Mitt Romney on Tax Reform Former Republican Governor (MA)

Raised service fees like highway ads, from $200 to $2,000

ROMNEY: We raised fees $240 million. Not $730 million. Facts are stubborn things. We audited our fee increase, because, of course, we cared. Now, why did we raise fees $240 million? We had a $3 billion budget shortfall, we decided we were not going to raise taxes, and we found that some fees hadn’t been raised in as many as 20 years. These were not broad-based fees for things like getting your driver’s license or your license plate for your car, but instead something like the cost of a sign on the interstate and how much it was going to cost to publish a McDonald’s or a Burger King sign on the interstate. We went from, like, $200 a sign to $2,000 a sign to raise money for our state in a way that was consistent with the what the market had done over the ensuing years.

Fees are appropriate for the government to provide services

A: I mentioned fees, and it’s appropriate if the state is providing a service to someone that’s not a requirement to have a car or a driver’s license, but instead, let’s say, we’re going to be taking out an oil tank from your back yard because it’s leaking into the ground and the state’s going to provide that service. But to charge a fee sufficient to do so makes a lot of sense. So the fees ought to be adjusted from time to time to compose the amount of what the cost is of providing that service. If there hasn’t been a fee raised in a couple of decades, you probably have some inflation in there you ought to adjust for.

I support the Bush tax cuts

Avoid recession with immediate middle-income tax cuts

A: Well, immediately I’d go to try and get a reduction on taxes on middle income Americans. Specifically I proposed having people who earn under $200,000 a year be allowed to save their money tax-free. It means no tax on interest, dividends or capital gains. It keeps more money in their pockets. It also means that we have more capital going into the marketplace available for business startups as well as for homes.

Q: So for families earning under $200,000 a year, you’d recommend some sort of immediate tax cut, is that right?

A: That’s exactly right. This is middle-income Americans. These are where 95% of Americans live, and get their tax rates down, allow them to save for the future, allow them to make investments in their homes be able to save for college. The best thing we can do is keep money in the homes of the American people.

Raised $240M in MA fees, but only covering cost of services

ROMNEY: First of all, we raised fees by $240 million in our state because we had a whole series of fees that hadn’t been raised, in some cases, in decades, so we brought them up to the cost of providing services. These were not broad-based fees that were required for all people to pay, rather for specialized services.

Zero tax rate on capital gains, for incomes up to $200,000

Lowering taxes, like Bush tax cuts, grows the economy

ROMNEY: Lowering taxes grows the economy. Lowering taxes helps build jobs & helps working families, and so I strongly have been of the view that one of the great lessons for Ronald Reagan was that lowering taxes helped built our economy. Sen. McCain was one of two Republicans who voted against the Bush tax cuts. I believe the Bush tax cuts helped our economy grow and are one of the reasons that we’re not in a recession today Senator McCain continues to believe that that was the right vote to take, and I respect that that’s his view. I just happen to disagree with it. As governor, I fought tirelessly to reduce taxes. We cut taxes some 19 times in our state, and we held down s

FactCheck: Never opposed 2003 Bush cuts, but never supported

HUCKABEE: Did you support or oppose the 2002 Bush tax cuts?

ROMNEY: I have never opposed the Bush 2002 tax cuts. I supported them. The first comment I made about the Bush tax cuts was that I supported the Bush tax cuts.

Huckabee is referring to the 2003 cuts, which occurred right at the beginning of Romney’s term as governor. Romney is correct to say that he neve publicly opposed Bush’s tax cuts. But while he may have supported them, we find no record of his doing so in public. Indeed, Romney rather pointedly refused to endorse the Bush tax cuts in 2003. The Boston Globe cited Romney telling the state’s congressional delegation that he “won’t be a cheerleader” for tax cuts that he doesn’t agree with. According to this account, Romney added that he wouldn’t oppose Bush’s cuts either, because he “has to keep a solid relationship with the White House.”

Reduce the tax burden on middle-income families

Signed no-tax pledge; Dems pledge to raise taxes

A: The total fees raised were $260 million, which is a big number. We had a $3 billion budget gap. The Democrats wanted to raise taxes. I said, “No way.” And in fact we did not raise taxes on our citizens, and we lowered them across that state time and again. I’m proud of what we were able to do to lower taxes. I’m also going to lower taxes for the American people, and that’s the key thing. Right now, you can listen to the Democrats. Their pledge is clear. They’re going to raise taxes. I want to lower them.

Death tax just doesn’t make sense

• Just say No: “I said no to a tax hike; raising taxes hurts working people and scares away jobs. I also said no to more borrowing; borrowing just shifts our problems to the backs of our kids. Instead, I went after waste, inefficiency, duplication, and patronage.”
• The Death Tax: “It doesn’t make sense to me that people get taxed when they can earn their money, get taxed when they save their money, and get taxed when they die. We should get rid of the death tax.

Commission studied FairTax and found serious flaws

A: It’s good, but it’s not that good. There are a lot of features that are very attractive about a FairTax. Getting rid of the IRS is something we’d all love. But the truth is, we’re going to have to pay taxes. Completely throwing out our tax system and coming up with an entirely new one is something we have to do very, very carefully. The president’s commission on tax reform looked at this and said: Not a good idea. Some of the reasons are the FairTax, for instance, charges a 23% tax, plus state sales tax, on a new home, when you purchase a new home. But if you buy an old home, there’s no tax. Think what that might do to the construction industry. We need to thoroughly take it apart before we make a change of that nature. That’s why my view is, get rid of the tax on savings and let middle-income people save their money tax-free

Pledges no new taxes in 2007 after refusing pledge in 2002

A: I want to make it very clear that I’m not going to raise taxes. As governor of Massachusetts, I made it very clear there, and I did not raise taxes. We faced a huge budget gap, but I recognize that raising taxes could lead to a slowdown in our economy, so we didn’t do it. We balanced our budget, and that’s exactly what I’ll do with the federal government.

FactCheck: Did not raise MA taxes, but DID raise MA fees

End taxes on interests, dividends & capital gains

A: I like middle-income Americans to be able to save their money and not have to pay any tax at all on interests, dividends or capital gains. A zero rate on capital gains for middle-income Americans. And by the way, we’re all talking about how anxious we are to veto overspending. I was a governor. I’ve done it hundreds of times. I can’t wait to get my hands on Washington’s budget.

My pledge: no freeze on tax rollback

Calling it “my pledge,” Romney vowed not to support a freeze or reversal of the plan to roll income taxes back to 5 percent by next year even in the face of a budget hole nearing $3 billion. Romney chided Democrats for taking the “easy way” to fix problems by passing the tax hat.

“The easy way to fix any problem is to go to the people and say you have to pay more money, but that’s not what the job of management is,” Romney said. “That’s my pledge, we are not going to raise taxes, we are not going to walk away from what the voters are in favor of doing, which is bringing the tax rates down.”

Pledges not to raise taxes