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Local Lawmakers Split Over Steady Tax Rates Deal

NEW YORK (CBS 2) -- When ball drops in two weeks, Americans will not get hit with tax increases, no matter what their economic status is, Kathryn Brown reports.

In a rare midnight session, the House of Representatives approved a sweeping tax cut package. The deal extends the tax rates that were in force for years and were set to expire on December 31 for everyone for two more years, even high-income earners, extends unemployment benefits for an additional 13 months, and cuts estate taxes to 35-percent with a flat-out $5 million exemption.

It comes a little more than a week after President Obama struck a deal with Republicans, but liberal Democrats have been strongly opposed to the deal.

Overnight, New York Congressman Anthony Weiner, who voted no, said "we have shown a lack of courage and foresight that may lead from one politically expedient compromise to the next, and eventually the permanent extension of these unfair and ruinous tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans."

Supporters, including Long Island Congressman Peter King, said "this is the class warfare that liberal democrats can't resist. The upper income people we're talking about are the ones that create the jobs, produce the jobs who make the economy go up and we have a large number of those people living in New York."

"We have the highest number of upper income, there'll be more money to spend, small businesses will expand, this is a win-win for New York," King said.

The Senate already approved the tax deal and it now goes to the president's desk for signature.

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