TAX RELIEF IN WAGE BILL HELPS MOST AMERICANS

"With eyes cast to the 2000 elections," an Associated Press dispatch began this past week, "the Senate voted Tuesday to give minimum-wage workers a dollar raise over three years but tied the increase to $18.4 billion in business tax sweeteners opposed by the Clinton White House. President Clinton immediately denounced the move as a cynical tool to advance special-interest tax breaks' and renewed his promise to veto it. He urged Congress instead to pass a $1-an-hour increase over two years without the large tax cuts."So President Clinton vows to veto a $1-an-hour minimum-wage increase because it isn't exactly what he wanted and because it contained some modest tax relief for the American people. Let him.

The minimum wage is, of course, a difficult political issue to oppose, even for principled members of Congress. Congressional Republicans decided the best they could do was to phase in an increase over several years while inserting significant tax relief in the same bill.

So, what are the provisions the president is calling cynical special-interest tax breaks? The five-year GOP tax package includes a health-insurance deduction for people who don't have employer-provided coverage. It would allow a 100 percent deduction for health-insurance premiums for the self-employed. It would also increase business-meal deductions to 80 percent from 50 percent and allow higher 401(k) contribution limits.

It is quite literally an outrage, and an enduring testament to the emptiness of Clintonian rhetoric, for the president to call these sound measures special-interest tax breaks. The problem, as The Wall Street Journal noted editorially this week, "is that the Clinton administration has always treated the minimum wage as a component of class warfare."Increasing limits on 401(k) contributions makes all kinds of sense as we encourage Americans to save and provide for their own retirement. Restoring 80 percent deductibility on business meals consumed in restaurants will help that industry and all the wait staff, dishwashers and others employed in it.

Good for congressional Republicans. They should see the president's veto threat and then vote to override it. If they fail, they should pass this kind of package as many times as possible between now and next November and, issues in hand, take their excellent case to the voters.