Politics
Obama gets pay roll tax cut extended by Congress
Senator Max Baucus, a lead Democratic negotiator, said, “This is very important to a lot of people: 160 million Americans are now going to maintain their payroll tax cuts (and) a lot of folks who lost their jobs through no fault of their own are going to be receiving unemployment benefits.”
Their announcement capped a long day of fits and starts, political drama and high-level negotiating.
At one point, the deal seemed in jeopardy just hours after aides said it had been struck by lead negotiators.
Democrats complained that Senate Republicans were suddenly demanding that a new restriction on physician-owned hospitals had to be eased to gain their support.
Aides said some Democratic negotiators were also reluctant to sign off on the deal because of cuts in the pensions of federal workers.
The overarching issue, however, was the proposed extension for 10 months of the payroll tax cut set to expire on February 29.
Many Republicans had initially balked at the extension while others insisted that its cost had to be offset by spending cuts to prevent an increase in the U.S. deficit.
