For your wallet
Among provisions that aim to put money in Americans' pockets:
For the unemployed and poor: $40 billion to provide extended unemployment benefits through Dec. 31, and increase them by $25 a week; $20 billion to increase food stamp benefits by 14 percent.
Direct cash payments: $14.2 billion to give one-time $250 payments to Social Security recipients, poor people on Supplemental Security Income, and veterans receiving disability and pensions.
Tax breaks: About $116 billion for a $400 per-worker, $800 per-couple tax credits in 2009 and 2010. For the last half of 2009, workers could expect to see about $13 a week less withheld from their paychecks starting around June. Reduced payments to individuals making more than $75,000, couples $150,000.
Expanded college credit: About $14 billion to provide a $2,500 expanded tax credit for college tuition and related expenses for 2009 and 2010. Phased out for couples making more than $160,000.
Child tax credit: About $15 billion to provide the $1,000 child tax credit to more families that don't make enough money to pay income taxes.
Homebuyer credit: $6.6 billion to repeal a requirement that a $8,000 first-time home buyer tax credit be paid back over time for homes purchased from Jan. 1 to Nov. 30, unless the home is sold within three years. ASSOCIATED PRESS
about the writer
His political views differed from a transgender classmate’s, but they forged a bond that lasted a decade — until Vance seemed to pivot, politically and personally.
