HARRISBURG — The state Senate cast a symbolic vote Monday for a spending plan that would raise no taxes as Pennsylvania's three-week-old budget stalemate showed no sign of easing and partisan tensions intensified over state employees losing pay.

No high-level talks between Gov. Ed Rendell and legislative leaders were scheduled, aides said Monday, and Republicans and Democrats accused each other of refusing to budge from hard-line positions in hopes the other side will buckle first.

State employees whose paychecks are disappearing and the jobless who have exhausted the state's 72-week benefit got sucked into the debate as the sides worked to put each other on the defensive. At times, senators traded angry retorts during five hours of debate.

The massive task of filling a multibillion-dollar budget deficit has divided Republicans and Democrats, leaving Pennsylvania as just one of three states with a late budget for the 2009-10 fiscal year. The state is now deeper into the fiscal year without an enacted budget than in any other year since 1991 — although it took until December in 2003 to finalize a public school subsidy.

Republicans, who control the Senate, unveiled the plan Monday morning and sped it through the chamber as fast as constitutionally allowed, answering a Democratic plan that passed the House on Friday.

Unsurprisingly, the bill passed, 31-19, Monday night, and returns to the House, where it is certain to be rejected by the Democratic majority that, like Rendell, has sought tax increases to support higher spending.

The GOP called its $27.1 billion bill a responsible, balanced plan that would leave taxes untouched and wipe out the deficit by drawing on reserves and slicing spending by about 3.6 percent from the just-ended fiscal year.

It does not appear to make any concessions to Democrats and, if anything, widens the gap to $2 billion between the sides by cutting spending by more than $100 million from an earlier Senate plan that passed in May.

"It's not the time to raise taxes. People don't support it," Sen. Mike Waugh, R-York, said in floor remarks.

Only Sen. Lisa Boscola, D-Northampton, crossed party lines.