Senate votes limits on IRA expansion.

WASHINGTON - The Senate voted to limit the scope of a plan by Sen. Lloyd Bentsen, D-Tex., to expand the preferential tax status of individual retirement accounts.

Individuals making $80,000 annually and joint filers making $120,000 a year would be ineligible to take advantage of the IRA proposal in a pending $32.5 billion tax package, the Senate decided.

That narrowing made the IRA provision $1.5 billion less costly to the Treasury, said Sen. Howard Metzenbaum, D-Ohio. The Senate reinstated a $2,500 credit for first-time homebuyers that was dropped from the legislation.

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