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U.S. Congress Approves Tax Cut Bill
U.S. Senate gave final congressional approval on Saturday to a 10-year, 1.35 trillion dollars tax cut package and sends the bill to President George W. Bush for signature.
The Senate approved the bill by a 58-33 vote, with twelve Democrats joining Republicans to vote in favor.
The Senate voted hours after the House of Representatives, in a rare Saturday session, passed the measure 240-154.
A House-Senate conference committee reconciled differing versions of the bill on Friday night, setting the stage for both houses to pass the bill before the Memorial Day holiday on Monday.
Congress's approval of the tax cut package, the biggest in two decades, presented Americans broad tax relief and handed President Bush his biggest victory since taking office.
Bush, who takes tax cut as his top priority, is expected to sign it after lawmakers return from Memorial Day recess in early June.
"I think it's good for the economy. It's surely good for the working men and women of America to have tax relief," said Republican Senator Charles Grassley, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee and a chief negotiator for the final tax cut agreement between the Senate and House.
But the Democrats argued that Bush's tax cut plan would consume far too much of the projected 5.6 trillion dollars, 10-year budget surplus to meet other needs such as education, defense, debt reduction and Medicare prescription drug benefits. They also contended that it was unfairly tilted toward the wealthy.
The compromise bill, a mixture of earlier versions passed separately by the Senate and House, would give individual taxpayers a refund of up to 300 dollars this year and married couples up to 600 dollars.
A new 10 percent tax bracket is carved out of the bottom income levels of the current 15 percent bracket.
The top 39.6 percent rate would drop to 35 percent and the most other rates would be cut by 3 percentage points. The rate cuts will be phased in over six years but the first installment will take effect this July 1.
The bill increases the current 500 dollars child tax credit to 600 dollars this year and gradually raises it to 1,000 dollars by 2010 and also calls for repealing estate taxes.
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