Senate bills: near repeal of estate tax, trashing of Medicare, VA benefits

[swag]

http://www.cbpp.org/6-26-06bud2.htm

COMBINED EFFECT OF BILLS MOVING IN THE SENATE WOULD BE TO FINANCE NEAR-REPEAL OF THE ESTATE TAX WITH CUTS IN MEDICARE, VETERANS BENEFITS, SCHOOL LUNCHES, AND OTHER PROGRAMS
by Robert Greenstein and Richard Kogan

At the urging of Senate Republican leader Bill Frist, the House of Representatives last week approved a measure designed by House Ways and Means Committee chairman Bill Thomas to repeal most but not all of the estate tax. The measure contains no “offsets”; its large cost would be financed through higher deficits. The Senate takes up the bill this week.

One day before Rep. Thomas unveiled his proposal, the Senate Budget Committee approved a far-reaching bill to make major changes in federal budget rules. Crafted by committee chairman Judd Gregg and co-sponsored by Senator Frist and 24 other Senate Republicans, the bill includes a provision that would establish binding deficit targets, which would be set at 0.5 percent of the Gross Domestic Product for 2012 and all years thereafter. In any year in which the deficit targets would otherwise be missed, automatic across-the-board cuts would be triggered in every entitlement program except Social Security.

Policymakers who have pushed for repeal of most or all of the estate tax (and for other tax cuts) often act as though tax cuts are a “free lunch,” the costs of which need never be faced. As economists, and budget analysts frequently explain, however, this is not so. Sooner or later, someone has to pick up the bill.

The Gregg bill places a spotlight on how these tax cuts would be paid for. Taken together, the Thomas estate-tax bill and the Gregg budget-enforcement bill would result in multi-million dollar tax cuts for the estates of the wealthiest Americans who die, with these lavish tax cuts being financed by large reductions in health care, retirement, and other benefits on which millions of ordinary Americans rely.

. . . more

[undergroundpanther]

1. So many

good hearted elitist rich people out there..see how much they care about the less fortunate than themselves?