The Center for Effective Government (formerly OMB Watch) ceased operations as of March 2016. The majority of work and materials has been passed on to the Project On Government Oversight (POGO). This site is being maintained as an archive of materials produced.
The private tax collection program run by the IRS is in the news again. BNA reported yesterday that Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel (D-NY) and Oversight Subcommittee Chairman John Lewis (D-GA) (along with 12 other Ways and Means members) sent a letter to President-elect Obama urging him to end the private tax collection program. The House members quickly lay out the strong rationale for ending the program:
Disturbing story in The Washington Post this morning indicating that the executive compensation provisions in the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) may not apply to any the firms that have received money under the plan.
The Congressional Oversight Panel (appropriately acronym'd "COP") of TARP asked the really big question that the architects of the program has yet to answer: What's the point of TARP?
The Congressional Oversight Panel, a committee created by the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) legislation released its first report today. And because appointments to the panel were made only weeks ago, they had little time to conduct an investigation.
The budget situation in the states just keeps getting worse. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities released another update to their analysis of widespread state budget shortfalls. The total is up to 43 states and the District of Columbia (up from 29 states and DC since CBPP last released an update of this report). It looks like things are continuing to get worse despite efforts by state governments to balance the books:
Neil M. Barofsky will become a special inspector general within the Treasury Department to audit and investigate spending by the Troubled Asset Relief Program.
On Friday, the Bureau of Labor Statistic reported the largest job loss numbers since 1974 as the economy lost 533,000 jobs and the unemployment rate pushed higher to 6.7 percent. This news, combined with last week's pronouncement that the U.S.
A few weeks ago, we mentioned the Treasury Department's decision to change a bit of the tax code that would give banks some $140 billion in tax breaks without authorization from Congress. By many accounts, the action was simply illegal.
