OVERNIGHT MONEY: It's debate time

WEDNESDAY'S BIG STORY: 

October face-off: While professional hockey is stuck in limbo, the presidential debate season gets into full swing on Wednesday. 

After months of sparring from afar, President Obama and Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney will take the same stage on Wednesday night to hash out their domestic policies on taxes, the nation's finances, jobs, immigration and whatever else might pop up during the Denver meeting. 

Both men have spent weeks on debate prep — and we'll see how that translates tomorrow night.

Expect three questions on the economy, one on healthcare, one on governing and another on the role of government.

Republicans have raised expectations for Romney's performance, arguing that it could sway voters into the GOP camp and cut into Obama's recent momentum. 

Obama himself has downplayed his own debate skills.

The debate will follow the first of three job reports set for release this week, including September's monthly report that the Labor Department will drop on Friday. 

On Wednesday, Automatic Data Processing (ADP) will release its estimates of private-sector job growth last month, a report that has a tendency to vary wildly from the government report that provides a broader look at public and private job growth. 

The Obama campaign signaled on Wednesday that the president would probably press Romney for specifics on his tax plan. The Republican presidential candidate has said he'd cut taxes by 20 percent across the board, but keep the plan revenue-neutral by eliminating some deductions that benefit the wealthiest Americans. 

Democrats argue that they have studies to show Romney's plan would likely need to eliminate popular deductions used by the middle class to afford the plan, effectively raising taxes.

In a Sunday interview, Romney's running mate, Paul Ryan, said it would take too long to explain the math — the deductions — of how the tax plan would work. He also rebuked claims that it would cost $5 trillion over 10 years, as the Obama campaign alleges. 

"It doesn’t matter how much time he has, the math doesn’t add up, as we know," said Obama campaign spokeswoman Jen Psaki. 

Ahead of the debate, Romney floated new ideas on taxes and immigration on Tuesday. 

He suggested limiting deductions to pay for his 20 percent income tax cut and agreed to stick with the Obama administration's temporary policy of allowing young illegal immigrants to stay in the country.

And, he suggested a $17,000 cap on tax deductions that could follow through on his pledge to make the plan deficit-neutral. 

Obama has argued that Romney's plan would hurt the middle class and only help higher-income taxpayers. 

"As an option you could say everybody's going to get up to a $17,000 deduction; and you could use your charitable deduction, your home mortgage deduction, or others — your health care deduction, and you can fill that bucket, if you will, that $17,000 bucket that way," Romney said in an interview published Tuesday in the Denver Post.

"And higher income people might have a lower number."

Ryan broadly discussed the plan during a Fox News interview on Sunday, saying it would aim to eliminate deductions for the wealthiest taxpayers while leaving some deductions in place for middle-class taxpayers. 

Ryan, chairman of the House Budget Committee, has said the plan would allow middle-class earners to keep more money in their paychecks and would not provide a tax cut for higher-bracket earners. 

Over the weekend, Republicans insisted that, at best, wealthier taxpayers would pay the same rate they do now, pushing back against Obama's argument that the tax plan would hit the middle class. 

On the immigration front, Romney said "people who have received the special visa the president has put in place, which is a two-year visa, should expect that the visa would continue to be valid. "I'm not going to take something that they've purchased," he said.

In June, Obama said he would not deport children brought to the United States by parents who didn't have legal U.S. status. 

Let the debates begin. 

A look behind the curtain: On Wednesday, the Federal Reserve will release the minutes from its latest policy-setting meeting, which will include details of their talks about the latest round of quantitative easing. On Monday, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke defended the move and pushed back against Republican claims that the plan required the government to print more money. 

All but one voting Fed official agreed to take to the new stimulus, which has the central bank buying up $40 billion of mortgage bonds until it sees substantial improvement in the labor market.

ECONOMIC INDICATORS 

MBA Mortgage Index: The Mortgage Bankers Association releases its weekly report on mortgage application volume. 

ISM Services: The Institute for Supply Management will release its September report for the non-manufacturing sector, which accounts for about 90 percent of the economy, and covers industries ranging from utilities and retailing to healthcare and finance. 

WHAT YOU MIGHT HAVE MISSED

— GOP senators pressure Geithner on Libor 'complacency'

— Holiday sales estimated at highest level post-recession

— Obama administration approves visa-free travel for Taiwan

— Mortgage finance system overhaul way down the road

— Government close to naming AIG 'systemically significant'

— Regulator bashes court decision slowing Dodd-Frank rules

Catch us on Twitter: @VickoftheHill, @peteschroeder, @elwasson and @berniebecker3

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