Own welfare ahead of national interest

Being a responsible legislator seems an impossible dream for many members of the U.S. Congress. The recently passed tax “reform” legislation is a perfect example of this.

Normally legislation involves widespread public consultation — not just consultation with lobbyists as was the case with this bill. Then a draft bill usually requires hearings by committees in both the House and the Senate followed by votes in each chamber and reconciliation of any differences before a final approval is sought. Then, but only if both chambers approve, the legislation is sent to the president for his signature, at which time it becomes the existing law.

This complex and protracted procedure exists for good reasons. One is to ensure that the new law enjoys widespread support among the voters at large. In the case of the tax measure just passed, more than 50 per cent (some pollsters say 60 per cent) of U.S. voters do not support the bill.

A second is that the consultations, hearings and debate provide an opportunity to review in detail all of the provisions of the legislation and their probable impact intended or otherwise - so as to avoid serious errors that could adversely impact government revenues and encourage detrimental economic behaviour among the citizenry.

The necessity of this type of review was completely ignored by the Republican leadership who presented the final legislation (a document of more than 500 pages) just 36 hours before it was voted on. Few of those voting in support of the legislation had read it and even fewer understood its full impact. Why the rush to get it done? In 2017, the Republican leadership had accumulated a distinguished record of zero productivity on their agenda and the president was belittling them for this dismal performance. They wanted change the law so it could take effect in 2018 when every member of the House and one-third of the Senate would be up for re-election. They reasoned that tax cuts would help in their efforts to retain control of both chambers of the Congress.

The Republican Party has deep fissures within its congressional caucuses and the longer it would take to get the legislation through the more likely it would fail to gain sufficient votes to pass. Moreover, several members of Congress put their own welfare ahead of national interest because the final version of the bill would provide them with substantial personal tax breaks.

The most notorious of these was Senator Robert Phillips Corker Jr. of Tennessee who originally voted against the bill citing the enormous projected increase in U.S. government debt (something in excess of $1.4 trillion in the first 10 years).

But when benefits accruing to commercial property developers were strengthened he voted for the legislation. Being an important commercial property developer, Senator Corker could expect to be amply rewarded by the change.

Finally, for some “small-government” Republicans, Speaker of the House Paul Ryan being the most obvious, the forecast giant increase in the deficit is perversely attractive because it will immediately impose automatic spending cuts on a host of programs many of which constitute key parts of the social safety net. The aim is to reduce the size of government and de facto repeal a large part of the New Deal programs, some dating all the way back to the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt in the 1930’s.

With any luck, the voters in the midterm elections in 2018 will vote against the archconservatives seeking to force their values on the majority of voters and Republicans will lose their control of Congress. This would curb some of the negative impact of President Trump’s actions and start the US on a road to recovery from its nightmare of bad governance.

2017 will still be remembered, however, as the year when the large majority of Republican legislators simply failed to carry out the task they were elected to do: provide deliberate and reasoned consideration of proposed legislation.

David Bond is an author and retired bank economist. To contact the writer: curmudgeon@harumpf.com. This column appears Tuesdays.