OMB Watch strongly opposes the President’s “Growth and Jobs Plan to Strengthen the American Economy” for a host of reasons. There is no question that the President’s plan is bold. But it is unlikely to provide an economic stimulus now, when it is so needed; it moves the country in the wrong direction over the long-term; and it will adversely affect services upon which Americans depend while doing nothing to increase economic growth and jobs.

An economic stimulus plan will be on the table early in the next Congress. Following is the tentative schedule. Given the sudden change in Senate leadership with Sen. Trent Lott’s (R-MS) resignation as Senate Majority Leader, there is a great deal of uncertainty about how the budget process will proceed next year, including issues of timing, number of reconciliation bills, and content. The next Watcher may contain a very different timetable.

With the shake-up in the Administration’s economic team, the recent rise in the unemployment rate to 6% (the highest rate in eight years), and absolutely no evidence that the massive Bush tax cut has done anything but send the federal budget on a rapid spiral into deficit, a reasonable person might think that it was time for the Administration to reevaluate the idea that tax cuts are the solution to everything. The President’s economic stimulus plan, currently in the design phase, however, is expected to consist of tax cuts aimed at corporations and individuals in the higher tax brackets.

The Democratic Policy Committee (DPC) hosted an economic forum on October 11. Subtitled “Securing Our Economic Future,” it was billed as an attempt to offer a bi-partisan discussion of and debate about the issues underlying the nation’s economic woes. Though the point was clearly made that no Republican Members of Congress accepted the DPC’s invitation, the forum’s first panel was comprised not only of former members of Clinton’s Council of Economic Advisors, but also a former Associate Director for economics in President Reagan’s Office of Management and Budget and a former economic advisor to House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-TX).