In a surprising and welcome turnaround, The Hill reports that Harry Reid is rejecting the Baucus bipartisan jobs bill.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is rewriting a jobs bill after Democrats complained of too many concessions to Republicans.
Reid announced Thursday that he would cut back on the jobs bill Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) introduced only hours earlier, essentially overruling the powerful chairman....
Baucus had stuffed the bill with many provisions that Democratic senators thought went beyond the goal of creating jobs, such as $31 billion in extensions to expiring tax provisions, including the research and development tax credit. That and other tax cuts were included to win GOP votes....
Democrats complained the bill did not focus enough on job creation.
"I would prefer a jobs bill that simply focused on job-creating initiatives, this bill has become something more than that," said Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.), who led early negotiations to produce a jobs bill, said before the meeting. "Maybe that’s what has to be done in order to get some bipartisan support."
Reid said he decided to rewrite the legislation to send a clear message to people struggling financially in the midst of the biggest national recession since the Great Depression.
"The message is so watered-down with people wanting other things in this big package," said Reid.
How novel, focusing a jobs bill on job-creating initiatives. In addition to the tax extenders, the Baucus bill had "a short-term extension of the USA PATRIOT Act, flood insurance provisions, Small Business Administration loan provisions, and a $1.5 billion package of agriculture disaster relief provisions." Good show, Reid and Senate Dems. The bill might have to be done through reconciliation, but if Dems have to bring jobs to America on their own, so be it.
Update: Senate staff e-mails the provisions that will be included in the narrow-focused bill:
Ø Schumer-Hatch Jobs Payroll Tax Exemption: offers an exemption from social security payroll taxes for every worker hired in 2010 that has been unemployed for at least 60 days. There would also be an additional $1,000 income tax credit for every new employee retained for 52 weeks to be taken on the employer’s 2011 income tax return.
Ø Section 179 Expensing: helps small businesses grow by allowing them to write off more of their expenditures
Ø Highway Trust Fund Extension: extends existing highway programs which provide states and localities with the certainty they need to make decisions on projects. It allows for billions more to be invested in infrastructure throughout the nation and saves one million jobs
Ø Expanding Build America Bonds: which allow state and local governments to borrow at lower costs to finance more infrastructure projects and put people to work.
More spending is needed, and will probably have to be passed again in the not-too-distant future. But at least this won't be larded up with tax giveaways for the wealthy. A separate unemployment insurance/COBRA subsidy extensions bill will be taken up the week of the 22nd, after recess.
