“Things have come to a pretty pass…” There’ll be a vote today on… something. The Senate plans to vote on legislation to repeal or repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act today. It remains unclear whether Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has the votes to begin debate. What is clear: Barring the introduction of a completely new bill, the effects of the two options on health insurance coverage won’t differ much. And failure to pass a bill, Politico reports, could even count as a win if the bill loses by just one or two votes. 

“Our romance is growing flat…” Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and a group of US small-business owners want Congress to move past health care and start working on tax relief. They have a survey that they say shows that tax relief is a more urgent need than ACA repeal.

“Goodness knows what the end will be.” House Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows (R-VA) plans to offer an amendment to spending legislation that would cut CBO’s staff by 89 people, or nearly 40 percent. Meadows also thinks CBO should stop doing its own analyses and instead aggregate estimates from think tanks like the Brookings Institution, the Urban Institute, and the Heritage Foundation. It’s not clear whether the Freedom Caucus would find the aggregated estimates any more palatable.

“Oh I don’t know where I’m at.” Given all the gridlock, the International Monetary Fund thinks US growth will be slower than projected just three months ago. The IMF has cut its US growth forecast, noting that the President has not fulfilled promises relating to tax cuts or infrastructure spending. The IMF now projects the US growth rate will be 2.1 percent in 2017 and 2018, down from 2.3 percent and 2.5 percent for the two years projected in April.

“Something must be done.” Each year the IRS Office of Appeals hears requests of more than 100,000 taxpayers attempting to resolve their tax disputes without going to court. To deal with the demand, the Office  will pilot a virtual appeal process. Beginning August 1, it will use a secure, web-based screen-sharing platform to connect with taxpayers face-to-face. All taxpayers will need is a way to access the Internet.

“Go your way, I’ll go mine.” TPC looks at how household income has changed since 1979 for the top 1 percent of taxpayers. Measured in 2013 dollars, average income for that rarified group climbed from $355,000 in 1979 to nearly $1.5 million in 2007 before falling off to just over $1 million in 2013.