The political hot spot in the Congress will again be a focus on plans to extend a freeze on student loan interest rates for another year, as the Senate (after a week off) will take up a plan from Democrats which only differs in how the extension is paid for.
But, those details pretty much explain the root of our current political divide.
The House bill approved on a basically party line vote last Friday would extend the current interest rate of 3.4% for another year, delaying a doubling of that rate to 6.8% until July of 2013.
Republicans in the House would pay for that by grabbing money from a fund in the Obama health law, which has already been tapped to help pay for the payroll tax cut, and which the White House had proposed a reduction in funding next year.
But that didn't stop Democrats from arguing that the money would go to women's health programs, playing into their charges that Republicans are conducting a "War on Women."
The plan is paid for by taking aim at certain taxpayers who make more than $250,000 per year for a married couple and $200,000 for an individual, and receive income from a subchaper S corporation or limited partnership.
The fine print of the bill labels this "Employment Tax Treatment of Professional Service Businesses."
Here is the actual bill text, a reminder of just how verbose the tax code can get:
The political hot spot in the Congress will again be a focus on plans to extend a freeze on student loan interest rates for another year, as the Senate (after a week off) will take up a plan from Democrats which only differs in how the extension is paid for. ...
