WASHINGTON — In a rare move toward bipartisanship, Senate Democrats worked with Republicans as they prepared Tuesday to unveil an $85 billion jobs bill that would include payroll tax breaks for employers who create new jobs, aid to small businesses and other GOP-backed ideas to attack unemployment.
In the same spirit, President Barack Obama said Tuesday that he’s willing to start from scratch on health care as long as the final bill meets his goals.
Answering reporters’ questions Tuesday after a meeting with congressional leaders of both parties, Obama said both sides have to give ground on health care.
Obama said he’s willing to work on medical malpractice limits, favored by Republicans. But Republicans have to come around on the need for comprehensive legislation to reduce costs, expand coverage and rein in insurance company practices, he said.
After more than a year of relentlessly partisan conflict in which Republicans complained of being excluded from drafting the health care bill and Democrats denounced them as the “Party of No,” senior members of both parties were working Tuesday to blend their ideas on an issue voters seem to care far more about — jobs and job security.
Democrats embraced some GOP-backed ideas, including new help for small businesses, which in the past have led the way back toward recovering lost jobs.
According to a draft outline of the bill circulated by Senate Democrats, the cornerstone of the bill would be a proposal to give businesses that hire unemployed workers this year an exemption from the 6.2 percent Social Security payroll tax. If they keep those new employees more than a year, employers would get an additional $1,000 tax credit.
Other provisions of the bill are, for the most part, expansions or extensions of existing policies.
The tax break for new equipment purchases by small businesses would be increased. The bill expands the Build America Bonds program, which subsidizes interest costs for state and local bonds issue to finance infrastructure projects. It extends until May 31 unemployment payments and health care subsidies for the jobless, which otherwise would expire for many people at the end of February.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., did not endorse the emerging bill, but neither did he shoot it down.
“The sooner we could get the parameters of the final package the better,” McConnell said.
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