Beware of the Gregg-Conrad Bipartisan Tax/Spending Commission Bill

Wednesday, December 9, 2009 2:57 PM

Today, Senators Judd Gregg and Kent Conrad announced the introduction of their "Bipartisan Task Force for Responsible Fiscal Action Act of 2009," and as soon as we saw the announcements, our alarm bells went off.  The bill, as written would lead to a guaranteed tax increase. 

The bill is not new, it's been introduced in the past, as has a similar House bill, sponsored by Congressman Frank Wolf.  But with the current fiscal picture the temptation to fall for such a bipartisan commission is clearly there.

This excerpt from ATR's letter in opposition explains the problem with the commission:

The bill establishes an eighteen-member task force comprised of ten Democrat and eight Republican Congressmen, Senators, and Administration officials.  A report from the commission would need to gather fourteen votes in order to make an expedited recommendation to both bodies.  The recommendation would only pass with a supermajority vote in each chamber.

Despite the appearance of protection for taxpayers, this commission would guarantee a net tax increase be in its proposal.  Every Democrat on the commission would insist on tax increases to “balance” spending cuts in the recommendation.  There is no conceivable scenario whereby the commission would issue a report that does not contain tax hikes.  Therefore, this commission is unacceptable from a taxpayer perspective.

The fix to this problem is relatively simple: In the past, Congressman Patrick McHenry has sponsored an alternative to the Wolf-commission bill, the language was almost identical, with one notable exception.  One sentence was added that precluded tax increases:

LIMITATION- The legislation developed under this subsection may not include any new, or any increase in an existing, Federal tax.

Let's hope members of Congress will rally around an alternative with such a limitation.

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