Tax Agreements Move Forward

The Senate is moving forward with legislation to enact the tax agreement reached this week between the White House and congressional leaders.

Senate majority Leader Harry Reid (Nev.) filed a cloture motion on Thursday on a motion to concur on the Reid-McConnell tax amendment #4753. Voting will start when the cloture motion ripens at 3 p.m. Monday, Dec. 13. Sixty votes are needed to invoke cloture. Amendments are expected to try to modify the estate tax provisions of the bill.

A preliminary analysis of the bill shows that it contains estate tax provisions for two years, 2011 and 2012. The provisions include an estate tax exemption of $5 million per person and a top rate of 35 percent, indexes to the estate tax exemption for inflation and a spousal transfer of any unused estate tax exemption amount. This is the proposal put forward by Sens. Lincoln (Ark.) and Kyl (Ariz.).

A cloture is a motion aimed at bringing debate to a quick end.