House Democrats Want Tax Hike to Offset AMT Loss

[cal04]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/05/AR2008030503061.html?hpid=topnews

House Democrats want to use a parliamentary maneuver to push a $70 billion tax increase through a reluctant Senate, a move intended to spare millions of taxpayers from an unpopular tax without driving up the deficit.

Under the plan, the House would prevent the alternative minimum tax from expanding to include more than 20 million additional households at tax time in April 2009, a change that would ordinarily deprive the Treasury of billions of dollars. To cover the cost, House tax-writers said they would come up with a proposal to raise the money elsewhere. That bill would be sent to the Senate in a fast-track package that would need only a simple majority to pass, denying Republicans and conservative Democrats the chance to filibuster.

John M. Spratt Jr. (D-S.C.), chairman of the House Budget Committee, unveiled the plan yesterday as part of a budget blueprint for fiscal 2009. The House plan would also increase spending for such domestic priorities as public education and benefits for military veterans while erasing the federal deficit over the next four years. Spratt contrasted his spending plan with the budget proposed last month by the Bush administration, which also proposes to spare middle-class voters from paying the AMT, but without offering a way to pay for it.

"When we set out to do this budget, our overriding objective was to balance it because we are appalled at the mountain of debt being left our children and at our stature in the world as the greatest debtor nation," Spratt said. "Our budget resolution for fiscal 2009 is no grand solution, but it moves us in the right way."

The AMT was created to nab wealthy tax dodgers, but because it was not indexed for inflation, it threatens to ensnare millions of middle-income households. Last year, the House approved a plan to reform the AMT and to cover the cost in part by imposing new income taxes on the hefty commissions claimed by Wall Street financiers. The Senate repeatedly rejected the proposal.

[MADem]

1. So now they will rewrite the damn AMT to index it to inflation.

Why the hell don't people think this shit through in the first place? What, they think "inflation" is never gonna happen? This happens over and over again--this failure to take the long view.

Hell, there are geezers who get more in social security every year than they paid for their homes. Inflation, like shit, happens!

[razors edge]

2. Why don't they just

print the money they need to cover the gap? uhh, never mind. :sarcasm:


Hey cal04 :hi: