My Letter to Congress: S.1733 Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act

I am writing as your constituent in the 22nd Congressional district of Texas. I support S.1733 - Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act, and am tracking it using OpenCongress.org, the free public resource website for government transparency and accountability.

Sincerely,
Leo Hwang

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Dear Friend:
Thank you for contacting me regarding the urgent need to re-energize our nation's economy. I appreciate your thoughts and comments.

About 14 million Americans remain out of work. Decisive steps are needed to restore economic growth and spur rapid job creation.

On February 17, 2009, a Democrat-controlled Congress approved legislation proposed by President Barack Obama that committed nearly $1 trillion to short-term spending initiatives intended to jump-start growth. Since enactment of what came to be known as the economic stimulus bill, the national unemployment rate has never dropped below 9%, and a return to prosperity seems in many ways to be further away.

President Obama brought forward a second plan to stimulate the economy in an address to a Joint Session of Congress on September 8, 2011. This second jobs bill contains mostly the same short-term spending approach as the first stimulus. The President also asked Congress to offset the costs of his proposed $450 billion spending plan by increasing taxes on those who earn more than $200,000 (individuals) and $250,000 (joint filers and small businesses).

Although the White House and Congress need to work together to move our nation and its economy forward, I do not believe a second, huge injection of federal spending will be more effective in turning things around than the first one. Also, I'm convinced that it would be exactly the wrong step to raise taxes now on small businesses and individuals whom we rely on to invest in and create new private sector jobs. What is needed is comprehensive, pro-growth tax reform to bring fairness and simplicity through lower, flatter rates, and repeal of many special tax provisions.

I do agree with the President's proposal to offer tax credits to businesses for hiring veterans. An extension of the temporary payroll tax cuts for both new employees and their employers could be beneficial, too, even if only in the short run.

Also included in the President's proposal is an idea borrowed from legislation that Senator John Kerry (D-MA) and I introduced earlier this year -- to create a national infrastructure bank. The bill that Senator Kerry and I introduced was carefully drawn to provide $10 billion in one-time seed money to a new infrastructure bank to encourage private sector investment to meet infrastructure demands. The bank would be authorized to guarantee loans for economically sound, privately financed transportation, water, and energy system improvements -- which could exceed $600 billion in total investment in coming years. The President's version of an infrastructure bank, however, would relax loan guarantee standards, add billions annually for grants to politically favored projects, and impose additional federal regulations that would drive up costs and delay actual work.

If the President were to follow the Kerry-Hutchison bill, I believe there would be a good chance of Congressional approval. The result could be a significant investment toward meeting our infrastructure needs and hundreds of thousands of new jobs -- without higher taxes or adding to the national debt.

The White House also needs to slow down the tidal wave of new regulations -- more than 50,000 pages this year alone. This flood of new rules from federal agencies is driving up business operating costs by tens of billions of dollars and discouraging badly needed new investments in jobs. Businesses can't invest in new facilities and add workers when the costs of doing business are changing on a daily basis. And when it comes to these types of uncertainties, the biggest problem for businesses is the thousands of pages of new regulations and mandates that will be issued to implement the Obama health care plan in the coming months.

For the past 75 years, the U.S. economy has been the world's most dynamic and reliable creator of jobs and growth. We will not rise out of economic stagnation through higher taxes, bigger government, and additional trillions of national debt. Congress and the President need to come together on new policies that build on our strengths: innovation, skilled workers, and private sector investment in new businesses, new industries, and new jobs.

Please be assured that I will keep your thoughts in mind. I appreciate hearing from you, and I hope that you will not hesitate to contact me on any issue that is important to you.

Sincerely,
Kay Bailey Hutchison
United States Senator

284 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-5922 (tel)
202-224-0776 (fax)
http://hutchison.senate.gov

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Thank you.