Edition: U.S. / Global

Federal Budget Tricks

Published: February 24, 1999

To the Editor:

In ''Doubts About Tax Cuts'' (editorial, Feb. 17), you describe President Clinton's domestic program as ''the essence of conservatism,'' and you ask, ''How else to describe spending three-quarters of the 15-year surplus of $4 trillion to pay down the national debt and conserve Social Security and Medicare?''

In fact, the President's proposal does not pay down the debt. While it does start to pay down that part of the debt that is sold to the public, it actually increases the overall debt, by trading public debt for debt held by Government accounts, that owed to all of the trust funds, including Social Security.

In trading that debt, the President is using the regressive FICA tax to ''pay down the debt.'' Is it fair to make lower income workers bear this burden?



Ocean Pines, Md., Feb. 17, 1999