Washington D.C.- On Wednesday, Congressman Ron Paul voted in support of the Marriage Tax Penalty Relief Reconciliation Act, a bill designed to reduce taxes for married couples who file joint tax returns. The Act, which successfully passed in the House during yesterday’s floor vote, will save married taxpayers $28.8 billion annually, according to a Congressional Budget Office report.

Under current tax law, a married couple often pays more federal taxes than they would if they were unmarried and filed individually. A “marriage penalty” occurs because spouses who both work find themselves in a higher tax rate bracket as a result of their combined incomes. Similarly, married taxpayers are penalized by a standard deduction that is less for them than twice the standard deduction for a single taxpayer. The Marriage Tax Penalty Relief Reconciliation Act address these problems by increasing the width of the lowest tax bracket for joint returns to twice that of single returns, while similarly increasing the standard deduction for joint returns to twice that of single returns.

Paul praised the legislation as a tax cut for families: “Married couple will pay less in federal taxes as a result of the Act. Our tax code should provide married taxpayers the same deductions and lower tax brackets available to single persons. Income taxes should not influence the decision to get married. While I certainly support the principle of tax fairness, the real benefit of this legislation is that it reduces taxes. Taxes are too high for everyone, and the tax cuts contained in the Act are a step in the right direction.”

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