Pawlenty Campaign Press Release - A Tim Pawlenty Plan For Recovery

By Tim Pawlenty, Chicago Tribune

How did you enjoy your economic recovery last summer? Well, that's what President Barack Obama said we were having. He wrongly thought the stimulus, the bailouts and the takeovers were the solution. He said they worked.

The federal government's addiction to spending must be brought to a halt and we must have a president who has a growth agenda with pro-growth policies.

America's economy is not even growing at 2 percent — and that's what many projections say we can expect for the next decade. That's not acceptable.

Let's start with a big, positive goal. Let's grow the economy by 5 percent, instead of an anemic 2 percent.

It's been done before: Between 1983 and 1987, the Reagan recovery grew at 4.9 percent annually. Between 1996 and 1999, under President Bill Clinton and a Republican Congress, the economy grew at around 4.7 percent annually.

In each case, millions of jobs were created, incomes rose and unemployment fell to historic lows. The same can happen again.

How do we do it? Our economy will never grow at 5 percent laboring under a federal tax code that is hostile to business.

American businesses pay the second highest tax rates in the world. That's a recipe for failure, not adding jobs and economic growth. We should cut the corporate tax rate by more than half. I propose reducing the rate to 15 percent from 35 percent, recognizing that the tax code is littered with special interest handouts, carve-outs, subsidies and loopholes that should be eliminated.

But just changing business tax rates is not enough. That's because we know most job growth will come from small and medium-size businesses, and their owners are taxed under individual tax rates, not corporate rates. So, pro-job and pro-growth tax reform must include individual tax reform as well.

Five percent economic growth over 10 years would generate $3.8 trillion dollars in new tax revenues. With that, we would reduce projected deficits by 40 percent — all before we made a single budget cut.

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