Issue Position: My Economic Policy

Issue Position

Issue Position: My Economic Policy

Immediate Help for Long Island Families

Across Long Island, families are facing ever greater economic challenges. Gas prices continue to rise, unemployment is on the rise, and mortgages are threatened. Congress has ignored the issues for too long. It's time for a change. Now is the time to act.
Helping Long Islanders Confront Higher Living Costs:

Jack Martins Will Help Long Islanders Hurting From High Gasoline and Food Costs. Long Islanders need relief right now from high gas prices. Jack Martins will act immediately to reduce the pain of high gas prices. Long Island families should not have to choose between buying food and buying gas.

Our nation's future security and prosperity depends on making the hard choices that will break our nation's strategic dependence on foreign sources of energy and will ensure our economic prosperity by meeting tomorrow's demands for a clean energy plan. Jack Martins will lead the effort to develop alternative fuels to promote energy independence and cut off the flow of oil wealth to repressive dictatorships like Iran.
Expanding Domestic Oil And Natural Gas Exploration And Production

Jack Martins Will Support Expanding Domestic Oil Exploration. The current federal moratorium on drilling in the Outer Continental Shelf and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) stands in the way of energy exploration and production. Jack Martins believes it is time for the federal government to lift these restrictions and to put our own reserves to use.

In 2006, when the Democrats took over Congress, we paid $2.20 per gallon to fill our gas tanks. At the time Rep. McCarthy agreed that we needed an energy policy to address the high cost of gas and energy. Unfortunately, Rep. McCarthy did nothing about it.

Today, in just two short years, the price per gallon here on Long Island has more than doubled to over $4.40 per gallon. Many hard working Long Islanders can no longer afford to drive to work and some have to make the hard choice between paying for gas and paying for food. It must stop now. Rep. McCarthy continues to sit idle while we suffer the consequences of her do-nothing approach to this issue.

We must elect leaders to Congress willing to develop and implement short term and long term solutions to our energy crisis. We can not allow the failed do-nothing policies of today's Congress to continue to destroy our economic future.

There is no easier or more direct way to prove to the world that we will no longer be subject to the whims of others than to expand our production capabilities to meet our own needs. We must declare our energy independence.

We have trillions of dollars worth of oil and gas reserves in the U.S. at a time we are exporting hundreds of billions of dollars a year overseas to buy energy. This is the largest transfer of wealth in the history of mankind.
We MUST keep more of our dollars here in the U.S., lessen our foreign dependency, increase our domestic supplies, and reduce our trade deficit -- 41% of which is due to oil imports.

Jack Martins Believes In Promoting And Expanding The Use Of Our Domestic Supplies Of Natural Gas. When people are hurting, and struggling to afford gasoline, food, and other necessities, common sense requires that we draw upon America's own vast reserves of oil and natural gas. Within the United States we have tremendous reserves of natural gas. The Outer Continental Shelf alone contains 77 trillion cubic feet of recoverable natural gas. It is time that we capitalize on these significant resources and build the infrastructure needed to transport this important component of electricity generation and transportation fuel around the country.
Investing In Clean, Alternative Sources Of Energy

Jack Martins Believes That The U.S. Must Become A Leader In A New International Green Economy. Green jobs and green technology will be vital to our economic future. The U.S. must be a leader in developing and deploying these new technologies.

Jack Martins Will Support The Development Of Alternative, Low Carbon Fuels Such As Wind, Hydro And Solar Power. According to the Department of Energy, wind could provide as much as one-fifth of electricity by 2030. The U.S. solar energy industry continued its double-digit annual growth rate in 2006. To develop these and other sources of renewable energy will require that we rationalize the current patchwork of temporary tax credits that provide commercial feasibility. Jack Martins believes in an even-handed system of tax credits that will remain in place until the market transforms sufficiently to the point where renewable energy no longer merits the taxpayers' dollars.

Jack Martins Will Commit $2 Billion Annually To Advancing Clean Coal Technologies. Coal produces the majority of our electricity today. Some believe that marketing viable clean coal technologies could be over 15 years away. Jack Martins believes that this is too long to wait, and we need to commit significant federal resources to the science, research and development that advance this critical technology.

Jack Martins Does Not Support A Windfall Profits Tax. A windfall profits tax on the oil companies will ultimately result in further increasing the cost of gasoline as oil companies pass this expense to our hard working Long Island families. The money should remain in the hands of our hard working Long Island families who are better equipped to spend it wisely. Jimmy Carter put a windfall profits tax in place which resulted in the economic crisis of the late 1970s.
Helping Long Islanders With The Housing Crisis:

Jack Martins Supports Senator McCain's New "HOME Plan" To Provide Robust, Timely And Targeted Help To Those Hurt By The Housing Crisis. Under the HOME Plan, every deserving American family or homeowner will be afforded the opportunity to trade a burdensome mortgage for a manageable loan that reflects their home's market value.

Eligibility: Holders of a non-conventional mortgage taken after 2005 who live in their home (primary residence only); can prove creditworthiness at the time of the original loan; are either delinquent, in arrears on payments, facing a reset or otherwise demonstrate that they will be unable to continue to meet their mortgage obligations; and can meet the terms of a new 30-year fixed-rate mortgage on the existing home.

How It Works: An individual picks up a form at any Post Office and apply for a HOME loan. The FHA HOME Office certifies that the individual is qualified and contacts the individual's mortgage servicer. The mortgage servicer writes down and retires the existing loan, which is replaced by an FHA guaranteed HOME loan from a lender.
Keeping The Credit Crunch From Hurting College Students:

Jack Martins Supports A Student Loan Continuity Plan. Students face the possibility that the credit crunch will disrupt loans for the fall semester. Jack Martins calls on the federal government and the 50 governors to anticipate loan problems and expand the lender-of-last resort capabilities for each state's guarantee agency.
Pro Growth, Pro-Jobs Tax Agenda
Cutting Taxes For Long Islanders:

Jack Martins Supports Cutting Taxes For Long Island Families. Jack Martins will permanently repeal the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) - a tax that almost exclusively affects middle class families like those on Long Island. Repealing this onerous tax will save middle class families nearly $60 billion in a single year. Under this plan, a Long Island middle class family with children set to pay the AMT will save an average of over $2,700 - a real tax cut for working families.

Jack Martins Supports Double The Personal Exemption For Dependents. Jack Martins believes the tax code should be less of a burden on those, whether they are mothers and fathers or single parents, who are trying to raise a family. He supports raising the personal exemption for each dependent from $3,500 to $7,000.
Pro-Growth Tax Policy:

Jack Martins Will Keep Tax Rates Low And Fight The Democrats' Plans For A Crippling Tax Increase In 2011. Left to their devices, Democrats will impose a massive $100 billion tax hike.

Jack Martins Supports Making It Harder To Raise Taxes. Jack Martins believes it should require a 3/5 majority vote in Congress to raise taxes. The government must look to cut wasteful spending first.

Jack Martins Will Reward Saving, Investment And Risk-Taking. Low taxes on dividends and capital gains promote saving, channel investment dollars to innovative, high-value uses and not wasteful financial planning. Jack Martins will support the current rates on dividends and capital gains and fight the Democrats' efforts to again increase capital gains taxes.
Tax Cuts On American Employers:

Jack Martins Will Reduce The Federal Corporate Tax Rate To 25 Percent From 35 Percent. Jack Martins believes the taxes we impose on American companies should be no higher than the average rate our major trading partners impose on theirs. We currently have the second-highest combined corporate-tax rate in the industrialized world, and it is driving many businesses and the jobs they create overseas.
Retirement Tax Cut:

Jack Martins Will Support Lowering Medicare Premiums. Seniors face a growing threat from higher Medicare premiums that tax away their Social Security and retirement savings. Jack Martins supports comprehensive, pro-market health care and Medicare reforms to reduce health care costs and control increases in premiums - while delivering high-quality health care.
A Real Choice For Simpler Taxes:

Jack Martins Will Support An Alternative New And Simpler Tax System - And Give America A Real Choice. When this reform is enacted, all who wish to stay under the current system could still do so, but everyone else could choose a vastly less complicated system with two tax rates and a generous standard deduction. Long Islanders do not resent paying their rightful share of taxes - what they do resent is being subjected to thousands of pages of needless and often irrational rules and demands from the IRS.
Reforming Washington
Eliminating Wasteful Spending:

Jack Martins Support A One-Year Spending Pause To Evaluate Programs. He believes that outside of essential military and veterans programs there should be a one-year pause in discretionary spending growth that should be used for a top-to-bottom review of the effectiveness of federal programs.

Jack Martins Has The Leadership And Courage To Make The Right Spending Choices. Reduced spending means making choices. Jack Martins will provide the courageous leadership necessary to control spending, including:

Eliminate Broken Government Programs. The federal government itself admits that one in five programs do not perform.

Reforming Entitlement Programs For The 21st Century:

Jack Martins Will Protect and Strengthen Social Security. He will fight to save the future of Social Security while meeting our obligations to the retirees of today and the future without raising taxes.

Jack Martins Will Act To Control Medicare Growth. The growth of spending on Medicare threatens our fiscal future. Jack Martins supports comprehensive health care reforms that will reduce the growth in Medicare spending, protect seniors against rising Medicare premium payments, and preserve the advancements in medical science central to providing quality care.

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