Congress approves 4 tax cuts

WASHINGTON, Dec. 8 (UPI) -- The U.S. House of Representatives has passed four tax-cutting bills in two days, eliminating $94.5 billion in revenue from the federal budget.

The total cost in revenues is about twice the total spending cuts approved last month.

The largest tax cut passed Thursday 234-197. The measure extends reductions in tax rates on capital gains and dividends for two years at a cost of $56 billion, the Washington Post reported.

The House has also approved a bill that would, at a cost of $31.2 billion, slow the expansion of the alternative minimum tax. Other measures provide tax breaks for businesses in parts of the Gulf Coast hit by hurricanes Katrina and Rita, and allow members of the military to use combat pay to claim the earned income tax credit.

Robert Bixby, Executive Director of the Concord Coalition, a non-partisan budget watchdog group, was not impressed.

"If they want to cut taxes, fine, but they are going to have to cut spending by at least that much to help the deficit, and clearly they are not willing to do that," he told the newspaper.