Not So Budget-minded

Not So Budget-minded

March 15, 2006

This week, the Senate began debating the 2007 budget resolution. The federal budget is a concrete embodiment of policy choices, a moral document that reflects the values and priorities of our nation. The budget that the Senate is debating says some harsh things about the values and priorities of this administration. It prioritizes tax cuts for the rich and wasteful spending in the defense budget, while shortchanging veterans benefits, education, health care, energy research, homeland security, housing for the elderly and disabled, and child care for working families. And while the budget hurts those who can least afford it, every American will suffer as it would increase the deficit by $266 billion over already high levels over the next five years.

• The Bush administration policies have pushed us deep into debt. Since Bush has been in office, the Congressionally set limit on the total national debt has risen from $5.95 trillion to the current ceiling of $8.184 trillion. “That is more than $28,000 of debt for every man, woman and child in the United States.” Congress is looking to pass a resolution to allow the debt to grow even more. Even Bush’s newly appointed Federal Reserve chief recognizes the unsustainable fiscal course that the president has led us down. “The prospective increase in the budget deficit will place at risk future living standards of our country,” Ben Bernanke said yesterday.
  
  
• Conservatives have shirked their commitment to fiscal responsibility. Conservatives pride themselves on being the “fiscally responsible” ones in Washington. But this budget will force them to give up that mantle. Sen. Kent Conrad (D-ND) offered an amendment (pdf) to the budget resolution yesterday that would have imposed greater fiscal restraint. The right-wing rejected the so-called “pay-go” rules, a requirement that tax cuts be offset by budget savings or revenue increases in order to prevent the deficit from growing even larger.
  
  
• The budget is being balanced on the backs of those who can least afford it. The right wing has announced its commitment to repeal the estate tax and make the Bush tax changes permanent. A repeal of the estate tax would cost nearly $1 trillion over the first 10 years of enactment. While a responsible reform could exempt about 99.5 percent of all estates from the tax and avoid the lion’s share of costs, alleged “compromises” circulated by Senate Republicans would spend over 90 percent as much as repeal to help this tiny group of wealth heirs. In all, once made permanent, the tax cuts will eventually add over $400 billion to the debt and deliver over $100 billion to the richest one percent of tax payers each year.