Senator Dan Coats (R-Ind.), the Chairman of the Joint Economic Committee (JEC), today chaired a JEC hearing to examine the U.S. tax code and its effect on small businesses. Coats pressed for changes to our burdensome and complicated tax code and called for a fairer, simpler code that would spur economic growth. 

Coats said, “Against the headwinds of the slowest recovery since 1960, small business owners have to deal with a tax system that is hopelessly complex, full of provisions that expire every one or two years, riddled with special exemptions, deductions, and preferences, and filled with new penalties.”

Coats heard testimony about the negative effects of the current tax code from a variety of witnesses, including Hoosier small business owner Jody Fledderman, the President and CEO of Batesville Tool and Die, Inc. located in Batesville, Indiana.

“Tax Day is a perfect time to commit to not let another April 15 pass before we finally tackle comprehensive, pro-growth tax reform,” Coats continued. “And while it is urgent and essential to lower our corporate tax rate, which is the highest in the developed world, we must not forget the millions of small businesses that pay taxes at the individual level and have just experienced rate increases of their own.”