Deficit targets: Social Security, mortgage breaks

Contentious targets: Deficit panel: curb Social Security, tax breaks, spending

Andrew Taylor, Associated Press, On Wednesday November 10, 2010, 9:15 pm EST

WASHINGTON (AP) -- In a politically incendiary plan, the bipartisan leaders of President Barack Obama's deficit commission proposed curbs in Social Security benefits, deep reductions in federal spending and higher taxes for millions of Americans Wednesday to stem a flood of red ink that they said threatens the nation's very future.

The White House responded coolly, some leading lawmakers less so to proposals that target government programs long considered all but sacred. Besides Social Security, Medicare spending would be curtailed. Tax breaks for many health care plans, too. And the Pentagon's budget, as well, in a plan designed to cut total deficits by as much as $4 trillion over the next decade.

The plan arrived exactly one week after elections that featured strong voter demands for economic change in Washington. But criticism was immediate from advocacy groups on the left and, to some extent, the right at the start of the post-election debate on painful steps necessary to rein in out-of-control deficits.

The plan would gradually increase the retirement age for full Social Security benefits -- to 69 by 2075 -- and current recipients would receive smaller-than-anticipated annual increases. Equally controversial, it would eliminate the current tax deduction that homeowners receive for the interest they pay on their mortgages.

See the complete article in the Politics Forum.

http://www.maleescortreview.com/forum/index.php?/topic/5663-deficit-targets-social-security-mortgage-breaks/

MsGuy started a thread on this in the Politics forum as well.

MsGuy started a thread on this in the Politics forum as well.

Thanks for pointing that out. I have placed a notice in the counterpart to this post in the Politics Forum. This is a case of: the early brid gets the worm.

Thanks for pointing that out. I have place a notice in the counterpart to this post in the Politics Forum. This is a case of: the early brid gets the worm.

Or a mis-appropriated post to begin with. Dueling posts of the same topic in two forums serves no-one well.