Earmarks

Feb 8, 2016

Top 400 Taxpayers See Tax Rates Rise, But There’s More to the Story

As Americans were gathering party supplies to greet the New Year, the Internal Revenue Service released their annual report of cumulative tax data reported on the 400 tax r...

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Feb 4, 2016

Chlorine Bleach Plants Needlessly Endanger 63 Million Americans

Chlorine bleach plants across the U.S. put millions of Americans in danger of a chlorine gas release, a substance so toxic it has been used as a chemical weapon. Greenpeace’s new repo...

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Jan 25, 2016

U.S. Industrial Facilities Reported Fewer Toxic Releases in 2014

The Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) data for 2014 is now available. The good news: total toxic releases by reporting facilities decreased by nearly six percent from 2013 levels. Howe...

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Jan 22, 2016

Methane Causes Climate Change. Here's How the President Plans to Cut Emissions by 40-45 Percent.

UPDATE (Jan. 22, 2016): Today, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released its proposed rule to reduce methane emissions...

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more news

Mentioning the Unmentionable

Feb 11, 2008 by Craig Jennings

Writing in The Wall Street Journal, Jesse Drucker notes($) that the full cost of the recently-passed economic stimulus package is slightly underestimated by the Joint Committee on Taxation's score: A round of business tax cuts in Congress's economic-stimulus package passed Thursday will cost nearly triple the official government estimate, tax experts said.

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DAILY FISCAL POLICY REVIEW -- 02-11-08

Feb 11, 2008 by Dana Chasin

Budget --

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FY09 Budget Process -- There You Go Again

Feb 8, 2008 by Dana Chasin

President Bush will try one last time to distract from his fiscal legacy of the enormous and enduring additional $3.5 trillion in national debt incurred on his watch by provoking another veto-spitball fight with Congress over something like $10-20 billion in discretionary spending in FY09. This morning, Bush said: Last week, I proposed a budget that terminates or substantially reduces 151 wasteful or bloated programs. Those programs total more than $18 billion. And if Congress sends me appropriations bills that exceed the reasonable limits I have set, I will veto the bills.

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DAILY FISCAL POLICY REVIEW

Feb 8, 2008 by Dana Chasin

SUDDENLY, STIMULUS: Congress must have surprised even itself yesterday, moving with alacrity to complete work on and adopt the biggest stimulus package ever and send it to the president. Of course, the package wasn't paid for so there wasn't much heavy lifting. The legislative process took less than a month...

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Budget Reform Proposals-in-Wonderland

Feb 7, 2008 by Dana Chasin

Once again this year, the president's budget includes a set of budget reform proposals, not substantially changed from the proposals put forth in the same space in years past (evaluated here). Among the highlights:

Joint Budget Resolution: The President's budget advocates a joint budget resolution requiring the President's signature. Of course, this would give the Budget Resolution the force of law, meaning that Congress would effectively set the level of appropriations bills.
Line-Item Veto: George Will has the last word...

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DAILY FISCAL POLICY REVIEW

Feb 7, 2008 by Dana Chasin

The FY09 budget proposal submitted Monday by President Bush is the talk of the town (leaving the the Super Bowl and Super Tuesday results and aftermath aside). Not so much because it is likely to be enacted, but because it provides talking points opportunities for everyone. Below are figures from the Senate Budget Committee that express the president's broad priorites in stark terms. The defense figure is the highest in real terms since World War II; the domestic cuts belie the administration's concerns about a recession...

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More Reactions/Analysis of President's Budget

Feb 7, 2008 by Adam Hughes*

More reactions and analysis of the president's budget have emerged since our first round-up post on Tuesday:

CBPP: President's Budget and Medicare "Trigger"
NWLC: Budget Woes: President's FY 2009 Budget
Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget: The President's FY 2009 Budget
The Workforce Alliance: FY 2009 Federal Funding Analyses

There have also been a number of statements and analyses circulated from Capitol Hill:

Senate Budget Committee Dems: Brief Analysis of Bush FY 2009 Budget
Sen. Conrad (D-ND): Statement on FY 2009 Budget Release
Majority Leader Hoyer (D-MD): Bush's Legacy: Fiscal Meltdown, Weak Economy
House Budget Committee: State-by-State Analysis of President's FY 2009 Budget Request
Speaker Pelosi (D-CA): Statement on President Bush's FY 2009 Budget
Majority Leader Hoyer: Statement on Bush's Release of Another Fiscally Irresponsible Budget
Sen. Gregg (R-NH): Statement on FY 2009 Budget Release
Senate Budget Committee Repubs: Overview of President's Budget

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Bush Breaks His Record For Tiniest Budget Yet

Feb 6, 2008 by Craig Jennings

Since the president's FY 2009 budget request was mostly a rehash of old policies and proposals we've already spent time debunking in previous years, we've been looking for some new angles with which to view the president's budget. As I was sitting at my desk looking at the budget books in my office, the actual length of the main budget volume released this year jumped out at me. Or I should say, it didn't jump out at me. Turns out the main budget book for the FY 2009 budget is the shortest one ever released by the president. At 170 pages, it is more than 45 percent shorter than the average length of the budget book released each year by President Bush (which came in at 311 pages. Not sure what one can make of this change, particularly since the FY 2008 budget is also much shorter than the Bush average. This particular part of the president's budget proposal has evolved during the Bush administration to be a fancy, glossy, picture-filed advertisement for the administration's achievements and priorities, with little hard budgetary information. It is developed, I suppose, to help the administration put the best spin on their budget proposal and successes. I wonder if the Bush administration is tired of actively selling their misguided priorities, particularly in this final year and that is the reason for the shorter volume? Or perhaps they have realized they really don't have many budget achievements that they should be bragging about?

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Bush Budget Bashed on Bipartisan Basis

Feb 5, 2008 by Dana Chasin

Destined to be Disregarded and Consigned to the Dustbin The reviews have been swift and harsh. The FY09 budget proposal submitted yesterday by President Bush might serve better as wallpaper or fish wrapping than as a policy blueprint. The New York Times editorialized in Lame-Duck Budget thusly:

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Bush Weasels Out of Forecasting Another Record Deficit

Feb 5, 2008 by Craig Jennings

Had the president used realistic assumptions about economic growth in 2008, yesterday's headlines covering the FY 2009 budget request would have been: "Record Deficit Projected." Instead, the president chose to use a somewhat optimistic GDP growth rate of 2.7 percent, which produces a higher revenue forecast and subsequently lower deficit of $410 billion. If, on the other hand, the president chose to employ the CBO's numbers (GDP growth of 1.7%), the projected deficit for 2008 would have been a jaw-dropping $426.4 billion, significantly surpassing 2004's $413 billion deficit.

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