Obama tax cut compromise: The ‘best deal’ is still a bad deal for America

When political pundits talk about President Obama’s tax cut compromise and say ‘this is the best deal we’re going to get,’ one has to wonder what the worst deal would look like. As it stands now the republican strong-arm tactics against President Obama and the Lame Duck Congress will add $900 billion to the deficit, most of which will be caused by an extension of the Bush tax cuts for a handful of millionaires and billionaires.

While the GOP is on the brink of declaring victory for the wealthy, the rest of America remains unemployed, underemployed, in foreclosure or without a shred of hope from the shrinking safety net the GOP seems bent on tearing away from the bottom up.

According to The Nation, “It's the standard bribery model of legislating that has come to characterize Washington in the era of oligarchy: if you want to put food on the table of the unemployed, you must lavishly wine and dine the CEOs and bankers who laid them off.”

The republicans won control of the House in the 2010 elections with the promise of being the party that would take the federal budget deficit seriously and take steps to reduce it. That promise does not appear to apply to tax cuts for the wealthy. 

By TwitterButtons.com

Obama makes deal: Unemployment extension in exchange for tax cuts for millionaires

Image by Barack Obama via Flickr

President Obama has struck a deal with republican lawmakers who had promised to block all legislation unless the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy were extended. The compromise announced by the president on Monday, includes a 13 month extension for unemployment benefits and a 2 year extension of the Bush tax cuts for all Americans, including the wealthiest top 2%.

Other parts of the Obama deal include a 2% reduction in the employment tax. However, the president said he was not happy about extending the Bush tax cuts for the rich because they will increase the federal deficit.

Republican leaders claimed that increasing taxes during a recession would have a negative effect on the economy, and that the wealthy are the ones who create jobs.

In September, the National Bureau of Economic Research announced that “The recession ended in June 2009, 18 months after it began in December 2007,” according to the Washington Post. ” Yet there is little physical evidence to suggest that the statement is supported. The US department of Labor said the national unemployment rate increased in November to more than 9.5%.

If the tax breaks for the wealthy the republicans pushed so hard for do not create the promised jobs, they may face serious political fallout in the 2012 elections.

Related articles

• Obama signals compromise on extending tax cuts (thehill.com)