Call Your Senators NOW to Kill Estate Tax Giveaway to the Rich

by Mike Hall, Aug 3, 2006

We now have word the Senate will vote tonight on the millionaires’ estate tax cut package that poisons a minimum wage increase and would cut pay for tipped workers in seven states.

The poison-pill laden legislation just can’t stand the light of day. Republican House leaders, who crafted the package, muscled it through that chamber at 1:30 a.m. July 29.

In legislative jargon, the vote tonight will be a cloture vote on the motion to proceed—in other words, shutting off Democratic debate on the bill and moving it to a final vote. It takes 60 votes to win cloture.

Call your U.S. senators at 202-224-3121 (that’s the Capitol switchboard number and they will connect you to your senators’ offices). Tell them to oppose cloture on the motion to proceed. Tell them that you want the Senate to vote on a minimum wage increase of $2.10 an hour without any poison pills such as the estate tax and pay cuts for tipped workers.

The bill combines a minimum wage increase with a $753 billion cut in estate taxes. It completely eliminates the tax on estates of up to $10 million and slashes the tax rates for even larger multimillion-dollar families. Some of the nation’s richest families, including Wal-Mart’s Walton gang, are behind the estate tax campaign.

In addition to the estate tax poison pill, Republicans threw in a “tip credit” provision that could mean as many as 1.1 million workers who earn tips—such as waiters, waitresses and bartenders—in seven states will see their pay cut by as much as $5.50 an hour—a move pushed for hard by the National Restaurant Association, which has fought against every attempt to raise the minimum wage.

On their website, the group brags about its aggressive efforts:

The National Restaurant Association worked aggressively against the wage hike, and fought hard to include numerous provisions in the final package [including]…a tip credit for the seven states that are currently prohibited from utilizing a tip credit.

In a letter to the Senate, AFL-CIO Legislative Director Bill Samuel wrote:

These poison pills are not only unacceptable, but also unnecessary. It would be simple to enact a $2.10 increase in the federal minimum wage without poison pills. A majority in both houses of Congress already supports a $2.10 increase without poison pills. The only thing standing between minimum wage workers and a $2.10 pay raise is the unwillingness of the Republican leadership of Congress to allow consideration of a clean $2.10 increase. Minimum wage workers should not have to wait for millionaires to get yet another million-dollar tax cut before they receive a long-overdue pay increase.

Print This Article | E-Mail This Article |Comments (1)