more:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rj-eskow/obamas-tax-holiday-a-pois_b_793526.htmlEXCERPT:
The president may resent the widespread lack of trust from members of his own party. But their distrust doesn't mean they're "sanctimonious" or "purist." It means that he's done very little to earn anyone's trust on this issue. Instead, he's given people every reason to doubt his willingness to protect Social Security.
Obama described his disaffected base as impractical people who only want "the satisfaction of having a purist position and no victories for the American people." But that assumes that this deal is a "victory for the American people." Yes, he won an extension of unemployment benefits. But when good liberal economists on the presidential payroll struggle to describe it as "a plan that's all about jobs," the gentlest thing one can say is that they're overstating the case. When it comes to jobs then, as Dean Baker succinctly says, the plan is "not trivial, but it's an order of magnitude less than what we should be looking for."
Worse, whatever gains working Americans might see under this plan is likely to cost them far more in the long run. It's not just that the $120 billion cost of the "payroll tax holiday" could be used more effectively in other ways. And it's not just that it could be distributed in a way that doesn't give yet another break to the wealthy. (Obama's economists keep repeating that this plan will save $1,000 next year for a family making $50,000, and that's true. But it will save more than twice as much ($2,136) for a family making $106,800, the current maximum for the FICA tax. And it will save $2,136 for a family making a million dollars. And $2,136 for a family making ten million. And $2,136 for a family making a hundred million...)
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