Lawmakers have said that the two sides must reach agreement on a framework by early this week to have enough time to advance legislation through Congress before the Christmas holiday. If Congress doesn’t act, tax rates for income at all levels would rise next month, along with taxes on estates, capital gains and dividends.
Senate Republicans are discussing a legislative strategy for extending the tax cuts for income up to $250,000 a year. Under the scenario, the House would vote on a measure that would enact that policy as well as a separate bill that would continue the tax cuts for all income. The Senate then would approve the first bill and send it to Obama for his signature.
Democrats are banking on the idea that the public would blame Republicans if no deal is reached by year’s end.
“If they don’t come to a compromise, all the ensuing problems on Jan. 1, almost all of them, will really be on their shoulders, and I think the public knows that,” Schumer, the chamber’s third-ranking Democrat, said of Republicans in a Dec. 13 interview.
Sixty-five percent of those polled say Obama’s Nov. 6 election victory gave him a mandate on his proposal to raise tax rates for top earners, according to a Bloomberg National Poll of 1,000 adults conducted Dec. 7-10.