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<p>WASHINGTON -- Wondering how Democrats might approach income taxes in this already heated election season?</p> <p>The House tax panel chairman introduced a bill Thursday that would repeal the alternative-minimum tax and substitute the loss of nearly $800 billion over 10 years with a "replacement tax." The new surtax would kick in for couples with incomes more than $200,000 and singles making at least $150,000. (The specific threshold would be set by the Treasury Secretary.) The surtax would be 4% for most people but would rise to 4.6% on incomes of more than $500,000.</p>

WASHINGTON -- Meeting reporters at breakfast last week, Secretary of the Treasury Henry Paulson set as his tax priority a "patch" to slow the runaway Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT). The former investment banker acted as though he were oblivious to plans by Rep. Charles Rangel, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, to turn the need for such a temporary tax fix into the most radical left-wing tax revision in half a century. When one questioner asked whether Paulson contemplated recommending a presidential veto of AMT legislation, he indicated astonishment at the very idea. His only stated concern was...

To add to the mortgage meltdown miseries, the credit panic, the plunging home sales and the rising foreclosures, here's a new worry: a proposed cutoff of mortgage-interest tax deductions for houses with more than 3,000 square feet. One of Capitol Hill's most experienced and most powerful legislators is drafting a "carbon tax" bill that would do precisely that. The chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, John D. Dingell (D-Mich.), expects to introduce comprehensive climate-change legislation when Congress returns next month. Besides imposing hefty new federal taxes on gasoline, the forthcoming bill would, in Dingell's words, seek to "remove...

A Democratic proposal to raise taxes on the private partnerships that are behind buyout mania on Wall Street has a good chance of passing because legislators plan to couple it with an extension of Alternative Minimum Tax relief — a combination President Bush would have a hard time vetoing. The higher taxes would be imposed on private equity and hedge funds — and possibly real estate and other private partnerships — to generate as much as $80 billion in revenues that could pay for two years of relief from the Alternative Minimum Tax, or AMT, investment analysts estimate. AMT relief...

WASHINGTON – Working middle-class families threatened by the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) next April would save money under legislation introduced today by U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL). Sessions’ bill, the Saving Families First AMT Relief Act of 2007, would allow taxpayers to claim personal exemptions under the AMT to reduce their taxable income subject to the alternative tax rules. Current law prevents AMT taxpayers from claiming personal exemptions, as most taxpayers do under normal tax provisions. The personal exemption in the 2007 tax year is $3,400 per person. “By allowing personal exemptions under the AMT, we will be providing tax...

Leading Democrats in Congress and on the presidential campaign trail are having a difficult time agreeing on what it means to be wealthy. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has said it means earning $500,000 or more annually. Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) contends that raising the tax rate on families making more than $400,000 could offset legislation to slash taxes on the middle class.

Federal Deficit Sharply Lower Jun 12 03:28 PM US/Eastern By MARTIN CRUTSINGER AP Economics Writer WASHINGTON (AP) - The federal deficit is running sharply lower through the first eight months of this budget year as growth in revenues continues to outpace the growth in spending. The Treasury Department said that the deficit through May totaled $148.5 billion, down 34.6 percent from the same period a year ago. That improvement came even though the deficit in May increased to $67.7 billion, up 57.8 percent from May 2006. However, analysts attributed this big increase to the fact that the Internal Revenue Service...

One Plan Would Impose Surtax Of 4.3% on Richest Households House Democrats looking to spare millions of middle-class families from the expensive bite of the alternative minimum tax are considering adding a surcharge of 4 percent or more to the tax bills of the nation's wealthiest households. Rep. Richard E. Neal (D-Mass.), chairman of the House subcommittee with primary responsibility for the AMT, said that option would also lower AMT bills for families making $250,000 to $500,000. And it would pay for reductions under the regular income tax for married couples, children and the working poor. All told, the proposal...

...Mr. Rangel and other key Democrats ...have come up with their plan to protect the middle class from the growing reach of the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT). If nothing is done this year, 25 million workers will be liable to the AMT when they pay their taxes next April. So to defuse this political time bomb the House plans to exempt families with incomes below $250,000. So far so good. But the Democrats' dilemma is to figure out how to come up with the $650 billion of revenue this stealth tax would have raised... The top AMT rate would increase...

Congress will have to steer carefully to avoid a shock to the economy as it strives to balance the budget by allowing tax cuts to expire in the next few years, economists say. The biggest danger is the alternative minimum tax (AMT), which this year is scheduled to cut deeply into the pocketbooks of as many as 23 million upper-middle-income taxpayers unless Congress extends tax relief. President Bush's budget and the House and Senate spending plans rely on the expiration of AMT relief to achieve balance in the next five years. Mr. Bush's budget provides a one-year fix of the...

House Democrats, aiming to seize taxes from Republicans as a political issue, have come up with a plan to shift the burden of the hated alternative minimum tax onto the shoulders of the nation's richest households... Because it was not indexed for inflation, the AMT delivered a significant tax increase to an estimated 3 percent of households this year. Unless the law is changed, it is projected to strike nearly 20 percent of taxpayers when they file returns next spring, many earning as little as $50,000 a year. House Democrats are trying to craft legislation that would spare those households...

Just in time for tax filing season, the Tax Foundation and Congress' Joint Committee on Taxation have compiled some useful facts about the federal tax system. Following are a few worth thinking about as taxpayers write their annual checks to Uncle Sam. c In 2005, the federal government took $2.4 trillion out of the pockets of the American people. To put this number into context, it is about the same as the size of the entire U.S. economy in 1959 in inflation-adjusted terms. Only two other countries on Earth have economies as large as our federal government: Germany and Japan...

On March 23, Grassley sponsored an amendment to the Senate's 2008 budget bill that read, "To amend the budget resolution for fiscal year 2008 in order to accommodate the full repeal of the Alternative Minimum Tax preventing 23 million families and individuals from being subject to the AMT in 2007, and millions of families and individuals in subsequent years." Seems fairly straightforward doesn't it? With the previous statement by Baucus and support of liberals like Chuck Schumer (D-NY), this amendment probably sailed right through with nary a dissenting vote. Except that it didn't. The vote wasn't even close. A bipartisan...

April's Fools: One Born Every Minute April 02, 2007 By Herman Cain An old and popular English proverb cautions us that a fool and his money are soon parted. Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) is taking us all for fools with some of his recent statements and votes. On January 4, 2007, Senator Baucus spoke on the Senate floor about the imperative need to repeal the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT). The AMT was enacted in 1969 to make sure that a handful of millionaires could not take advantage of completely legal tax deductions and shelters. Because Congress did...

AMT? Yes, it’s the alternative minimum tax, a poorly conceived, passive menace brought to you by inflation. The AMT—a parallel system with separate rates and fewer deductions—was written and passed to prevent the super rich from using deductions, credits and other shelters to avoid paying taxes. But because of rising incomes, this year the AMT is expected to ensnare 3.8 million taxpayers. Next year, the AMT exemption is scheduled to drop significantly, trapping another 20 million households, according to the congressional Joint Committee on Taxation. The quickest way to determine whether you’ll be swept up is to use the IRS’...

Is the AMT really the realization of the Flat Tax? Is it therefore actually more fair and democratic than the regular tax code? I wonder where my fellow Freepers stand on the issue of repealing, fixing or leaving in place, the AMT, which increasingly is going to become the main tax system in the country for people who actually pay taxes. On the one hand, it results in a higher amount of taxes paid, on the other hand, it seems like a fair, flat tax that a few years ago some conservatives claimed to like. I have my opinion, but...

<p>WASHINGTON - A tax law meant to crack down on wealthy tax dodgers has instead become the most serious problem facing millions of other taxpayers.</p> <p>For the government, the biggest problem is billions of dollars in unpaid taxes, National Taxpayer Advocate Nina E. Olson said Tuesday in a report to Congress on the hurdles Americans face in meeting their tax obligations.</p>

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- The Senate's top tax writers kicked off the new Congress Thursday with a renewed call to repeal the alternative minimum tax. Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., and Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, the tax panel's senior Republican, introduced legislation that would eliminate the alternative levy, which initially, in 1969, targeted a handful of wealthy Americans who had paid no income tax. Because the AMT wasn't indexed to inflation, it has grown to threaten millions of middle-class taxpayers. 'The new Congress intends to provide tax relief to middle-income Americans in a fiscally responsible way, and the...

Washington -- After six years of railing against Republican tax cuts for the rich and fiscal irresponsibility, Democrats will find themselves come January under enormous pressure to pass a hugely expensive tax cut -- without any way to make up the revenue. The alternative minimum tax, which slaps an extra income tax on many higher-income people, has become a political monster for Democrats, threatening to clobber prosperous professionals in such Democratic strongholds as California and New York. The tax was installed by Democrats in 1969 to make people with high incomes pay their fare share. However, because the rate was...

RANGEL: Not repealing. You are talking about after 2010? CAVUTO: Right. RANGEL: I don't think we will be speculating as to what's going to happen after 2010. I said it, that's my story and I'm sticking with it...RANGEL:... to see how these people can take care of their own problem; we have got to pull our troops out of harm's way, I would say, hey, that's what we are talking about. You really didn't have to change Rumsfeld, if he was to say those things. .RANGEL: ... You know, I get the impression that, if there are people that believe...