Boehner on Two-Month Tax Cut Bill: ‘Just Kicking Can Down the Road’

Alex Wong/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) — A day after the Senate voted 89-10 to extend the payroll tax cut by two months, Republicans in the House are signaling their displeasure with the short-term fix, saying action should have been taken to resolve the issue for the whole year.

“I believe that two months is just kicking the can down the road.  The American people are tired of that, frankly I’m tired of it,” House Speaker John Boehner said Sunday on NBC’s Meet the Press.

But it’s not just the speaker who has problems with supporting the temporary extension, which the House is expected to take up on Monday.  Sen. Roy Blunt, who was just elected to the Republican leadership in the Senate, said that even though he voted to pass the two-month extension, the House is right to want a year-long extension.

“I had a couple of calls from some of my buddies in the House in the morning saying we don’t want to do this, we’d like the one-year extension,” Blunt said on CNN’s State of the Union.

Still some, like President Obama’s lead economic adviser Gene Sperling, are optimistic that Congress will close the deal before Christmas.

“I think that it is very unlikely that the House would disrupt this compromise — overwhelming compromise — six days before Christmas,” Sperling said.

Failing to pass the tax cut would likely cost the average American family more than $1,000 over the course of the year.  Some economists say the tax cut will encourage spending and provide a vital boost to the economy, although other economists and several lawmakers dispute this.

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