2008 Democrats Propose a Ceiling on Bush Tax Cuts
By EDMUND L. ANDREWS
New York Times
WASHINGTON, April 20 — Grappling with one of the biggest domestic policy choices that will confront the next administration, the leading Democratic presidential candidates say they would raise a variety of taxes on affluent people but extend President Bush’s tax cuts for middle- and lower-income families.
Virtually all of Mr. Bush’s tax cuts are set to expire at the end of 2010, and the issue of whether to extend some or all of them sharply divides the parties and is a complex one for the Democratic candidates on both political and fiscal policy grounds.
Already, Republicans are signaling that they will attack the Democrats for what they say would be a mammoth tax increase that would threaten the economy and fuel growth in government spending. Democrats say the shift they are advocating would bring more fairness to the tax system and help pay for needed expansions of social programs while helping to keep the budget deficit under control.
Although they have yet to release detailed proposals or to talk about the issue in any depth on the campaign trail, Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama, and former Senator John Edwards, said through aides that they were backing variants of the same approach, which would result in higher taxes on income, capital gains and stock dividends for upper-income people. All of them, as well Senators Christopher J. Dodd and Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Gov. Bill Richardson, have made clear that they would support keeping in place the tax cuts that have benefited the vast majority of people, roughly speaking households with income less than $200,000 or so. In that way, the Democratic stance would ensure that a substantial portion of one of Mr. Bush’s signature policies would outlast his presidency, even if his party loses the White House.
(Continued here.)
New York Times
WASHINGTON, April 20 — Grappling with one of the biggest domestic policy choices that will confront the next administration, the leading Democratic presidential candidates say they would raise a variety of taxes on affluent people but extend President Bush’s tax cuts for middle- and lower-income families.
Virtually all of Mr. Bush’s tax cuts are set to expire at the end of 2010, and the issue of whether to extend some or all of them sharply divides the parties and is a complex one for the Democratic candidates on both political and fiscal policy grounds.
Already, Republicans are signaling that they will attack the Democrats for what they say would be a mammoth tax increase that would threaten the economy and fuel growth in government spending. Democrats say the shift they are advocating would bring more fairness to the tax system and help pay for needed expansions of social programs while helping to keep the budget deficit under control.
Although they have yet to release detailed proposals or to talk about the issue in any depth on the campaign trail, Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama, and former Senator John Edwards, said through aides that they were backing variants of the same approach, which would result in higher taxes on income, capital gains and stock dividends for upper-income people. All of them, as well Senators Christopher J. Dodd and Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Gov. Bill Richardson, have made clear that they would support keeping in place the tax cuts that have benefited the vast majority of people, roughly speaking households with income less than $200,000 or so. In that way, the Democratic stance would ensure that a substantial portion of one of Mr. Bush’s signature policies would outlast his presidency, even if his party loses the White House.
(Continued here.)
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