BLUE BELL, Pa. — Sen. John McCain proposed $52 billion in tax breaks on Tuesday that aim to encourage savings and provide relief to seniors and the unemployed, ensuring that both presidential candidates will head into their final debate tonight armed with fresh plans to ease middle-class burdens.
Under the Republican’s plan, seniors would pay lower taxes when they tap their retirement accounts, and people who sell falling stocks could write off more of their losses. Those who are out of work would no longer be taxed on the unemployment benefits they collect. And those who make a profit by selling long-held stocks would pay only half the capital gains taxes for the next two years.
“I will help to create jobs for Americans in the most effective way a president can do this — with tax cuts that are directed specifically to create jobs and protect your life savings,” McCain said.
With less than three weeks before Election Day, McCain and rival Sen. Barack Obama have now both pledged to use the federal Treasury to help the middle class cope with the increasingly treacherous financial marketplace.
As they campaigned through battleground states this week, both candidates said their goal was to make sure that struggling homeowners and small businesses get their fair share of the hundreds of billions that the government has authorized to stabilize the nation’s economy.
“Instead of just propping up institutions deemed ‘too big to fail’ in this crisis, we will use more of this public money to help businesses and homeowners that may be too small to survive,” McCain vowed Tuesday.
Obama proposed a $60 billion economic stimulus plan on Monday that also included tax breaks and other benefits for seniors and homeowners.
“If Washington can move quickly to pass a rescue plan for our financial system, there’s no reason we can’t move just as quickly to pass a rescue plan for our middle class that will create jobs, provide relief and help homeowners,” he said in Toledo.
The Democratic nominee gave McCain’s plan a mixed review, endorsing the Republican’s idea to allow seniors to hold on to their retirement accounts until the stock market improves while dismissing his proposal to cut capital gains taxes.
“Nobody really has capital gains right now,” Obama said. “So if the idea is to cut capital gains taxes, when I don’t know anybody, even the smartest investors who right now are going to be experiencing a lot of capital gains, that probably is not going to be particularly useful in solving the financial crisis.”
McCain had proposed that the government use some of the $700 billion Wall Street rescue package to buy up troubled mortgages and refinance them, giving troubled homeowners who another chance at solvency. And he had called for suspending rules that require seniors to begin withdrawing from their retirement accounts.
On Tuesday, he went further, saying that the government should commit new money to reduce the impact of wildly fluctuating stock prices on average people.
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