I guess I'm just not smart enough to figure out how a $430B program can cost no more than a $350B dollar program, aside from just fudging the numbers.

Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, May 8, 2003; Page A02

Senate Finance Committee Republicans agreed yesterday to support limited tax relief for stock dividends as part of a revised $430 billion tax cut package that the panel will take up today.

Under the 10-year plan roughed out during 90 minutes of closed-door negotiations involving the 11 badly divided GOP senators, all taxpayers could exclude $500 in dividends from taxes. In the first four or five years, 10 percent of dividends above that amount would also qualify for the exemption, and the exclusion would rise to 20 percent in later years. The cost of the relief would be $81 billion over the next decade -- much less than the amount sought by President Bush in his original $726 billion tax cut package, and less than that in a major House tax measure that goes to the floor there Friday.

… Many of the details were, however, still being worked out, including the question of what trade-offs will have to be made to keep the $430 billion measure from costing more than the $350 billion that a recently passed Senate resolution allowed. To bring the price tag down to that number, Republicans were seeking at least $80 billion in offsetting tax increases or spending cuts -- a process that left tax lobbyists nervous yesterday.

"There are about $20 billion that they can find pretty easily," said one lobbyist, but beyond that Congress would be going after corporate tax shelters and other tax provisions that have strong backing among GOP supporters in the business community.