Highlights Of The Senate Stimulus Bill

(AP Photo/Ron Edmonds)

The Senate is presently working out the details of the $888 billion stimulus package promoted by President Obama and Senate Democrats.

As we noted in a similar post on the House version of the bill, the details of the package often get lost in all the coverage of the back-and-forth between lawmakers. So we're publishing the Associated Press' breakdown of the highlights of what's in the package.

A few points: One, many provisions below expire in two years. Two, the list does not reflect efforts by Democrats Dianne Feinstein and Patty Murray to add $25 billion in infrastructure projects to the bill. (Republican senators blocked the effort today, though it garnered 58 votes.) And three, members of both parties are planning to introduce amendments to the bill as the debate goes on, and the final version is unlikely to look exactly like this.

Aid to the poor and unemployed

$47 billion to provide extended unemployment benefits through Dec. 31, increase them by $25 a week and provide job training

$16.5 billion to increase food stamp benefits by 13 percent;

$3 billion in temporary welfare payments

Direct cash payments

$17 billion to give one-time $300 payments to Social Security recipients, poor people on Supplemental Security Income, and veterans receiving disability and pensions.

Health care

$26 billion to subsidize health care insurance for the unemployed under the COBRA program

$87 billion to help states with Medicaid

$24 billion to modernize health information technology systems

$5.8 billion for preventative care

$3.5 billion for health research and construction of National Institutes of Health facilities

$870 million to combat flu

Infrastructure

$46 billion for transportation projects, including $27 billion for highway and bridge construction and repair and $11.5 billion for mass transit and rail projects

$4.6 billion for the Army Corps of Engineers

$5 billion for public housing improvements

$6 billion for clean and drinking water projects

Education

$54 billion in state fiscal relief to prevent cuts in state aid to education

$26 billion to fund special education and the No Child Left Behind K-12 law

$19.5 billion for school modernization

$14 billion to boost the maximum Pell Grant by $500 to $5,350

$2.1 billion for Head Start.

Energy

$14.4 billion for Energy Department energy efficiency and renewable energy programs

$4.6 billion for fossil fuel research and development

$6.4 billion to clean up nuclear weapons production sites

$4.5 billion toward a so-called "smart electricity grid" to reduce waste

$2.9 billion to weatherize modest-income homes

Law enforcement

$4 billion in grants to state and local law enforcement to hire officers and purchase equipment

Taxes Cuts For Individuals

Provide a $500 per-worker, $1,000 per-couple tax cut for two years, costing about $142 billion. For the last half of 2009, workers could expect to see about $20 a week less withheld from their paychecks starting in June. Millions of Americans who don't make enough money to pay federal income taxes could file returns next year and receive checks.

Spare about 24 million taxpayers from being hit with the Alternative Minimum Tax in 2009, at a cost of about $70 billion. The change would save a family of four an average of $2,300. The tax was designed to make sure wealthy taxpayers can't use credits and deductions to avoid paying any taxes. But it was never indexed to inflation, so families making as little as $45,000 could get significant increases without the change. Congress addresses it each year, usually in the fall.

Increase the earned-income tax credit — which provides money to the working poor — for families with at least three children, at a cost of $4.7 billion.

Provide greater access to the $1,000 per-child tax credit for the working poor in 2009 and 2010, at a cost of $10.5 billion. Workers making as little as $6,000 a year who pay no income taxes would be eligible for checks.

Provide a $2,500 tax credit for college tuition and related expenses for 2009 and 2010, at a cost of $13 billion. The credit is phased out for couples making more than $180,000. Low-income families that pay no income taxes can qualify for a portion of the credit.

Repeal a requirement that a $7,500 first-time home buyer tax credit be paid back over time for homes purchased from Jan. 1 to Sept. 1, unless the home is sold within three years, at a cost of $3.7 billion. The credit is phased out for couples making more than $150,000.

Exclude from taxation the first $2,400 a person receives in unemployment compensation benefits in 2009, at a cost of $4.7 billion.

Extend and increase tax credits to homeowners who make their homes more energy efficient, at a cost of $4.3 billion. Homeowners could receive tax credits of up to $1,500 for upgrading furnaces and hot water heaters and making other improvements through 2010.

Taxes Cuts For Businesses

Provide an infusion of cash into money-losing companies by allowing them to claim tax credits on past profits dating back five years instead of two, at a cost of $19.5 billion.

Allow money-losing businesses to apply a long list of business tax credits to taxes paid in the previous five years, providing them with refunds, at a cost of about $11 billion.

Extend a provision allowing businesses buying equipment such as computers to speed up the depreciation of that equipment through 2009, at a cost of $5.3 billion.

Repeal a Treasury provision that allowed firms that buy money-losing banks to use more of the losses as tax credits to offset the profits of the merged banks for tax purposes. The change would increase taxes on the merged banks by $7 billion over 10 years.

Extend tax credits for renewable energy production, at a cost of $13 billion.

[ediatmom]

May be everybody have to learn how to be more responsible with their decisions since many people in this country expend more than they can afford, buying houses that are not at their levels of their salaries, charging their credit cards up to a maximum amount, leasing expensive cars, etc, etc, etc, then the government has to take care of them and charge everybody with more taxes to pay that expenses, and this will not solve the problem, they are only put his country in a huge debt for all the next generations.

[debbedd]

WE NEED A STIMULUS PACKAGE THAT GIVES THE DISABLED STIMULUS CHECKS

[baby54boomer]

What so many of those Repugnicant "nope" peddlers are not mentioning is that projects SUCH AS replacing sod on monument properties that they try to brand as "pork" do provide stimulus. The sod has to be PURCHASED from a SOD FARM. These small to mid-size businesses are very "housing" dependant and many are probably starting to fail. That means more jobs lost. Why can''t conservatives see beyond the end of their most recent tax cut? Because they simply cannot let go of their short-sighted failed idealogy of trick-down economics.

[BloodBought357]

It seems strange to me that so many of the comments talk about what the plan is not doing rather than asking themselves what does it do for the country. Most of the opposition to the plan is from those that can''t see any thing for themselves. "Ask not what your country can do for you but what can you do for your country. Low and middle income individuals are the largest spenders and will invest in the economy naturally.

[rotflmmfao]

Federal spending to stimulate the economy is a well established economic principle.

Republican don''t want to support anything that might help our current crisis. Like their patron saint Rush Limbaugh, they want President Obama and the nation to fail. When things do turn around, President Obama and the Democratic Party will deservedly receive all the credit.

[cowskins6]

Excelsior9 - the money towards ATV trails are still in there, this is a breif overview of the bill.

The bill is looking better but still poses a huge problem. The largest majority of this bill is aimed at providing money for low-income people. With this bill the government will lose $163 billion just from providing the low-income people.

If the government loses that much revenue, how will they pay for a $816 billion bill?

[excelsior9]

So where are all the BS pet projects that we keep hearing about? Like the $12Mill for ATV trails etc.

[gargueii]

What about the unemployed and those losing are homes.

[colonieny]

How about REAL CHANGE:
1. 20 new NUCLEAR ENERGY PLANTS to be built in 5 years.

2. Mandate that ALL Cars MusT be dual ELECTRIC PLUG IN- in 10 years - with cheap electricity from NUC power , we will be really doing something big. That is real change, in my pocket ! and we will have that terrible Saudi Family -off your couches.

[ctla567]

Tax cuts is not America needs now. Years of Republican tax cuts starting from Pres. Reagan has almost bankrupt America. Only Pres. Clinton was able to balance the budget, pay off some of the debt created by Pres. Reagan and Bush Sr., and accumulated a big budget surplus by raising taxes of the wealthy. Then came Pres. Bush Jr''s tax cuts, America again went into borrowing. Our wealth disparity is wider than ever. I''d like to try Pres. Obama''s approach. I''m sure it would be better than Republican''s tax-cut failed policy. The amount of what the Republican called "waste of money" is nothing if compared to the amount of our debt created by Republican''s tax cuts for the rich. Besides money spent even on sodding or art or home insulation still would create jobs ordinary Americans need. That is how government needs to spend money. However work must be done by citizens or legal residents.