Victor H. Fazio Quotes

Increased revenues, meaning higher taxes, will be a central element of any successful long-term budget plan, and President Obama is right to insist that the wealthy - the slice of America that has come through the recession in by far the best financial health - should provide those funds.

Well, the taxes that everyone else is paying are supporting lots of programs that were in place prior to Obama's new spending. So new spending has too be paid for by new taxes, or by eliminating existing tax breaks. And Obama wants that burden to be borne exclusively by the rich.

As a matter of policy, increasing taxes on the most economically productive group, which already generates 60 percent of the nation's federal revenues, during a sustained period of economic doldrums is a wretched idea.

You can always raise taxes on the rich, but that will not solve the deficit problem.

There are a few things that we can do. One of them is that we can increase the taxes that people are paying who are the extremely wealthy in our communities. So, 70 percent, 80 percent, we've had it as high as 90 percent.

The Clinton tax increase - which was an increase in taxes primarily on upper-income people - not only made the tax code more nearly progressive, it preceded one of the most productive economic periods in American life.

Having won re-election convincingly and against the economic odds, President Obama quickly made good on his promise of maintaining taxes as they are for the middle class while raising them on the wealthiest Americans.

If anything, taxes for the lower and middle class and maybe even the upper middle class should even probably be cut further. But I think that people at the high end - people like myself - should be paying a lot more in taxes. We have it better than we've ever had it.

Tax rates should never be raised in some brackets without being raised in all brackets.

I want to reform the tax code so that it's simple, fair, and asks the wealthiest households to pay higher taxes on incomes over $250,000 - the same rate we had when Bill Clinton was president; the same rate we had when our economy created nearly 23 million new jobs, the biggest surplus in history, and a lot of millionaires to boot.

If you raise taxes on millionaires and billionaires, you'll do nothing to address the debt and the deficit. And the thing you might do is you might finally put this economy over another cliff. These millionaires and billionaires are the folks that try to create jobs and help grow the economy.

I just think that - when a country needs more income and we do, we're only taking in 15 percent of GDP, I mean, that - that - when a country needs more income, they should get it from the people that have it.

Those who claim the economy will collapse if tax rates on the wealthy increase, do not know their history. In the Eisenhower Administration—and Eisenhower was hardly a left winger—the marginal tax rate was 91 percent. I am only suggesting that it go to 50 percent.

My tax break is your tax hike.

I have continuously said that, at the very minimum, the Bush tax cuts for income under $250,000 should be extended.

President Obama has repeatedly urged Congress to let the Bush tax cuts expire for those earning more than $250,000 a year. Increasing rates on top earners is an obvious way to raise revenue from those who can afford it most.

I'm all for lifting the payroll-tax cap, if only to make payroll taxes a little less regressive.

I think the rich should pay more in taxes - I agree with that 100 percent - but everybody should feel the pain a little bit.

You replace it by 23 percent tax, a frank, transparent tax embedded in the cost at retail, and everybody gets to takes their whole check home. And the average income earner gets a 50 percent increase in take-home pay.

You don't raise taxes in times of such uncertainty.

While the deficit and debt are serious problems, I oppose solving these problems by raising taxes.

I can't imagine an argument that says that raising marginal tax rates on high income people, many of whom are business owners, is a recipe for economic growth.

In 1993, as House Democratic Leader, I led the fight to pass the Clinton-Gore economic plan - a plan designed to slash the deficit, invest in education, cut taxes for working families, and ask the wealthy among us to pay their fair share... Not one Republican voted for that plan. They said it was a job killer.

The 55% of American households that make less than $40,000 will get a tax break of only $7 while the households that make more than $1 million will receive an average tax break of $32,000.

The good news is that, according to the Obama administration, the rich will pay for everything. The bad news is that, according to the Obama administration, you're rich.