The Senate gave final approval yesterday to a five-year, $70 billion tax package that would extend deep cuts to tax rates on dividends and capital gains for two years, effectively locking in all of President Bush’s first-term tax cuts through the end of the decade.
The Republicans that voted against the measure were: George Voinovich (OH), Lincoln Chafee (RI), and Olympia Snowe (ME). The Democrats that voted for it were: Mark Pryor (AR), Bill Nelson (FL), and Ben Nelson (NE). Jay Rockefeller and Arlen Specter managed not to cast a vote either way. Jim Jeffords voted no.
The Washington Post reported that “middle-income households would receive an average tax cut of $20 from the agreement, according to the joint Urban Institute-Brookings Institution Tax Policy Center, while 0.02 percent of households with incomes over $1 million would receive average tax cuts of $42,000.”
Write Pryor and the Nelsons and tell them they can take your twenty bucks and shove them where the sun don’t shine.
