Summers: Payroll tax holiday was GOP's preference for tax stimulus (DK)

[somone]

http://jed-lewison.dailykos.com/

Summers: Payroll tax holiday was GOP's preference for tax stimulus
by Jed Lewison
Thu Dec 09, 2010 at 08:30:03 AM PST

Larry Summers during a Wednesday afternoon gaggle with reporters:

Q So the only reason that the payroll tax holiday will provide more stimulus is because it’s twice as large. Making Work Pay was capped. Why didn’t you preserve Making Work Pay? Is it because, as the President said some months ago, it’s just a kind of invisible tax cut and didn’t provide any political benefit for the White House?

MR. SUMMERS: No, it came out of the process of compromise with the Republicans who were more attracted to the payroll tax holiday concept, and that was a proposal that, as had been coming out of here, we had been giving considerable thought to in the context of the President’s budget.

So now that we know that it was the GOP's preference for a payroll tax holiday over extending Making Work Pay, what are Republicans saying about the proposal? HuffPost's Ryan Grim reports:

"Once something like this goes into place, a year from now, when it expires, it'll be portrayed as a tax increase," said Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.). So in a body like Congress, precedents matter and this is setting a precedent. I think that certainly is going to create some problems down the road if it passes." Given that Congress, under Democratic control, can't gather itself to let tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans expire, members of both parties are convinced that letting the payroll tax rate revert back to its current spot will be near impossible... "There's always a tendency to continue those things... Once something comes in, it's very difficult to change it," said Sen. George Voinovich (R-Ohio.) He then volunteered, without prompting, that "It would be detrimental to the Social Security system, especially when it's in bad shape." HuffPost noted that some of his colleagues would likely treat the deprivation of Social Security funds as a benefit of such a circumstance rather than a drawback. "I suspect so, yes," agreed Voinovich.

[jtown1123]

1. K & R

[myrna minx]

2. Wellity, it appearers that it *was* the poison pill to destroy Social Security.

It's their back door defunding - sneaky bastards.

[atreides1]

5. And the President went along with it

Because it was the best deal he could get. That's like trading a thoroughbred horse for a unicorn. You give up something tangible and receive little to show for it.

[hfojvt]

3. but we just HAVE to drink some hemlock to get Republican votes

Don't be such a purist, poison really has some unsung nutrional benefits.

[Liberalynn]

4. I sure hope the House Dems stick to their guns and don't let this evil come to be.

and even if Harry lets it come to the Senate floor that the Senate Dems take the courage pill the House Dems did and fillibuster it.

[Bandit]

6. Of course it was a Republican idea, it will kill Social Security

Get it small enough to drown in the bathtub...Right now SS is solvent, but cut thirty percent of it's funding and quess what, it will become insolvent and need Republicans to "fix it"...