Progressives in Congress Proposed Budget that Saves and Enhances Social Security

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Wednesday March 21, 2012 · 11:50 AM PDT

2012/03/21 · 11:50

While the White House continues to fudge what it will give away in the upcoming budge negotiations, progressives in Congress have proposed a budget that raises taxes on the rich, cuts military spending and saves Medicare by increasing investment in it. Even Krugman in the NYT admits such a budget is workable and will not blow up the deficit.

The CPC plan essentially balances the budget through higher taxes and defense cuts, plus some tougher bargaining by Medicare (and a public option to reduce the costs of the Affordable Care Act). The proposed tax hikes would fall mainly on higher incomes, although not just on the top 2%: super-brackets for very high incomes, elimination of deductions, taxation of capital income as ordinary income, and — the part that would be most controversial — raising the cap on payroll taxes.
None of this is economically outlandish. Marginal tax rates on high incomes would rise substantially — enough to make even liberal economists slightly uncomfortable — but the historical evidence suggests that the incentive effects wouldn’t be too severe. Overall taxes as a share of GDP aren’t given, but they would clearly remain well below European levels.

mpjh

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Monday March 19, 2012 · 2:14 PM PDT

2012/03/19 · 14:14

This post originally based on tweets summarizing a Washington Post article. It took me a while to get the article because I don't have a subscription. Information is absolutely wrong -- Obama has not placed these cuts on the table.

Original post

OK, people are reporting that the Washington Post asserts that Obama has left the grand bargain on the table and is willing to cut Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid with not cuts to military spending and no tax increases for the very rich.
I cannot really find any good fact based information on this, but I would like to know what you all think.

If you don't think Obama will agree to any of these horrible actions, can you provide some reference when his administration is committed not to agree to them?

Poll

32 votes Show Results

In order to get a budget deal, will Obama agree to

32 votes Vote Now!

In order to get a budget deal, will Obama agree to

Cuts in Social Security

3 votes

Cuts in Medicare

4 votes

Cuts in Medicaid

0 votes

No cuts in Pentagon Budget

3 votes

No tax increase for the very rich

1 vote

Or Obama will not agree to any of the above

21 votes

No CLASS Affordable Health Care for All Americans

mpjh

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Sunday March 18, 2012 · 8:57 PM PDT

2012/03/18 · 20:57

Recently a cache of letters to President Obama were found mislaid in one of the Postal Sorting Centers abandoned by the federal government. We are carefully reviewing these letters to ensure that no information is revealed that would endanger the life of anyone. Thus, identifying references have been removed to protect the innocent.

What follows is the text of the first of those letters we are releasing.

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Progressives in Congress Proposed Budget that Saves and Enhances Social Security

watch for spam tweets about Obama and Grand Bargain in Washington Post

No CLASS Affordable Health Care for All Americans