Page 20 - Volume 17 Number 4

NATIONAL BUSINESS AVIATION ASSOCIATION • focusAs Deficit Talks Intensify,Key Allies Supporters Champion Business AviationAs talk of deficit reduction, and Additionally, leaders with organized labor“sequestration” – or across-the-boardgovernment spending cuts for lowering the deficit Business aviation has come increasingly the focus of Obama administra- tion officials.Specifically, the rhetoric used by the White House in discussing business aviation has often seemed intended to paint the industry with a negative brush. Fortunately, the industry has some strong allies, and they have not been silent amidst the administration’s statements.For example, Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS) recently stood up for business aviation during a hearing of the Senate Finance Committee on President Obama’s nomination of Jack Lew as Treasury Secretary. Roberts used the opportunity to question Lew about the White House’s unfavorable characterization of business aviation, and “the seemingly unending attacks this Administration continues to direct at this essential aviation industry.“General aviation has become a ‘piñata’ in regards to tax reform by this administration,” Sen. Roberts said, “and I’m more than a little tired of it.”The previous day, and on the other side of Capitol Hill, Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-4-KS) made a forceful speech on the House floor noting that depreciation schedules like those on business aircraft are, “Something that every asset in America is subject to, and yet somehow [the president] has picked on this particular depreciation schedule as offensive and antithetical to the American way of life.”Pointing to the million-plus jobs created by the manufacture and use of aircraft for business, the congressman added: “It is unexplainable why anyone would pick on this industry.”and champions for small business have weighed in, putting forward the facts about business aviation’s importance and calling upon the White House to stop targeting the industry with “job-killing” tax proposals.In an op-ed published by Reuters and other news outlets, International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers president Tom Buffenbarger called the White House’s plan a “job-killing tax provision.“Like a bad game of whack-a-mole, this short sighted idea keeps raising its ugly head, threatening an industry [business aviation] that employs 1.2 million Americans and, with most of its product exported, creates a trade surplus with the rest of the world,” he noted.Also weighing in was Karen Kerrigan, president and CEO of the Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council, who questioned whether focusing on business aviation would meaningfully reduce the deficit. Extending the depreciation schedule for taxes on business aircraft would not generate any new long-term revenue, she wrote in a letter published in the Feb. 12 edition of The Washington Times.Kerrigan further noted that the president’s proposal “would decimate the thousands of businesses that use these aircraft for a variety of critical functions. Contrary to the contentions of some inside the Beltway, the vast majority of businesses that own and operate their own aircraft are small to mid-sized companies – middle managers, technical specialists and sales personnel, in most cases.“They use these aircraft to visit far-off plants in rural areas, deliver and pick up supplies and reach customers. In addition, there are thousands of communities that depend on these aircraft for important services such as18 • TWIN & TURBINE APRIL 2013