Lew Explains American Jobs Act Offsets

http://news.firedoglake.com/2011/09/12/lew-explains-american-jobs-act-offsets/

Now that I’ve had a chance to examine what OMB Director Jack Lew actually said about the pay-fors in the American Jobs Act, the gambit is becoming more clear. Here’s the scenario, as best as I can describe it:

The Administration had been readying a $3 trillion package of deficit reduction to submit to the Super Committee. Then the idea came along for this American Jobs Act, and specifically to move it as a piece of legislation. That bumps up against statutory rules around offsets and pay-fors that would be needed in the legislation as long as it wasn’t seen as emergency funding. So the Administration shifted its most populist ideas from the already-conceived $3 trillion package into the American Jobs Act pay-fors. And, they’ll now have to come up with an additional $450 billion in deficit reduction to meet their targets of a paid-for jobs bill and $3 trillion in deficit reduction for the Super Committee.

In other words, these eliminations of tax breaks for corporations and the rich aren’t really “paying” for the jobs bill. Whatever the Administration will employ to replace that spending in the deficit reduction package they release next week will really be paying for it.

Lew basically admits this in the White House briefing:

More at the link --

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