How payroll tax gridlock in Congress finally came unstuck

A deal to prolong the payroll tax cut has also paved the way for Congress to extend long-term unemployment benefits and the Medicare 'doc fix' to the end of the year.?

A surprise shift by House Republicans to extend a payroll tax cut ? without requiring offsetting spending cuts ? broke an impasse over two other measures now set for votes in the House and Senate on Friday.

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If Congress passes and the president signs this package into law, as expected:

• Americans will no longer see a 2 percent hike in payroll taxes.
• Doctors serving Medicare patients will no longer face a 27 percent drop in reimbursement.
• Long-term jobless workers won?t immediately lose their extended benefits.

All the provisions were set to expire on Feb. 29. In a bid to pay for these features, the unemployed will be eligible for fewer weeks of benefits, beginning in June. Some will face new requirements, such as drug testing, to access them. And new federal hires will be required to pay more for their pensions than current federal workers.?

Until Monday, House Republicans had demanded offsets for the $100 billion cost of extending the 2 percent cut in the Social Security payroll tax, from 6.2 percent to 4.2 percent. They said that the payroll tax holiday was not, in fact, a tax cut, because it relied on taxpayer dollars to make up for the uncollected revenues in the Social Security trust fund.

But in the end, the political pressure on House GOP leaders to avoid what would seem to be a tax hike was simply too high.

?The agreement that?s been reached to stop a tax hike on middle class Americans is a fair agreement and one that I support,? said Speaker John Boehner (R) of Ohio, in a briefing with reporters on Thursday.

?But let?s be honest,? he added. ?This is an economic-relief package, not a bill that?s going to grow the economy and create jobs.?

Some Democrats agree that the tax cuts should have been offset by revenues. They want the Bush tax cuts, which expire Dec. 31, to be offset and see a bad precedent in the current deal.?

?By taking this action, we?re saying that tax cuts somehow don?t have to be paid for,? said Sen. Mark Warner (D) of Virginia in a floor speech on Thursday.??We?re advancing a policy that I believe will come back to haunt us later this year when the Bush tax cuts expire.?

Other Democrats?are mounting an 11th-hour protest against extending the Social Security payroll tax cut, saying it undermines Social Security.?The deal mandates that revenue not collected by the Social Security Trust Fund through the payroll tax be replaced out of taxpayer dollars in the US Treasury's General Fund.?

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/__ooE07pd3c/How-payroll-tax-gridlock-in-Congress-finally-came-unstuck

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