Phasing out child tax credit killing 1st world birth rate- more room for 3rd worlders

Birthrates amongst western peoples are already well below replacement levels. Now they want to punish people even more for having children. Makes more room for 3rd world hordes that way I guess...

Obama Team Plots To End Child Tax Deductions, Mortagage Interest Payment Tax Deductions

Sacrosanct tax breaks, including deductions on mortgage interest, remain on the table just weeks before the deficit commission issues recommendations on policies to pare back with the aim of balancing the budget by 2015.

The tax benefits are hugely popular with the public but they have drawn the panel’s focus, in part because the White House has said these and other breaks cost the government about $1 trillion a year.

At stake, in addition to the mortgage-interest deductions, are child tax credits and the ability of employees to pay their portion of their health-insurance tab with pretax dollars. Commission officials are expected to look at preserving these breaks but at a lower level, according to people familiar with the matter.

The officials are also looking at potential cuts to defense spending and a freeze on domestic discretionary spending. It is unclear if the 18-member panel will be able to reach an agreement on any of the items by a Dec. 1 deadline.

Even if they do reach an agreement, any curbs on current tax breaks would likely face tough sledding in Congress. The banking and real-estate lobbies have fiercely rebuffed efforts to rescind the mortgage-interest deduction in the past.

Still, officials have found there aren’t any easy ways to balance the budget, and they are expected to steer clear of more polarizing issues like Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security and a broad rewrite of the tax code in their short-term recommendations. The panel could still make long-term recommendations to change these issues, but they would be less concrete.

“My concern is that the talk of tax expenditures is couched as ‘tax reform,’ but it’s not tax reform,” said Alison Fraser, director of the Thomas A. Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies at the conservative Heritage Foundation. “It’s simply a revenue-raising exercise.”

Committee officials plan to try to broker a deal in November, after the midterm elections. They have until Dec. 1 to win the support of 14 of the commission’s 18 members to endorse a final report. It is possible that the panel’s Democrats and Republicans would issue separate reports if they can’t agree, people familiar with the process said.

President Barack Obama created the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform in February, amid concern from lawmakers and economists that the growing budget deficit could damage the country’s long-term fiscal condition. The bipartisan panel, made up mostly of lawmakers but also business and labor leaders, has met for months, at times more constructively than many expected.

“There’s a lot of potential for agreement on the committee,” said panel member Alice Rivlin, a senior fellow at the liberal-leaning Brookings Institution.

If the commission reaches a consensus, House or Senate leaders could agree to bring some of the changes up for a vote, perhaps early next year, although there is no deadline.

To balance the budget by 2015, excluding interest payments on debt, means officials would need to find roughly $240 billion in annual savings, according to commission documents. Panel officials also hope to issue recommendations that would “meaningfully improve” the country’s long-term fiscal situation.

Even though officials are focusing on issues where they believe they can get broad agreement, they will likely face stiff resistance from certain lawmakers and interest groups. Some Republicans are expected to label any caps on tax breaks as a backdoor way of raising taxes. Several lawmakers’ offices declined to comment on specific proposals as negotiations aren’t yet under way.

Committee officials have also focused on the $700 billion in annual defense spending, which accounts for more than half of domestic discretionary spending. Critics say the government could cut some of the $400 billion spent on outside contractors. But many conservative groups have said cutting military spending would be a mistake, citing national security risks.

Changes to Medicaid and Medicare are unlikely to be recommended despite their looming presence in the U.S. budget. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that if laws don’t change, federal spending on health care alone will grow from 5% of gross domestic product in 2010 to 10% in 2035.

Commission officials looked closely at making short-term changes to Social Security, but talks shifted in recent weeks toward incorporating those ideas into a longer-term plan. This is in part because any changes would probably have to be phased in over years, delaying the budgetary impact for at least a decade.

“My sense from talking to members of the commission is that’s where they are focusing [on the long-term recommendation], Social Security reform,” said Martin Feldstein, an economics professor at Harvard University who served as a senior official in the Reagan administration.

It remains unclear whether the panel will reach a consensus with negotiations taking place right after the midterm elections, when Washington tends to buzz with political jostling. The imminent debate over whether to extend all or part of the Bush-era tax cuts could also complicate its efforts. The panel isn’t expected to weigh in on this issue.

The White House said this month that the budget deficit for the last fiscal year was $1.3 trillion, the second highest in 60 years. The government’s revenue was roughly $2.16 trillion in the year ended Sept. 30, compared with $3.46 trillion in outlays.

The White House hasn’t signed off on any of the potential proposals as it’s waiting for the panel to complete its work.

Mr. Obama “expects that the fiscal commission will continue the process of discussing and analyzing a wide range of ideas and it is premature to describe any specific idea as a conclusion of a commission that has not even voted yet,” White House spokesman Amy Brundage said.

The commission “is the last best hope right now for getting some substantive movement on the issue of the deficit, the debt, and the financial disaster we’re facing,” Sen. Judd Gregg (R., N.H.), a member of the commission, said in a recent interview.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100...8643889337142.html?mod=WSJ_hp_MIDDLTopStories

 

Another 5 bucks for Pheno ...! Keep posting and you'll have enough to buy a bicycle.

 

Don't YOU have more posts and post more frequently than he?

How can I get in on this shit?

 

in all fairness, removing the tax credit for having a child doesn't discourage having children. if it did, you could make the argument that people have children to get the tax cut - which is preposterous.

instead, focus on what removing the mortgage interest deduction will do to the housing market. it will totally and completely obliterate it. who would own a home if they couldn't get a benefit from deducting the interest? the answer would be most people IF housing prices appreciate - because you could at least gain in the value of your home (less the capital gains tax, of course).

but home values going up? oops. so now who would own a home if you'd lose money in it, pay property taxes on it, and not be able to deduct interest payments? wtf would i EVER buy a house for?

i hope he passes it and the result will be a cataclysmic - yes, that's the word i'd use - effect on housing. of course, the republicans will be smart enough to block such asinine legislation in the first place.

 

I think you're probably right. Although I do believe there are women having babies to get more welfare.

 

But half my posts are over in Chit Chat.

Call Dick Armie or one of the Koch brothers I'm sure they'll hook you up.

OHHH, look at LVS, GO BABY GO.

 

Of course there are, which is why tax cuts for children are better. This encourages people to have children who are actually making money, and can afford them. If it were so that you actually had to be making money to benefit from having children, that would be a lot better.

The birthrate in America is below replacement levels. It's one of the facts which is being used to advance the cause of amnesty for illegals in the USA, and for the mass invasion of 3rd world mongrels in Europe. The fact is that it's a valid criticism. If our birthrates don't increase, drastically and soon, our grandchildren will live in a very, very different world. Do you think those 3rd world hordes will treat us as well as we've treated them when we are a small minority??? In 50 years asia will still be 99% asian, africa will still be 99% african, latin america will still be 90% latin, but not the west.. Do you really think that wont fundamentally change the face and character of the west?? A quick glance at eurabia should cure anyone of that delusion.

Do you ever notice how this "multiculturalism" is a unicultural phenomenon? Why is it that only white nations are called upon to practice this "multiculturalism"? Why is it that african, arab, and asian nations aren't criticized for not being "multicultural".... You can't be too "multicultural" in Saudi Arabia or Sudan. Think about all the defining features of Western civilization. Free speech, freedom of assembly, religious freedom, freedom of the press, limited government. These are all uniquely western ideals and even now are limited mostly to Western societies. If the west ceases to be western, what exactly do you think the world will be like???

America is now more multicultural than it has ever been in history, it is now more hated than it ever has been in history. The more "multicultural" it has become, the less free it has become.

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sorry, i dont know that i can agree with this. i make good money, and the decision over whether to have more children has never been about a potential tax savings of $3500.

 

You're preaching to the choir when it come to multiculturalism.

 

Yah, but for a 40-60k household, that's significant. For average, middle class folks. But I agree, it should be more than 3500, maybe a % or graduated tax cut per child. SOMETHING has to get the birth rate up.... I also think that not taking punitive measure against men for having children, and belittling women for having families might also help...