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Tuesday, April 03, 2007
CTJ: Biggest Tax Increase in History?
Citizens For Tax Justice has a good piece on the "biggest tax increase in history" line being used by every Republican on the planet.
The budget resolutions in the Senate and the House do not by themselves increase or decrease taxes, but they do make Congress "pay for" any further tax cuts by setting up PAYGO rules that ensure that new tax cuts do not increase the deficit. Enacting more tax cuts is what, in a legal sense, extending the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts would be, since they expire in 2010, and new legislation would have to be passed to continue them.
President Bush, on the other hand, proposed to "pay for" new tax cuts with enormous spending reductions (the biggest spending cut in history?), but did not request that Congress enact a PAYGO rule that would have more or less required cuts of this magnitude if the tax cuts were extended.
If Bush were serious about offsetting the tax cuts, why wouldn't he ask for PAYGO?
PAYGO distinguishes the Bush budget and the Democrat's budgets. The President's budget wants more tax cuts even if they increase the deficit, while the Democrat's budget would allow more tax cuts only if they do not increase the deficit. This difference is an indication of how the parties intend to deal with the expiration of the tax cuts in 2010.
Posted by Matt Lewis
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