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A full-blown congressional debate on the expiring 2001 and 2003 tax cuts will unfold this fall, but some lawmakers have already weighed in on the most controversial issue: whether it makes sense, at a time of huge budget deficits, to extend tax relief for those earning more than $250,000.

When it comes to taxes in the U.S., it's the income tax -- and the annual April 15 deadline for filing returns -- that gets most of our attention. But that's only part of the picture -- there are property taxes and sales taxes, even taxes built into every cell phone bill. So how much do we pay? One couple in Connecticut opens their books to find out.

The U.S. unemployment rate surged far higher and has remained higher than in other major industrial countries. It's now at 9.6 percent. The big shift came when American companies cut workers more aggressively than foreign firms in the face of the financial crisis.

In the early 1960s, writer Norton Juster and illustrator Jules Feiffer created The Phantom Tollbooth, which quickly became a kid-lit classic. Now, 50 years later, the two have finally collaborated once more — this time, on a picture book called The Odious Ogre. They speak to NPR's Liane Hansen about their partnership and their new project.

In their seven-year love affair with Interstate 95, Stan Posner and Sandra Phillips-Posner have found the best Polish sausage, Berger cookies and a battleship you can spend the night on.

Coming from a singer-songwriter who wrote a triple-platinum hit in response to her label's request for a "marketable love song," Bareilles' latest single, "King of Everything," seems indicative of a trend. In an interview, Bareilles says she likes writing happy tunes that tell people to kiss off.

What do Wikipedia and Craigslist have in common with the Tea Party movement? They succeed by being decentralized, says Rod Beckstrom, co-author of the management book The Starfish and the Spider.

Past the very northern end of Interstate 95, traffic dwindles to just a few thousand cars a day. Past that, there's no sign of the highway residents were promised more than 60 years ago.

Caravan Palace formed when the band was recruited to compose the soundtrack for a silent porn movie. But last year the group sold over 150,000 copies of its first CD and reached No. 11 on the French album chart. At the heart of the band's popularity is a confluence of gypsy jazz, American swing from the 1930s and a high-energy electronic beat.

Dusty Hill and Billy Gibbons, two thirds of the blues rock trio ZZ Top, play a quiz about a famous miser, Hetty Green. Known as the "Witch of Wall Street," Green was incredibly wealthy by the time she died in 1916 -- but she was famous for never parting with a nickel if she could help it.