tax-budget proposal signals that this is an administration of and for wealthy and corporate interests at the expense of working families, the poor and the most vulnerable.
We call on responsible members of Congress from both parties to seize the opportunity to apply the surplus toward vital education, health care and retirement security needs, balanced by a more reasonable tax cut that benefits the families who need it most.
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