WASHINGTON (AP) — Senior citizens receiving Social Security would get a bonus payment of $300 under the Senate version of President Barack Obama’s economic recovery plan.

The $820 billion Senate measure includes tax cuts and spending proposals prepared by the Senate’s two most powerful committees on Friday.

Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., unveiled a $455 billion plan combining $275 billion in tax cuts with $180 billion in spending in anticipation of a panel vote on Tuesday. That measure will be paired on the Senate floor with $365 billion in additional spending sought by the Appropriations Committee.

The Senate plan is likely to grow during committee debates Tuesday and subsequent floor action. The Social Security bonus is a one-time payment. Other provisions in the stimulus measure generally extend for two years.

A House companion measure slated for a vote Wednesday carries an $825 billion price tag, with one-third reserved for tax cuts.

The economic recovery plans combine tax cuts for individuals and businesses, help for cash-strapped state governments, help for the poor and unemployed and direct spending by the federal government. The goal is to infuse money directly into the economy in hopes of bringing the nation out of recession earlier and to keep unemployment from hitting 10 percent or more.

There’s nothing in either measure that would address the foreclosure crisis or provide direct help to homeowners.

The bonus for seniors is but one chapter in the Senate proposal. There’s also a temporary two-year $500 tax cut for most workers and $1,000 for couples, a $2,500 tax credit to help pay for college, tax cuts for businesses and to promote renewable energy, and $87 billion worth of help to states struggling with their 2009-2010 budgets for the Medicaid health care program for the poor and disabled.

A summary of spending items under the jurisdiction of the appropriations panel released Friday evening calls for approximately $140 billion in infrastructure and science spending, including $27 billion to states for highway construction and repair. That’s likely to disappoint backers of road projects.

But there’s also lots of money to build and repair schools and federal buildings such as VA hospitals, bring broadband Internet service to underserved areas, and relieve a backlog of water and sewer projects. The appropriations panel’s plan would touch numerous accounts, from day care centers at military bases to health research financed by the National Institutes of Health.

For the poor, food stamp benefits would go up, while states would get $77 billion in aid for education and $25 billion as a block grant with no strings attached.

Some programs, such as almost $1 billion to combat bird flu, are likely to attract ridicule from Republicans and budget hawks for doing little if anything to create jobs.

The Finance panel plan also would subsidize for two years almost two-thirds of health insurance premiums for the unemployed retaining health care under the so-called COBRA program. It would extend unemployment benefits for the long-term jobless through the end of 2009, increase the weekly benefit by $25 and provide unemployment benefits to more part-time workers. Up to $2,400 in unemployment benefits would be tax free.

Both House and Senate would provide a $7,500 tax credit for middle-income, first-time home buyers who purchase homes in the first half of 2009.

For low-income workers, the measure would make the child tax credit more generous by making more people eligible for refunds if they earn too little to pay income tax. The earned income tax credit for the working poor would be made more generous for larger families.

President Obama wants the bill on his desk by the middle of February. First it must pass the full House and Senate in the next few weeks. Then, the competing versions would have to be reconciled.

To accommodate the $275 billion infusion of tax cuts and even more in new federal spending, the measure would increase the legal limit on borrowing by the federal government by $825 billion, to $12.1 trillion. That means the so-called debt limit will have increased by $1.5 trillion since October.

Unlike the House plan, which moved through several committees this week, the Senate measure is likely to pick up at least some Republican support.

Republicans are particularly pleased with provisions extending tax cuts for the purchase of new plants and equipment and allowing money-losing businesses to claim refunds on taxes paid up to five years ago.

Workers making $75,000 or less would be eligible for the full $500 tax cut, intended to offset the pain of Social Security payroll taxes, with couples earning up to $150,000 and filing joint returns eligible for a $1,000 credit. The benefits would be gradually phased out so that people making between $75,000-$87,500 and couples earning $150,000-$175,000 would get smaller tax cuts.

Unlike the $600 per worker lump-sum rebates issued last year, taxpayers would have less withheld from their paychecks. The idea is that people would spend more on goods and services immediately, rather than saving the tax cut or using it to reduce credit card debt.

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