The financial crisis and the Great Recession left firms with excess capacity, reducing incentives to invest. If businesses expect slower growth to continue, that will also hold down investment.
The tax code is very inefficient. Both the personal tax code and the corporate tax code. By closing loopholes and lowering rates, you could increase the efficiency of the tax code and create more incentives for people to invest.
The American economy is driven by small business. And there's nothing basically to create incentives for small businesses. We've done no tax reform. They're the highest-taxed group in the country. And corporations can go anywhere they want and do whatever they want. Small businesses have to stay.
Additionally, this tax forces family businesses to invest in Uncle Sam rather than the economy. When families are forced to repurchase businesses because of the death tax, that means less money is being invested in new jobs and capital expansion.
Tax reform for the 21st century means rewarding hardworking families by closing unfair loopholes, lowering tax rates across the board, and simplifying the tax code dramatically. It demands reducing the tax burden on American businesses of all sizes so they can keep more of their income to invest in our communities.
I think we need a very, very serious effort, primarily through tax policy to provide incentives and encouragement for people to save and invest and expand their businesses and to create more jobs. The kind of thing we did in the early Reagan years, 30 years ago. I think that's essential.
Tax reform done right will improve incentives to invest in U.S. production and to repatriate profits.
One way we gave small businesses more money to invest was by extending tax provisions on expensing. This allows businesses to immediately write off things like equipment, without being burdened by depreciation requirements.
We can attract new businesses and jobs in fast-growing industries through tax incentives, incubators, zoning tools and CUNY partnerships.
Enterprise zones have succeeded in attracting needed capital to our urban poverty centers. Businesses and investors that wouldn't otherwise give these blighted areas a second glance react to the incentives and invest.
And what's interesting, and I don't think a lot of Americans understand this fact, is that, one, most new jobs are created by small businesses; two, most small businesses pay tax at the individual income tax, or many small businesses pay tax there.
Businesses will only invest in Greece if three conditions are fulfilled. First, there must be a clear commitment to the euro. No businesses will invest if they have to fear that Greece will leave the euro zone at some point. Second, the Greek government must be prepared to work together with European institutions in order to restructure the country.
They tax when you earn a dollar, they tax you when you save it, they tax you when you invest it. If you earn a dividend, they tax it again, and if you're stupid enough to die, they steal up to half.
What you do by having an income tax rate reduction across the board, you really provide great incentives for people to work, produce, and increase output. So I would support a carbon tax in replacement for a progressive income tax.
If we think that high marginal tax rates are bad because they distort incentives, the same is then true for tax subsidies.
In addition to billions in new 'stimulus' spending that our country can't afford, the Geithner plan also contains billions in tax increases on small and family-owned businesses while protecting the tax preferences of wealthy, multinational corporations.