$318 Billion Deal Is Set in Congress for Cutting Taxes

Maybe Scrat's being forced to give two cents a month through his tax dollars to the poor compensates for about one quarter of this pacifist's tax dollars going to defense? Or my atheist tax dollars going to religious institutions? Can't seem to work up any sympathy for the Scrat here...

Doesn't the neo-con's generous heart make you want to cry? c.i.

The don't understanding is on the other foot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Pacifist athiests have no feet to stand on.

cjh, Whether you like it or not, the House just passed legislation to extend the child tax credit to the poor. Hooray! c.i.

I never said I was against it, but I will say it makes no sense. How can you credit back something that was never paid? Talk about voodoo economics.

No. It means that they are not generous enough. It means that they view it as the government's role to be generous for them, with other people's money.

CI - Let me tell you a story. There's this guy on-line who can't differentiate between someone questioning HOW we help those who need it, and the notion of WHETHER we should do so. See, this other person (we'll call him "Scrat") he keeps trying to engage liberals in a discussion of whether giving "the poor" a refund of taxes they did not pay is an appropriate way to help them, and whether those who argue against doing so are really trying to hurt "the poor". He has further pointed out that for many of these "poor" families, the fact that they don't qualify for the refund is a direct result of the help they have already received from a recent tax cut the same liberals want to pretend did not help the poor.

Quite a story, isn't it?

C.I.
No one is saying that we should not help the poor and unfortunate. However, tacking it on to tax reduction legislation rather than expense legislation is subterfuge. It is in no way tax reduction.

au - Thank you for "getting" my point.

It is far easier to support my opinion when people acknowledge what that opinion actually is. (It also makes for a meaningful debate should others disagree. Simply pretending that my position is something it is not may make it easier to tear apart, but it results in no meaningful exchange.)

Scrat and au, Subterfuge or a "refund they did not pay" doesn't make much difference. "Subtrfuge" by our government goes on all the time. As for "refund they did not pay," it's a matter of priorities. I didn't approve of our country going to Iraq to spend billions on a war. Our government also gives away billions every year in foreign aide that I do not approve. I'd rather we help our poor citizens first with food and shelter. As for our tax laws, it's the biggest boondoggle our government has ever created. c.i.

WASHINGTON - The House voted narrowly Thursday to extend $1,000 child tax credits through the rest of the decade while preventing low-income families from cashing in on rebates going out to other households this summer. The House also removed from a Senate-passed bill language that would have enabled families of servicemen and servicewomen who served in the war with Iraq (news - web sites) to claim bigger child tax credits. Republicans said the low-income families covered in the legislation already pay no income taxes. "We're turning our tax code into a welfare system," said Spencer Bachus, R-Ala
the war goes back to the Senate.

dys, Looks like it's not going to Bush for signature just yet. c.i.

Scrat
That point had been made 20 or so pages ago. I am afraid it falls on deaf ears.

The following is excerpted, and the link is at the end. Rather than 'quote' these excerpts, due to the quote boxes' hard-to-read quality, I will set my comments off in color and the excerpt in black, as I have done in this instance.)

As the United States' economic doldrums continue, evaluating whether Bush's tax cuts make sense becomes an increasingly pressing task. The Dow may be rising, but employment is continuing to fall. Deflation is possible. The dollar is weakening. Local and state governments are beset by their own deficits, while the federal debt is ballooning at an astounding rate -- on Tuesday, the Congressional Budget Office warned that the federal government is headed for a record $400 billion deficit in 2003. And, perhaps most critically, there is a massive financial crisis looming on the horizon: the budget bomb caused by huge Social Security and Medicare benefits that will be paid out to retiring baby boomers beginning in 2008.

The White House says that supply-side tax cuts will cure all of our economy's problems, but a look at the record of such cuts in the Reagan years suggests just the opposite. Indeed, to many observers, a relentlessly executed program of tax cuts seems designed to accelerate a Social Security catastrophe, not avoid it.

Even staunch conservatives are beginning to express doubts. Pete Peterson, the chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and Richard Nixon's commerce secretary, noted that under Bush the Treasury has turned $5.6 trillion of projected surpluses into an estimated deficit of $4 trillion.

"Since 2001, the fiscal strategizing of the party has ascended to a new level of fiscal irresponsibility," Peterson wrote. "For the first time ever, a Republican leadership in complete control of our national government is advocating a huge and virtually endless policy of debt creation."

* * *
Are Republicans stupid? Is the White House advocating policies that have been shown to be both useless and reckless simply because Republicans have no weapon in their economic arsenal other than ever larger tax cuts? For many on the left, it's tempting to think so, but that's probably not the case. There may be method to their madness: Since his campaign, Bush has been calling for a "restructuring" of Medicare and Social Security, and his idea of restructuring rests heavily on the private sector.

Bush wants to allow people to divert some of the money they pay to Social Security taxes into "private accounts" invested in the stock market. In the days of the market boom, this didn't seem like a terrible idea -- at the time, remember, betting your retirement on the fortunes of a high-flying firm like Enron was an eminently sensible thing to do. Well, we know how that story ended. Now, after the Wall Street scandals, voters may be more inclined to keep their money in old-fashioned, government-run Social Security. And so, pro-privatization Republicans find themselves with a problem: How do you get people to think that Enron is a better investment than Social Security? The answer is obvious: You make the government's finances worse than Enron's.

The Plot to Kill Social Security

PDid, The warning signs about the bankruptcy of social security have been around for over 10-15 years, at the very least. Our government continues to borrow from the social security fund to fund other projects. When the baby-boomers begin to retire, and there are more retirees than workers, guess what the consequence is anyway. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure that one out - or maybe it does. c.i.

Here's the latest available info on social security taxes collected vs social security benefits paid for 2001. Revenue was $434 billion, and Outlay was $441 billion. The Administration on Aging provides the following stats on the US Elderly Population on people over age 65. In the year 2000, we represented 12.4%, but it 2020 that jumps to 16.4%. They are projecting that by 2030, there will be only two workers for every beneficiary of social security. c.i.

I like the way you set that up PDiddie. You're right about the quote boxes -- they are disaster (what happened?). Will follow your format in the future. It's much clearer.

It's interesting to look at the "tax cuts" from the point of view of a senior citizen or young mother or unemployed person -- all with very limited incomes, sometimes so low that they are not liable for federal -- FEDERAL -- taxes. Because of the sharp cut in services and federal tax money going to the states, this group of low income people (who are receiving no relief from the federal government) find themselves paying more and more for just existing. Here are the increases they are liable for: state sales tax increases (which I avoid by buying many of the more expensive items over the internet); public transportation fare increases (which I avoid because I own a car); property tax increases (whether they rent or own); day care increases; co-pay increases... If you add up what they will be paying out to feather the nests of those at the top end of the income scale, you'll find that it's those at the top who are getting the free rides, the "welfare." The welfare kings and queens in this thread -- the ones with the high incomes and the increase in their discretional spending thanks to their tax cut, might want to think through the details... Take one of your family's cars out on the federal highway system or into a national park and remember that you are taking advantage of a piece of federal welfare which is no longer available to those who no longer can afford personal transportation. Take your kid to school and remember that your kid is subsidized by funds which are not available to the senior citizen with no children.

Tartarin
Yeah! as a senior citizen who pays federal tax. Why am I not getting a tax give back? At least relief from paying tax on my social security.