CONGRESSMEN ADMIT BREACH OF TAX LAW

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, February 14, 1993                   TAG: 9302140214
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C5   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium
CONGRESSMEN ADMIT BREACH OF TAX LAW
Virginia Reps. L.F. Payne and Herbert Bateman say they violated the law by failing to pay Social Security taxes for domestic workers.
Fifth District Rep. Payne and his wife, Susan, "had not paid Social Security for people assisting for child care in their home. He is taking the necessary steps to correct this," spokesman Ellis Woodward said Friday.
Bateman, R-Newport News, said in a telephone interview he was embarrassed by his situation, involving failure to pay Social Security taxes for a cleaning woman.
"We now know it is the law. I will do whatever I will have to do" to comply, Bateman said, including paying back taxes and any late fees.
Both congressmen said they were not aware until recently of the federal law that requires paying Social Security taxes for a household worker earning more than $50 per quarter.
Woodward said he did not have all the details involving the family's child-care situation. Susan Payne works in advertising in Charlottesville, and the couple has two children at home.
Bateman hired the cleaning woman on an irregular basis perhaps three or four years after he came to Washington in January 1983, he said. Some years later, the woman began working one or two Mondays each month.
This year, Payne was named to the House Ways and Means Committee, which handles tax issues.
If there is a move to raise the $50-per-quarter standard for paying a household worker's Social Security, it would come before the committee. Many feel the standard is too stringent and outdated.
Roughly a dozen members of Congress have acknowledged violations of laws governing paying of Social Security taxes for domestic help, according to the Thursday editions of Roll Call, a twice-weekly newspaper about Congress.
In a survey Friday by the Richmond Times-Dispatch, no one else in Virginia's 13-member congressional delegation said they violated the law. Aides to two Virginia lawmakers said they did not know the answers to a reporter's questions and would ask their bosses.
The nation got an education about Social Security taxes for household workers recently after Zoe Baird, President Clinton's first nominee for attorney general, withdrew her name. She had failed to pay Social Security taxes for an undocumented immigrant couple she employed.

by Archana Subramaniam by CNB