Let's Stop the Tax Cuts for Corporations Instead

How much would it cost to #StopTheCuts to all the non-defense programs threatened by sequestration next year? $37 billion. And even if the sequester is averted, funding for these programs would be at historically low levels, following years of reduced funding.

read in full

Senate Budget Resolution to Call for Freezing All Non-Security Discretionary Spending

Come Git Yer Budget

Budget Committee Chairman Sen. Kent Conrad (D-SD), who released his mark for the Senate's budget resolution yesterday, is calling for $671 billion more in deficit reduction over the next five years compared to the president's budget proposal. Conrad achieves his reduction by jettisoning the president's selected discretionary caps and placing a freeze on all non-security discretionary spending over the next three fiscal years.

read in full

Senate Rejects Arbitrary Budget Caps

Thanks in no small part to the 1,146 emails you sent in the past 48 hours, the Senate just voted down the Sessions-McCaskill amendment, which would have instituted draconian discretionary budget caps for the next three fiscal years. The amendment lost on a 56-40 vote, failing to reach the 60-vote margin it needed by only four votes.

read in full

Tell the Senate to Vote No on Disastrous Discretionary Spending Caps

In what looks like an attempt to out-fiscal-hawk President Obama, Sens. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) and Claire McCaskill (D-MO) have introduced an amendment that would impose strict limits on discretionary spending for the next three years. The amendment sets limits far lower than Obama's already low budget proposal, and it even includes a cap on defense discretionary spending, something the President's proposal does not do. Such caps would result in drastic cuts to many vital economic safety net programs and public protection agencies, negatively impacting the lives of millions of Americans. And while the two senators claim that the amendment will reduce the deficit, in reality, because discretionary spending is so little of the federal budget, the amendment's deficit-reducing effects will be minimal.

read in full

House Passes Statutory PAYGO Bill

The House passed legislation (H.R. 2920) on July 22 that would reinstate statutory "pay-as-you-go" (PAYGO) budgeting rules, which were allowed to expire in 2002.

read in full

House Hearing Questions Whether PAYGO is Enough to Control Spending

The House Budget Committee held a hearing on June 24 on the Statutory Pay-As-You-Go (PAYGO) Act of 2009, which was recently introduced by Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD). During the hearing, House members focused on the enforcement mechanisms in PAYGO, the significant exemptions granted under the proposed legislation, and whether the bill is the appropriate method to reinstate fiscal discipline in Congress.

read in full

Budget Legislation Watch

Some good and bad news from Congress before the August recess.

read in full

Good Riddance to Bad Policy: Budget Enforcement Bill Dies

A conservative effort to severely limit domestic programs was soundly defeated in the House last week. The so-called "Spending Control Act of 2004" failed by a vote of 146-268.

read in full

Comparison of House and Senate Budget Plans

The budget resolution plan passed by the House Budget Committee is far worse than the Senate plan. Nevertheless, the "fiscal discipline" of both plans is based on huge cuts in domestic spending for programs and services that most Americans value in order to extend tax cuts to wealthier Americans.

read in full

Bad Budget Rule Changes Could Still be Proposed

The Senate budget being debated this week includes only a two-year cap on appropriations, and continues Senate pay-go rules that apply to both entitlement increases and tax cuts. However, concern over other changes in budget rules remains.

read in full

Pages