ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, January 8, 1996 TAG: 9601100114
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-4 EDITION: METRO
SOME LOW-income Virginians may be colder these days. The feds have slashed fuel assistance.
"If it gets much lower, then it's almost not worthwhile to do it," says Charlene Chapman of the Virginia Department of Social Services. Some GOP leaders in Congress would agree; they've been trying to eliminate the program altogether.
The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimates that 42 percent of proposed cuts in civilian discretionary spending come from programs benefiting low-income Americans. The poor and lower middle class are being asked to absorb hits not just in heating-oil aid but in job training, funding for schools with disadvantaged students, food stamps, subsidized shelter, the Earned-Income Tax Credit, not to mention welfare. And House leaders are pushing to eliminate the minimum wage.
Meanwhile, according to the Congressional Budget Office, Washington provides some $100 billion a year in tax breaks and special subsidies to corporations, from which the free-marketeers in Congress have cut an estimated 1 percent. Moneyed special interests continue to lobby for and win special breaks. The Pentagon has gotten money for weapons-systems it says it doesn't want.
This budget debate isn't just about money. It's about priorities.
LENGTH: Short : 33 linesby CNB