During Senate debate on legislation to cut taxes, Senator John Breaux (D-LA) proposed an amendment which would have eliminated from the bill tax increases on overseas workers earning between $50,000 and $75,000. To offset the forgone revenue from the tax increase on those workers, the Breaux measure would have reduced the bill's total dividend tax exemption to a sixty-five percent exemption from 2004 to 2006. Progressives voted in favor of Breaux's amendment because they believed that providing tax breaks for middle income earners should take priority over tax breaks for wealthy individuals (the dividend tax exemption disproportionately benefits high-income taxpayers). The Breaux amendment was narrowly defeated on a vote of 49-51.