A bill recently passed by the House that addressed the state Social Security and public employee taxes went through a few changes in the Senate today.

The House passed a version of the tax cut in February that contained more exemptions and carried a price tag of $285 million. Senate leaders said the state could not afford a cut so large, and Crowell on Tuesday first rolled out a proposal to phase in a tax cut that would have cost the state $176.8 million a year by 2012.

Under current law, individuals who earn $25,000 or less or couples who earn $32,000 or less do not pay taxes on Social Security benefits. As part of a compromise with several Democrats, Crowell on Wednesday agreed to raising the exemption to $85,000 or less for individuals and $100,000 or less for married couples.

That eliminated tax cuts for about 30,000 upper income bracket earners and put to rest the idea that the tax cuts were just to help the rich, Crowell said.

“Under this proposal, a gazillionaire is not going to get a tax cut,” he said.

Too bad for those “gazillionaires.” The changes in the bill were adopted by a 29-3 vote. Freshman Kansas City Democrat, Jolie Justus, was one of the three Democrats who opposed the measure and the bill as a whole.

“I fundamentally believe tax cuts are service reductions,” Justus said. “When we cut taxes, we reduce the services that we provide to the most vulnerable residents in our state.”

Don’t worry Sen. Justus, i’m sure your big law firm salary can do a lot to help many of those “vulnerable residents” of yours.

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