PATERSON, NJ -- ​Pascrell demands any year-end tax package include tax relief for working families in N.J. [November 30, 2015]

U.S. Rep. Bill Pascrell, Jr. (D-NJ-09) released the following statement supporting the call for Congress to protect crucial improvements to tax credits that could help build economic security for hundreds of thousands of New Jersey families, including the Earned Income Tax Credit and Child Tax Credit which are set to expire at the end of 2017.

“The EITC and CTC are the principal antipoverty programs of our time. They promote work, boost the economy, and improve health and educational outcomes over a lifetime. Working Americans need these modest income supports and our economy needs these job-creating credits,” said U.S. Rep. Bill Pascrell, Jr. (D-NJ-09), New Jersey’s only member of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, empowered to oversee federal tax policy.

“I’ve been a cosponsor of legislation to extend the enhanced EITC and CTC because each has been a resounding success. I'm also cosponsor of legislation aimed at improvements. We can eliminate the marriage penalty, which makes the credit worth less to a married couple. We can expand the EITC to apply to childless workers, the only group taxed into poverty. But since half a million working families in New Jersey are counting on us, the one thing we can’t do is let these program enhancements lapse.”

Introduced in 2007, the Strengthen the Earned Income Tax Credit Act was the first tax reform proposal put forth by Pascrell as a member of the House Ways and Means Committee. The bill reduced the marriage penalty; increased the return for families with three or more children; expanded the credit for individuals with no children; and permanently extended the provision that allows members of the armed forces to include combat pay as income in EITC calculations. The bill was folded in as a part of the $275 billion in tax cuts passed in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. The congressman is working to ensure that any year end package of legislation addressing tax policy would include an extension of critical refundable tax credits.