Test test test test test test test test test test test test test test test test test test test test test test test test. We can lower the Corporate Tax rate and get it to within shouting distance of our trading partners. Were a better place to do better because of transportation, because of safety, because of security, because of environment and all those things. But there is a point at which you run out of those benefits when you are talking about so much of your income being paid in taxation. I appreciate that point. Its an etch lexcellent one. I kind of lost my place. Consumption tax versus income tax. I come from the state where the author of the book called the fair tax comes from and hes on radio. If i dont ask some question about consumption tax when we have a hearing like this, i get chastised at home. How many of you are familiar with this . Whats your thought or do you have any thought about it at all . Mr. Mazur, start with you. I guess my basic thought about our tax system is that we have a portfolio of taxes. Some are based on income. Some are based on consumption. We have payroll taxes. A portfolio of taxes. Having a consumption tax would make sense. Trading partners has a value added tax. You can imagine having that as part of a portfolio of taxes. A shift from an income tax to consumption tax, thats a huge change. Probably beyond the tolerance of the American Public to address that change. Thats like what every other country does. Anybody else have a comment . Yes, maam. I included support for a consumption tax as part of a portfolio in my written statement. The approach that has been advocated for a number of years as well as a bill introduced would take us a long way in that direction, would match our system with the tax systems of other countries which is how those other countries have managed to significantly reduce their Corporate Taxes and create a system thats more conducive to investment. Most important thing if we make a change like that is how you convert the taxpayer from the old system to the new one. One of the big problems we had in 86 was passive loss. We went back and clawed back and changed the treatment of passive laws and the treatment of investments and the Balance Sheet of a lot of corporations, particularly construction corporations. Transition is critical. Yes, sir. Just to add, even our income tax isnt part of consumption tax. There are many aspects of our income tax. For example, Retirement Savings are not subject to tax. Even what we consider an income tax is really a hybrid of those kinds of things. If we were to move to a consumption tax, the transition is a very important issue. I also think dealing with Income Distribution would be an important aspect. You would have thoi about what rate and what affect that might have. Thank you for your testimony. I guess senator warner is next. I appreciate the panel being here. One of the first hearings on tax reform. Its down to isakson and warner here. We will fix it up. At this point. I thought it was interesting when we talk about this issue, at least the first three panelists quoted star wars, dr. Seuss and greek mythology. Im not sure what that meant, but it did say maybe how challenging this is. I want to make a bit of a comment and ask a question. Here is my worry. I agree very strongly with mr. Mazur that i want to do tax reform. I want to bring our corporate rates much lower. I believe very strongly we need to do repatriation and bring the earnings that are offshore back. But as somebody who spent a couple years trying to put together the simpson bowls plan, i worry whether were going to have the wherewithal to really make the tradeoffs you need to make in terms of broadening the base to really lower the rate. Six or seven years ago, eight years ago when this was the vogue, the bid and ask on corporate was the democrats are more 28, the republicans more at 25. But because the world has not stayed static, i think we have seen many of our industrial competitors lower their corporate rates down closer to 20 and at least aspirationally the administration looks at a rate thats closer to 15. My memory serves correct me if im wrong that the rule of thumb is for every point that you lower the corporate rate, you are talking basically 100 billion a point. So its fairly straight math. Bring it down to 25, you gotta get rid of raise a trillion dollars. Bring it to 15, you have to bring it down two trillion dollars. One thing i dont think my colleagues realize this is where we think we have to get common facts. If you add up all of our state, federal and local taxes combined, america actually ranks as one of the lowest taxed industrial nations in the world. The data i have among oecd nations shows america is at 31st out of 34 nations. You start with a nominally the highest tax rate when you actually look at collections, were 31 out of 34. What i worry this goes to where senator isakson was at. All of the nations that a lot of my friends in business like to refer to that have business or Corporate Taxes in the low te s teens, they all still raise dramatically more revenue than we do. Were at about 24. 5 of gdp. I think its unique i hear a lot of people refer to germany and their great apprenticeship programs. Do you think realistically with so many biases that we have on our tax expenditures, every business is for tax reform until it comes to their tax expenditures, that we can ever get to a rate that would keep us competitive . Lets say for argument sake thats low 20s on the corporate side. By actually broadening the base and lowering the rate. Or will we not have to . Look at what senator isakson said. Look at a carbon tax. Look at some other broadbasedr us to bring down rates to a competitive level and i would argue hopefully on a permanent basis. I have no interest in another shortterm tax holiday without some broadbased new revenue source. We can take it from mr. Mazur on down our start at the other end and go down the list. I will just jump in quick. First, on your 100 billion per point, thats true for the first point. Each point gets progressively more expensive as the base gets broader. Its more than 2 trillion. Thats just on c rates. That doesnt talk about exactly. Second point i think mr. Isakson hit on this is if you want to look like other countries with a low corporate rate, you need another revenue source. It could be evaluated tax like other countries have or something else. You cant just broaden the base dont think we will get to broadening the base. Correct me if im wrong, gentlemen and ladies, please. I think its important to take the steps as far as we can go to get the rate down. It goes back to my answer to the previous question, which is how far do we want to push the rate down. If we want to push the rate down, we have to take on a lot of the tax expenditures. Could we end up saying, lets try as hard as we can on broadening the base and then if we still got a delta that says we want to get to 20, then you could put whatever that delta is, you could put in some form then have to make a hard decision of whether you want to move to a consumption tax. During this process at the present time, i think if you want to push the rate down, you have to give very hard thought to what tax expenditures you are going i doubt then the question is how far can you get it down. Then you have to decide i dont if we could get to 25. The last two comments. I agree. I think it will be very difficult to eliminate enough tax expenditures to bring the rate down as far as we need to bring it down to be competitive. Were a low tax country relative to the rest of the world. I have a chart many my written statement that talks about the difference in the portfolio of taxes that other countries look to. What they do to make up the difference that allows them to put a more attractive corporate rate out there is they have a value added tax as part of their portfolio. Do as much as we can. But then i think at some point were going to have to come back in any event to look at it another tax to add to the list of taxes in order to those value added taxes deal with border adjustment. Senator, i will take this in a slightly different direction because they said everything i would have said. I think this goes to why both bipartisanship and marketing to the American Public is important. Because the only way this gets done is for these difficult issues to actually get sold to the American Public that this is going to raise their standard of living. Anything you do thats basically going to bring down the corporate rate, if you are going to raise taxes on them through a consumption tax or through tax expenditures, that has to be sold as something that is going to be good for them in the long run. Bipartisanship means not reconciliation. Were going to have to move on. I share senator warners view. Senator menendez. Thank you for your testimony. The president s tax proposal and the House Republican blueprint call for the elimination of the state and local Tax Deduction which would hike up taxes on thousands of new jersey and millions of americans. The purpose is to save families from double taxation. Nevertheless, the Trump Administration advocated for its repeal arguing the federal government should not be subsidizing the tax and spending policies of individual states. I find it hard to understand i want to i think you had a little dialogue on this before. If one believes do you believe that its fair to force individuals and families to face double taxation while large multinational corporations are able to avoid such treatment . As i said before, i think that the state and local Tax Deduction is about double taxation as well as about ability to pay and notions of federalism. I think the foreign tax credit is about double taxation as well. It is not listed as a tax expenditure. The state and local Tax Deduction is. I think if we eliminate the state and local Tax Deduction, we have to be worried about some collateral consequences. Obviously, our state governments, were putting more pressure on them to Fund Infrastructure and education. Those issues obviously would suffer if we were to remove the state and local Tax Deduction. So i think it actually could be treated as an Unfunded Mandate except its not on the spending side, its on the tax side. Senator, im concerned about it. Appreciate the question. If one believes that the state and local Tax Deduction subsidizes progressive states, it seems to follow that the foreign tax credit subsidizes european socialism with american tax dollars. I dont think thats a far stretch. I dont know if we get to our logical conclusion of the arguments being presented that we wouldnt be adverse to the idea that Foreign Corporations get deduction and getting it abroad for activities abroad that ultimately i think some of my republican friends would find far more objectionable than what state and local municipalities are doing. Let me ask you this, do you believe that the president should sign a tax reform bill that raises taxes on almost a quarter of all middle class families . I would open that to anybody. Senator, i think that if that was all it did, then probably no. But you have to look at the totality of what the entire bill does. Well, in my focus on this committee, part of what to do is help middle class families afford a home and education and retirement. And while on the campaign trail, the president promised to cut taxes on the middle class, what we see under his plan at least the schematic that we have, is that the top 1 of millionaires and billionaires receive nearly half of all the tax cuts are getting an average of 175,000 back while almost a quarter of middle class families wy ies wo a tax increase. I dont know thats tax exwitneequity at the end of the day. I dont know how you help middle class families in that context. Is it fair to say doing tax reform under regular order is more preferable than reconciliation because of the policy restrictions that come with reconciliation . Anyone who wants to answer that question. Can you elaborate on the weakness of doing tax reform through reconciliation . Well, i think reconciliation, first you need a budget resolution which obviously is somewhat difficult to get as we saw with Health Care Reform. Secondly, once you have a budget resolution in place, the march begins are narrowed and any dispute could cause the bill to fail. Finally, most importantly, i think going to your question is, as i called it in my testimony, i called it a fastian bargain, because you bring in the byrd rule and other protections in reconciliation that could cause you to then have to engage in gimmickry to avoid them. Therefore, we sunset the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts because the byrd rule. Thats an example. We would have to do things to avoid that in the context of something that was run through reconciliation. What i heard consistently from Corporate Leaders across the country in the last two years is give me predictability. I dont know reconciliation does that. One final question. The administration has advocated changing the way the cost of tax legislation is calculated or scored for the purposes of analyzing its impact on the budget. As i think all of you know, different socalled dynamic scoring models produce a wide range of results depending on what the assumptions are. The joint committee on taxation is a nonpartisan highly respected institution that provides members of congress and the general public with objective analysis regarding the costs of tax legislation. Do you agree that congress anded administration should use and respect the nonpartisan joint committee on taxation as the ultimate arbitrator on the cost and impact of tax reform legislation . Mr. Mazur . Senator menendez, as a joint tax alum, of course, i would say that. I think even as a taxpayer, thats the right thing to do. To look at the professional staff of the joint Tax Committee and look at their expertise the way to help congress get to a rational decision. Anyone disagree with that . For the record, i will say those are all no one disagrees. Thank you. Thank you, senator menendez. Thank you. I want to thank all of you for appearing here today. We have i think collectively here people who have served in the last three administrations. Thats a particularly valuable asset to this committee as we continue working to reform the tax code and as many of you have noted, todays tax code is way overly complicated and burdensome. Its not kept pace with changes that we have seen in our economy over the past 30 years, making it a drag on the economy. Im hopeful we can change the code in a way that fosters greater Economic Growth and that benefits all americans. I want to come back to the pass through rate issue. The administrations tax reform framework and the house bl blueprint. This is an area we have been exploring in particular detail. At first blush it sounds simple. Tax the income earned by a pass through business at a separate rate which some have proposed by tied to the Corporate Tax rate. As you dig deeper, there are a number of challenging questions that arise. For example, how do we account for pass through owners who are actively engaged in the business and treat them similarly to an owner of a C Corporation who is also an employee . Should the pass through tax rate for active owners be based on the return on the capital that they have invest in the business or compensation that they pay them services . Recognizing only s corps can play owner employee wages. If so, how should industry and geographic differences be taken into account . How do we create an equitable system that treats them all similarly . Finally, how can a pass through rate take these factors into account in a way that will be d administrable . The bipartisan policy paper reforming the taxation of pass through businesses. I would ask to insert this into the record. I want to put that out there and would welcome your thoughts on the concept. Anybody who would like to take that on. I raise a lot of issues. If you would care to comment. Senator, thanks for the question. Obviously, the argument for parody in rates must take into account that theres a double level tax on C Corporations but also designing a special tax rate on pass throughs is difficult as you alluded to and could be costly and so we would have to figure out a way of constraining it and making sure its not prone to abuse. Differentiating Service Income from capital income has been a nutty issue for all of us over the course of many years. We put our regs in the mid 1990s that subsequently got withdrawn that may actually provide some framework for what you are trying to do. But again, i think its a very, very difficult issue and difficult to constrain. So i think that the report that uriyou are inserting does good job. Its complicated and one that will be difficult to administer going forward. I will look at the 1986 act. 1986, we cut the individual rate to 28 . We set the corporate rate at 34 . Then fully taxed dividends and Capital Gains from corporations at 28 . The result of that disparity was that we drove all sorts of business out of the corporate sector and into the pass through sector. The incredible growth we have seen in s corps, llc, partnership, starred edstarted. If we were to do corporate reform that made being in corporate solution much more attractive, i think we would see as we did back in the late 80s a migration out of pass through form and into c kcorp form. I would add that if one is going to level the Playing Field by taking eliminating from the code various deductions and preferences, that might be a reason for lowering the rate. The way part they anership work flows out to the owners. Thats true for s corporations, for participanerships, llc. You have to create bass kkets o income. Once you identify that, presumably that would flow through and enjoy the lower rate. As my colleagues have pointed out, to the extent its attributable to services, you will want to figure out a compensation element. The challenge is to figure out that compensation element. Either you could use a reasonable compensation approach, but reasonable compensation approach as we all know is extremely difficult to administer. It may require some sort of formula. For example, to treat a certain percentage of the income as being compensation income or to figure out some what capital contribution the owner has made and to the extent of that earnings on the capital contribution can enjoy the lower rate and the rest might be subject to the higher rate attributable compensation. This is very difficult to figure out exactly how that compensation almost would be calculated. I think thats the nub of the issue. Mr. Chairman, i have another question. Im out of time. I will submit it for the record. It has to do with the gig economy and the tax rules that apply. We will have to take a new look at that. We have a bill that does that. Submit that for the record. Im another who thinks that this is an area that needs to be looked at. I appreciate that. Senator portman. Thank you, mr. Chairman. This has been terrific. I enjoyed the testimony from all four of you. You are all for experts from various administrations and yet you find consensus on the fact that not only is the code broken but on how to fix it. As i listen to you and look at your testimony, i am reminded of the fact that this is not new. Let me quote, your efforts are timely, particularly in light of the changing global landscape. We must be connaware of this. She said that six years ago. At this same hearing where three of the four of you were present and all of you said something similar. Its not just a question of finding Common Ground today. I think you have been on this for quite a while as this basic proposition that we need to broaden the base, we need to lower the rate, we need a simpler system, a fair system. The devil is in the details, the details are important. Senator thune mentioned one. If you have a lower corporate rate and the individual rate is high,causes unfairness. The prescription to deal with it and mr. Soloman talked about some of the issues. Its not just that theyre difficult philosophically to find. Its that once you find them, the compliance is going to be a huge problem. Let me ask, do you all agree with that . Absolutely. We have our work cut out for us. We need your help on that. I want to go back to something that senator widen said about wage growth. This is really important. We have talked about this as we noted for years, maybe even decades since the 86 act, we dont focus enough on why. A lot has to do with the very real problems in our current economy which is slight growth and better job numbers in the last several months when you take them in aggregate. Wages are flat. Maybe even declining on average. This is one way to provide some Economic Growth but also wage growth. Kevin hassett says, 1 increase in Corporate Tax rates, wages decrease 1 . He has good studies around that. 2009 study, famous cbo study i referred to a lot by william n randolph says 70 is on workers. You higher pay, Better Benefits if you can deal with the fact that the United States has a corporate rate higher. A prover w a professor who testified said 67 of the burden of our high Corporate Tax rate and the way we tax on a worldwide basis falls on workers. You want to get wages up, which all of us do, this is a great opportunity to do it. So i know trih tax reform is hard i assume is what you are referring to. How about trim . Tax reform is mandatory. We have to do it. Let me ask quickly if i could about a specific interest and thats Interest Deductibility. That along with the pass through issue has been a tough one for us. Can someone tell me, maybe you mr. Soloman, is the preference over Equity Financing versus Debt Financing an Economic Policy issue that you think is important to address . If so, what would you do about it in the tax code . Certainly in the code today, usa all know, theres a difference in the treatment between dividends and the payment of interest. It does create distortion because having Additional Debt in our system encourages companies to take on debt and it may affect the relative portion of debt they would undertake and could affect financial stability. Thats an example of a discorporatidi distortion that you would Pay Attention to. What would do you about it . Senator hatch and his team have been talking about actually making dividends deductible. Another way is to as the house bill does, limit deductibility of interest. Any thoughts on that from the panel . Well, i testified in my testimony that i thought corporate interegration that is going after Interest Deductibility based on my discussions with capital intensive businesses, Interest Deductibility is more important than most other issues. I actually somewhat disagree with my colleague here. I believe that the debt bias hasnt led to overleveraging based on the research i have seen recently. In the nonfinancial sector. We have to demonstrate that the discorporation is actually having negative economic consequence. I agree. I think that the a better approach would be to go in the direction of corporation integration. There are a lot of businesses that depend on Debt Financing, because they dont have access to the equity market. Those are some of the things that need to be taken into account if you think about doing an interest limitation. A lot of other countries have put limitations on Interest Deductibility. Theres a theme out there internationally of doing that. I think that the limitations that other countries have put on Interest Deductibility are not so severe that they actually impede companies from getting the financing they need or being able to deduct the expenses associated with it. My time expired. If you wouldnt mind, give me your views in writing and you want to followup, followup. I want to talk about the sweet spot and the best tax policy to address that. Its an important area. Welcome. We appreciate your being here today. We appreciate your service to our country and your continuing service to our country simply by your presence today. My colleagues have heard me ask four questions with respect to tax reform proposals. Ive been asking the same four questions for a while. I will probably take them to my grave. It may take that long before we do tax reform. We will see. Hopefully not. I ask, is it fair . Does it foster Economic Growth . Does it simplify the tax code or make it even more complex . What is its fiscal impact . Those are the four questions i ask. One of the questions i have asked here today its less a tax reform question though but its one we need your input on. We under fund the irs. We ask them to do more than is hugh pan humanly possible. We change the tax code and we expect them with not enough people, money, technology, to somehow be able to make it all work. Any advice for what we should do . Sure. One of the ways i like to think about the Internal Revenue service, its like a giant Credit Card Company. What they do is we like Credit Card Companies in delaware. Exactly. You know how that works. They bill people. They make collections. They go after people who dont pay. Under funding the irs is like under funding your accounts receivable. No rational business would do that. Thats a great line. Im going to use it. Its not copyrighted. The numbers show that if the irs gets an extra 1,000, they will bring back an extra 4,000 or 5,000 in revenue. It pays for itself and then some. Thanks. Anyone else . Pile on. Go ahead. The irs, of course, as we all know collects revenues that are needed to fund our government. Its very important that the irs have the capability both in services and enforcement to collect revenues called for bit law in a fair and efficient manner. Others. I agree with all of that. Im thinking back to this involved a Credit Card Company that senator portman used to tell stories about when he was part of the irs Restructuring Commission or the group that looked at restructuring the irs. The service that you expect. American express doesnt come back two years later and say, about that bill. We need to fund the irs to make sure that they have the technology that they need and to make sure particularly with all of the Identity Theft and Cyber Security issues that theyre able to safeguard the information they collect. Its really important to make sure they are adequately funded. Thank you. Agreeing about the one out of four. We fund the irs, we can reduce the tax gap, reducing the tax gap i think actually helps with the perception of fairness of the code. What happened obviously in 86, one of the things we did was we shut down loopholes. We are putting additional responsibilities on the irs without increasing their funding. One example of that is healthcare reform. We have run a lot of Health Care Reform through the service. We havent increased their funding, we have cut their funding. Thats a good point. Let me i ask a lot of question or no questions. I would be happy with a yes or no on this, if you will. Do you think the administration has a responsibility here to put out a rigorous, well thought out offering opening offer on tax reform, something beyond what i think are rather vague, general principals . Please. Yes. Thank you. Yeah. I think its essential, because i think its essential that the president and other leaders who want to push for tax reform market whatever they are trying to market to the American People and demonstrate that its going to increase our standard of living, especially for middle class. Thank you. Others. I think the Treasury Department has enormous resources that could offer a lot in the consideration of tax reform. Thank you. Anyone else . Its just important that i think that both the congress and Administration Work together and its bipartisan as possible to cheef achieve tax reform. How important is tax reform that doesnt further balloon our nations deficit . I just saw a news report last week that said budget deficit which would hit 1. 4 trillion close to ten years ago during the bottom of the Great Recession went down, down, down, bottomed out at 400 billion. Last year was up to 575. The administration so far is heading for adding another 100 plus billion dollars for the current fiscal year. We could be looking at 700 billion. People dont talk about that anymore. The idea is cutting taxes by another couple of trillion dollars, is that something we should proceed to without much thought . Anyone . Obviously, i think you need to be concerned about the medium and long run fiscal situation. Unpaid for tax cuts that make the situation worse is just like digging the hole deeper. Thanks. Others. As i said in my testimony, if our tax reform should be achieved in a fiscally responsible manner. We all recognize that spending is going to continue to increase, including mandatory spending. We need to do reform. But we have to do it in a way that doesnt disadvantage us. Briefly, if you would. I addressed this in my written statement as well. To my mind, we need to look at both sides, the spending side as well as the revenue side. Clearly spending is growing out of control. We need to take a hard look at it. We have to be fiscally responsible. Whatever Congress Agrees to spend, we have to fund. Tax reform has to be sustainable. That means in part generating enough revenue to cover what we agree to spend. Yes, sir. A degri agree. I would say, these folks are brilliant. Arent they . Yes, they are. We should bring you back. I thank my colleague. We will have to move in order to get everybody in before 11 00. Senator cassidy. Thank you for being here. Highly mobile intangibles. Microsoft can move licenses and they dont pay tax. We see a lot of issues. But other dozen it as well. U. S. Multinationals using International Rules. How do we handle this . Is it a matter of lowering the corporate rate so it doesnt profit them to move overseas . If we cant because you mentioned we have to its expensive to lower the Corporate Tax rate, can we get it down to irelands . Maybe not. How do we balance this highly mobile intangible and the ability of folks to move it overseas . Down the row, if you will. I think that obviously there are approaches being looked at in the International Tax reform regarding the structure of a minimum tax that could help address those issues. We do have to look at our transfer pricing and cost sharing rules to make sure they work appropriately. I think the chairman had a care and stick approach to encourage ip to be redomesticated into the United States and taxed at a rate that would give us the first rate of taxation and not give ireland the first rate of taxation. The first and best i think antibase erosion measure is well designed tax system. If the tax system is well designed, its going to attract income back to the country and eliminate a lot of the issue. Thats got to start with a rate thats competitive with the rest of the world. That doesnt have to mean irelands 12. 5 . But we have to get somewhere in the ballpark. Right now were at the top of the heap. Thats the first thing. The second thing that i think we should look at is consumption tax base because consumption tax base is what other countries use to ensure theyre taxing a share of the value thats delivered in goods and services. Let me interrupt. Consumption tax i cant help but note that when were prosperous than every country which has a consumption tax. If we shy abopeak about taking f the working middle class, theyre the ones who pay a greater percent in a consumption tax. You could hold them harmless by a rebate. I have to note that folks in our lower class have more disposable income because of the absence of a consumption tax. I just note that as you answer. It does seem like we have conflicting goals and priorities. There are lots of ways to address the potential regressiveness of a consumption tax. That would include lessening the tax burden. That could be done through an expanded earned income tax. More people off the income tax rolls. I think i dont necessarily always agree with economyism iet i think they are right when they say that a consumption tax base is more conducive to Economic Growth. Let me ask one more time. If you look at a consumption tax the economist thinks if i lower it here and raise it here, it has no influence on behavior. If i go and something is 20 higher than it was or whatever you pick it to be, i ma know the buy it. Even though i have more money here. It seems as if we see that countries like china and germany have a consumption tax, they have a higher rate of savings which they promote, exportbased economy. But they dont consume as much. Again, the econs would say that its all the wash. Im not sure that practically speaking its a wash from the person looking at the higher price. I digress. I would add that a lower rate, corporate rate, it win ll reduce some incentives. We are going to need base erosion rules. John referred to some of the rules that might be considered. You know the technical aspect of this more than me. Im just learning from you. Im not trying to challenge to be difficult. It seems like some of the High Tech Companies have low effective tax rates. How much lower you can get than 0 . They are moving their ip. Thats what is lowering their effective tax rate. On their income in the United States, they have a low rate. Apple paid 0 one year. Ge pays 0. Any comment on that . How low can you go . Gotta be quick. We have a lot of colleagues waiting. One comment on that. If you are going to move to Something Like a territorial system, you need to be considered about base erosion. Thats what my colleagues have said. One approach could be to set a global minimum tax. If you have a global minimum tax of 15 , then no matter where the income is earned, they pay at least 15 . They pay 0 in the cayman isla s islands, 15 in the United States. Thats a way to keep a minimum amount of tax. Thank you. Thank you. Let me thank our witnesses. This is extremely helpful. Tax reform in order to be successful must have certain conditions met. One is an open process, transparency. We have been talking about that. This hearing helps us in talking out some of the issues. I want to thank the chairman for convening this hearing. I hope this is how we will proceed with tax reform in an open way with this committee being engaged. Secondly, its got to be fair. Which means middle income taxpayers should not pay any more of the costs of our government percentage wise than they are paying today. Most members of congress agree on that. We want to make sure this is not an additional burden on middle income families. Raise the revenue we say were goes to raise. We dont add to the deficit. I have listened to the exchanges as to the desires to reduce the mar marginal business tax rate. A degre i agree with that. There is distortion as a result of high marginal tax rate. Planning is done to avoid the taxes. I listened to the exchanges with other of my colleagues as to how we could get down the business tax rates within the income tax code. Senator warners point about every one of the issues being difficult to achieve is correct. When you have winners and losers, the losers are not going to be quiet. Its very difficult to get that done and to get up to the revenues you need. If you deal with the c rate, 10 reduction is a trillion dollars. If you deal with the those who have pass through income or use the individual rates, its 1. 6 trillion to get a 10 rate reduction, which is not easy for us to find real offsets to equal those numbers. Which brings me to the exchanges we had with some colleagues. Im glad were talking about it. Thats the consumption taxes. I think there is no other way to get competitive marginal business tax rates in this country without bringing different revenues into funding government other than income tax revenues. Miss olson i appreciate your statement where you see economists across the political spectrum concluded that consumption base taxes are a more efficient way to raise money. The two Major Concerns we heard it today will middle income families pay more, something which i said i wouldnt support. I urge my colleagues to look at the progressive consumption tax that i filed. Working with our those that do our scoring at the joint Tax Committee to make sure the middle income families will not pay more than they are paying today. You are correct, there are ways of adjusting other parts of the income tax code to make sure this is progressive. Then theres concern on the other side that we will raise more revenue than we say were going to raise. Thats been an issue i heard from many of my colleagues that it will grow government. One of the conditions is we raise revenue we say were going to raise. In my progressive consumption tax, we have a way of rebating additional revenues if its over what we say we are going to raise so, therefore, we will not be a justification to grow government. Not an exercise of growing government through tax reform. Miss olson, what am i missing here . Is there a way of getting this done thats easy within the political system without bringing in consumption to get down business tax rates . I know the old saying about the vat tax and people come out against it. I do point out as you did, this is a credit invoice method which is different than a value added tax. Would you just comment as to whether im the observations i said are accurate . Hour do you s i agree. Adding a consumption tax like a value added tax to the portfolio of taxes that we use would go a long way towards making tax reform easier. It would allow us to keep Something Like our current base and then to lower the rates in a way that would make the u. S. More competitive as a place to invest. As i look out into the future, weve got a rising difference between what we expect to be collecting in revenues and what we expect to be spending. We have to find some way in addition to making tax reform easier to close that gap. A consumption tax seems to be something thats a viable alternative and should be carefully considered by the committee. I appreciate that. Next is senator scott. Thank you, mr. Chairman or mr. Ranking member. Mr mr. Mazur, you made a comment about imposing a minimum Global Tax Rate of 15 . How does that work when the companys invert and are no longer American Companies . So the issue is how do you Tax Companies where you have the jurisdiction to tax them . In the case of a company that say was a u. S. Company had been acquired by a foreign theres a u. S. Entity that is subject to u. S. Tax. What you want to ensure is that there are sufficient base erosion rules so that u. S. Entity cant ship income abroad and have it subject to no or low tax rates abroad. You need tight base erosion rules. One approach in the case of shifting intangible income intangible Property Income is to have a global minimum tax. No matter where the income is pushed around the world, it is still subject to some minimal rate in the u. S. You need additional tools as well. Its like a belt and suspenders approach to make sure you have enough of a hook on the u. S. Operations that you can subject them to tax. Thank you. Next question for miss olson and mr. Soloman. South point sis a manufacturer haven. We have boeing and ge. The Current System of global taxation seems to be a major impediment to growing jobs in our economy at home. Can you talk for just a few seconds a few minutes about the improvements that could be made to our National Economy if we went to a specific territorial system and allowed for Companies Large companies to bring home their resources to build plants here and hire more employees here as opposed to the challenge that we face around the world today . Certainly, thank you, senator scott. Two issues are the high rates and then our worldwide system. When put those two issues together, what you end up with is lockout affect that several of us have talked about already in our testimony. We really do need to get rid of the system which i think is the worst of all possible worlds, a system that doesnt raise a lot of revenue because it doesnt it doesnt encourage earnings to come back. And that results in income being invested somewhere other than the United States. I think the key here is to look at bringing the corporate rate down to something thats competitive with the rest of the world and then to fix the International Rules so that we dont have the lockout effect. Thank you. Just to briefly add to that, just an example of the situation that youre positing, a situation where a u. S. Company is wanting to do business in a foreign country. And we have what i will call the worldwide system, where if money is subject of attacks, but if theres a company from a third country trying to do business in that particular second country, they wont be subject to the repatriotation tax. A company that is in a country that doesnt have a repatriotation tax will have an advantage. Thank you, sir. In my last min or so of questions, if you will walk me through the process of we are successful in reducing our operation from 33 to 22 to 23 , we talk about repatriotization, we have 6 million jobs open. So we create a million more jobs. If we dont end the conversation in tax reform, Regulatory Reform with making sure that our workers are able to do the work that we are creating, i think we have really shortchanged our economy. So my question really is on using the tax code if we arent a absent of the elimination of our credits, would we want to focus on other vehicles to make sure the workforce is prepared for the new opportunities in a world that has been successful at tax reform . Yeah, i think we have probably focused too much on people going to college, which doesnt necessarily prepare them for the jobs of the future or the jobs that are available today. And so doing more to focus on apprenticeship programs, technical schools, Community Colleges that prepare people to take jobs and then also something that focuses on the fact that we need to constantly be retraining because the world is changing so much and the jobs that are out there are changing so much, the skills that are necessary. Thank you. Thank you, senator scott. Youll have a lot of us on this side of the aisle interest in the apprenticeship issue. Brings up senator mccaskill. Let me ask a yes or no yes to all four of you since you represent all of you represent different parties, two and two, in terms of who you go for. So a lot of us are spending a lot of time yearning for the bipartisanship right now in the u. S. Senate. So let me ask a yes or no question, do you believe the bill that restructures or tax code should be bipartisan . Yes, it should be bipartisan. It would be preferable if it were bipartisan. What mark and eric said. And i inclutdded that in my testimony. The chairman is not here, but i would say to the chairman, mr. Chairman, will we have a hearing on the tax reform bill . Will the republicans allow us to have a hearing in the finance committee on the proposal that is going to restructure or tax code. Is that going to be possible . Do you have any idea as a Ranking Member, mr. Widen . Oh, good, heres the chairman. Mr. Chairman, im asking my question again. Im asking you, mr. Chairman, will we have a hearing in the finance committee on the tax reform proposal that you all plan to vote on on the floor of the senate . Well i would like to. I dont know as of right now. Wouldnt that be normal order . Yes and no. It depends on who is running. I have seen democratic times when it was not regular order, but be that as it may, i would prefer to do hearings if we can. Thats great to hear, mr. Chairman. Im not saying were going to but would prefer it. Im a new member. And i had this idea that i was coming to this committee to actually consider important items of finance to our government. And there is no more important items of finance to our government than the structure of our tax code. There is nothing that is more impactful on our economy or on businesses and job creation in this country than the tax code. If we cannot have a hearing in the United States senate on the committee on finance, on tax code reform, then i dont know why we have this committee. It doesnt make sense to me. So i am very hopeful, mr. Chairman, that there will be a proposal. You said in your Opening Statement you hope the democrats want to work on tax reform, you werent sure that all wanted to work on tax reform, you hope some do. I can assure you, mr. Chairman, all the democrats want to work on tax reform. We all want to have a seat at the table. So im imploring you to use your influence on senator mcconnell to allow us to have a hearing in this committee. Well, you would be idiots if you didnt want to work on tax reform. And i know you all do and i intend to see that you do. Thats what this hearing is about, by the way. But we dont have a proposal, mr. Chairman. This is all hypothetical and policy, which is great, im glad were having it, but this is not on a proposal that would actually change the tax code. We have nothing in front of us. In terms of a proposal. Nothing from the administration, nothing from the republican majority. Its a far cry from the finance Committee Hearings that you have sat through for decades in this senate that have looked at the specifics of legislation. Well, im listening. Okay, good. Im so glad you are. Lets talk about temporary tax code changes versus permanent. If we go through the partisan exercise of reconciliation, those tax code changes would be temporary. They would only be good for ten years. I would ask any of you to comment on whether or not it would make sense to make major changes around the deductibility of interests or a territorial tax system if the Business Community knows these are only a tenyear window. I would think a permanent set of changes is preferable. That businesses want certainty. They are making longterm decisions. They basically deserve to know what the years are going to be in years 11, 12 and 13. Certainty is very important. So permanence is needed. The more significant the change, the more important something being durable and sustainable is. As an example, if we are doing rate changes thats one thing, but structural reform is a whole nother set of challenges to do on a temporary basis. It will have a longer lasting effect if its lasting reform. I agree planning is very difficult if they are not permanent. As you say, structural changes are important to be permanent. Another good reason we should not be using reconciliation to make major tax structure changes since it is only a temporary change in the tax structure. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, thank you. And i want to thank you and the Ranking Member for holding this hearing. And i want to thank the witnesses for holding the hearing. And i want to be the second to last to question you. And i will anticipate the questions i will ask you. Perhaps having been asked or a part of your testimony, im going to ask anyway. Im from the state of nevada. And it was hit particularly hard. And ive seen a lot of recovery. But we have a long way to go. And the question is, what is standing in the way of full recovery . And i do believe that a tax reform package, comprehensive or changes in our tax code would go a long way to seeing some of these changes. I want to thank the chairman for holding this hearing. And my discussions with him and with the white house and with the house of representatives is that they do by september 1st want to have something in concept by somewhere around september 1st so that we can have open hearings. And i know the ten didcy from the chairman is to have open hearings so that we can discuss in details some of the details some of my friends from missouri may have. But back in 1986, one of the key elements of that act, which was the last time we had tax reform, was to broaden the tax base, to reduce tax rates and to simplify the coat. I guess my question for the panelists is, ill start with you, mr. Sullivan, whether or not you believe the three key products, broad anything the base, reducing rates, simplifying the code, is still the key moving forward on this proposed movement of tax changes. Well, i think they are very important. I also think revising our International Tax system is a very important part for all the crossborder Business Activity that occurs and will be increasing over time. We talk about these words, broadening the base, simplifying the tax code, easy to say, what does that mean for the average taxpayer . So for the up average taxpayer it may not have an effect because the average taxpayer today is not affected by a lot of the things an issue here, so they may not be it itemizing tax codes. But if you do great rate expanding, that would take a lot of people out of the itemized income tax range. And that would have a positive effect on them and reduce the recordkeeping burden and make the tax code simpler. There are things we can do that would involve broad anything the base, lowering the rate, greater simplification average for the taxpayer. I dont want this to be an exercise for washington, d. C. I want the average taxpayer to know if we go through the activity and process, if theres something at the end of the day that works for them, i had a meeting at the white house talking to the treasury secretary. I cant remember his percentage, but he wants that percentage of americans to be able to take a look, be able to calculate their own taxes, in other words, its going to get complicated for some, but for the average american they should be able to calculate their own taxes. Is that a goal that is a worthy goal moving forward . Simplification is definitely a goal to try to achieve and making americans think that the tax system is fair by understanding what their Tax Obligation is and being able to fill out their own forms is very important. I think i agree with that. One of the important roles of the tax system is like an annual civic ritual we participate in. If you understand what it is, you can appreciate it more. And i think you can use technology to do this. People talk about filing a tax return on a postcard, my kids have to go to the museum to find a postcard. They are finding their things on the app where it is downloaded electronically. If you think forward, you can probably have a situation where it is simply to understand the rules and how to comply. They get over the hump, its simplified, we have done a great job. In your opinion, what would you anticipate gdp to be if we have done this right . Look, we have done a fair amount of analysis on dynamic scoring. Youre talking about doing something in a revenueneutral way to improve incentives a little bit, you should improve the economy a little bit, youre not going to get a giant improvement in the economy. I think one of the things that is a bit unfortunate is people seem to sell dynamic scoring effects as giant effects. They are really not going to be that large. We have a 20 trillion economy, youre not going to move the needle that much. You can move it some. Can you quantify it at all . When Congress Passed the path act in 2015, the joint committee did an estimate, the number is about right, with the conventional scoring, it cost 700 billion. With dynamic scoring it was 600 billion. Now they are doing ecredit and other incentives permanent due to have an effect. That is 1 6 or 1 7 of the amount. Mr. Chairman, my time has run out. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, when i was a young congressman, i happened to see tax reform and see it pass in 1981. And then some of the thing that is were mistakes in the 81 bill were change in a comprehensive tax reform in 1986, i couldnt pass either one of those without bipartisanship. I would like to ask you all with your experience and your expertise on tax and passing it with one party as opposed to bipartisan . If you want tax burden to last a long time, you have to pass it in a bipartisan way. I think that is obvious. Thank you for reaffirming that. May i ask your opinion on, if, what would you say is a realistic target for getting the tax rates down to both corporate and individual and still have some money leftover for a significant infrastructure package . Im just what the Obama Administration did today in a Business Tax Reform plan, it could find a way to get in a longterm revenue neutral way, the tax rate from 38 to 25 and generate a couple billion for infrastructure. Thats a sevenpoint reduction in the corporate rate. On the individual side, i think it goes back to points that eric and pam were making, it basically depends on how bold you want to be on reducing tax expenditures on individual sides to how low the rates can go. Anybody else want to venture what rate individually, because on the corporate side, as he just mentioned, you would only end up under the obama proposal a couple hundred billion. But we have trillions of dollars in needs in the infrastructure. You would have to take individual rates to have, lets say a trillion dollars for infrastructure. That sounds to me like youre taking rates up if were going to produce money for infrastructure. No, no, in tax reform. Okay, so in tax reform, dave camps 2014 Tax Reform Act took the corporate rate down to 25 . It took top individual rate down to 35 . And earmarked some revenue from repatriotization for offshore earnings for use in infrastructure spending. I just want to note that there is an awful lot of capital invested offshore. Some of it is u. S. Corporate cash, there is also a lot of other funds available. I was over in asia last week, and heard an awful lot about capital available for investment in the United States. In particular with an interest in investing an infrastructure in the United States. So if we can get our tax system reformed, we may need some more treaties and need to address some issues in the tax code that are impediments to infrastructure. But i think theres an awful lot of capital around the globe to help with our infrastructure needs here in this country. As i mentioned before earlier this morning, how to get the individual rate down depends on what deductions, credits and incentives that you would eliminate. Thats correct. The tax expenditures. So ill summarize my comments, my thoughts here, which is why i asked the question of you all, if you have the ability to lower the rates, both corporate and individual, you can design that in a way that you still have revenue leftover over a tenyear period in order to invest in infrastructure. The only way youre going to get to that goal is to do it bipartisan. And thats the bottom line of my comments. Thank you. Thank you, senator. I want to thank the group of people and experts for taking time to be here with us today and this is their excellent testimony. Were grateful to you. Most all of you have been here before the committee a number of times, but we cant tell you what it means to us. Tonight on the communicators, the co