Unlimited Chances
By: Mary Mostert, Analyst, Original Sources, (www.originalsources.com)
February 11, 2000
After thirty years of taxing marriage, the U.S. House of Representatives yesterday passed HR 6, which would eliminate the Marriage Penalty in the U.S. Tax Code. The change in the U.S. Tax code in 1969 was announced at the time as "tax relief for single persons (a new tax rate schedule that will hold their tax to no more than 120 percent of the amount owed by married couples with the same income.) What happened, of course, was that the new tax schedule had an "unintended consequence." It helped spur a 1960s free love notion - that marriage was not necessary. In fact, at this point in time, the IRS tax code actively discourages marriage by slapping an average of $1400 a year on young couples who are married, as compared with those who merely are living together.
Now, as we know from the Great Debate over tobacco, when our society concludes that there is something detrimental to it, it tries to discourage it by slapping a tax on it. That is why tobacco and alcohol taxes are so high and why many believe they should be higher. It is believed by most that the higher the tax on an item, the more it will be discouraged.
So, for thirty years we have taxed marriage. How did taxing marriage do as a means of discouraging it? Statistics would indicate it was quite a successful method of discouraging marriage: By 1985, for example, the divorce rate in America had doubled from the divorce rate in 1965. However, today marriage and divorce rates are not really good indicators because so much of the younger population is opting to simply not get married in the first place, therefore when their casual live-in relationships break up, there are no statistics that indicate the break-up since there was no marriage.
Perhaps the most amazing statistic today is in family formation figures. Of all pregnancies in America, according to the Guttmacher Institute which traces these things, from 1973 to 1978, the number of abortions per year doubled. After 30 years combination of Roe vs Wade and such marriage discouragement federal policies as the marriage penalty tax, about 30% of all pregnancies in America now end in abortion and a third of the births of babies not aborted end in the birth of a baby to an unwed mother. Because of the huge number of abortions over the last 25 years, there are 20% fewer young women under the age of 25 than there were twenty years ago. The women from ages 20-24 are having abortions at a slightly higher rate than in 1977, however, women under 20 have cut their abortion rate dramatically.
Now, some of you out there undoubtedly are going to send me an e-mail to tell me that there is no direct connection between taxing marriage and the fact that marriage seems to no longer be the dream of our youth. In fact, it appears to me that today’s youth in general don’t have a romantic bone in their bodies. Sex has been shoved down their throats at such a young age and with such lack of romance that it is probably a miracle when any of them actually marry and form a family. I suppose I would have to do a major scientific study to determine what actually has caused marriage among the young to be so out of style.
However, if we believe in statistical models, and certainly in an election year we get polls and statistical models by the thousands, there is a statistical and time-line connection between the 1969 change in the tax code in which marriage was, for the first time, considered a taxable, and therefore unwanted, behavior.
The Washington Post, in reporting the vote in the House in today’s editions, notes that it would "cut income taxes for nearly 25 million married couples, seeking to end quirks in the tax code that force many such couples to pay higher tax rates than they would if they were single and filing separately."
"The GOP-sponsored bill, approved 268 to 158, would boost the standard deduction and expand the lowest tax bracket for all married couples and increase the earned-income tax credit for lower-income couples. Forty-eight Democrats joined with 220 Republicans to pass the measure.
However, the Democrats called the GOP bill "too costly" and said it could not be "justified." Bill Clinton has threatened to veto it and some Senators say it won’t be passed in the Senate. Obviously the fact that they are discouraging family formation and legal marriage is not considered sufficient "justification" for the Democrats.
According to a study last year by the Treasury Department, 24.8 million couples paid a marriage penalty on their estimated 1999 tax returns, or a little less than half of all joint returns filed. The average penalty was $1,141. However, the bills detractors point out, while nearly half of couples pay a marriage tax, others, they claim, receive a "marriage bonus" if the wife is a stay-at-home Mom. They claim that "income averaging" gives such couples a lower tax. There are millions of couples in the one-income-per family category, or in families where one partner makes a great deal less than the other.
The Washington Post notes: "Rather than risk alienating the "bonus" couples by eliminating their tax advantage, Republican leaders chose to shower additional benefits on these taxpayers while also helping the couples suffering under the marriage penalty. Indeed, more than half of the overall benefit of the plan approved by the House yesterday would go to "bonus" couples earning more than $75,000 a year, House GOP and Democratic aides agree."
Naturally if a couple dares to make that much money, they need to be punished, right? That’s what the Democrats are saying. And, that is why Clinton will probably veto the repeal of the marriage penalty.
On the other hand, House GOP leaders said their approach was essential because many of the "bonus" couples include stay-at-home mothers or fathers who are raising their families and shouldn't be denied the benefits of the proposed change in the tax code. "The point here is that . . . we don't create even more unfairness by leaving them out," said House Majority Whip Tom DeLay (R-Tex.).
Conservative family groups – including the Christian Coalition and the Family Research Council, as well as Jewish groups – pressed Republicans to broaden their plan to include such couples. Yesterday, the Family Research Council arranged a rally near the Capitol, decorated with Valentine's Day hearts and a wedding trellis, that drew the entire House GOP leadership. "We unabashedly help the stay-at-home moms," said Rep. Bill Archer.
Rep. Charles B. Rangel (N.Y.), the ranking Democrat on the Ways and Means Committee, contends the Republicans are trying to replicate last year's huge tax cut – which was vetoed by Clinton – by doing it piecemeal this time. "Why ask for a veto?" he said. "Why not work this out with the Democrats?"
Of course, the Democrats seem think that families with stay-at-home Moms are some kind of a detriment to society and therefore should be punished for their irresponsibility. I suspect that one of their problems is the fact that a stay-at-home Mom can save a lot of money. Mike Moore, one of my sons-in-law, tells everyone who will listen, "Gwen saves more than I earn!" He believes that the best thing he can do for his children is to give them a full-time mother. And, it is true that a full-time mother is in a position to save money by making home cooked, rather than fast-food restaurant meals, shopping carefully and taking better care of things at home. Obviously, women who do that, instead of going out in the workforce, in the minds of Democrats deprive the U.S. treasury of a share of the money they save the family.
Naturally, the Moores, and several other of my children, are paying the marriage tax. They are being penalized for getting married, having children and taking good care of those children without dipping into the federal treasury. Once upon a time America knew that good homes, where children can be carefully nurtured and taught are the backbone of a free society. When mother stays home and cares for the children, many federal program are not needed and not used: publicly financed child care; headstart programs; after school baby-sitting programs, school breakfasts and dinners; and, generally, such families don’t need the teen-services for pregnancies, abortions, juvenile crime, etc.
I’ve suspected for a long time that the Democrats have a real determination to get mothers out of the home and into the work force, so their incomes can be taxed. House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt as much as admitted it, saying the bill to end the marriage penalty , "threatens our prosperity and risks our future."
Republican Tillie Fowler of Florida, on the other hand, lightly touched on the real issue when she said: ""What is more immoral than taxing people just because they fall in love?"
Well, actually, Rep. Fowler, in all fairness I don’t think the Democrats really object to people falling in love. It just that they don’t want them to get married and establish legal families. Why, if everyone did that there would be a whole lot fewer people who would be in need of public welfare kinds of programs and when people are not on the public dole, they have a bad habit of voting Republican.
For years we have had Democrats in both Congress and the White House who have claimed they were "concerned" about families. Their votes on the incredible marriage tax is by far the best indicator of how much they care about families. This should be considered a bellwether issue. Those against repeal of the marriage tax are simply against marriage. Period. There IS no other real excuse for such a blatantly discriminatory policy.
If the voters would bounce any politician who opposes such an obviously needed and fair approach to taxation out of office on his or her ears if they vote against the Marriage Tax, we could get this problem straightened out forthwith during this election year. Now is the time to speak up, especially to your Senators.
To comment: mmostert@originalsources.com
To write your members of Congress on this issue go to: http://www.originalsources.com/PLobby/ContactCongress.html
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