Posted on 10/20/2005 9:09:39 AM PDT by West Coast Conservative
It's only taken a decade or so, but suddenly there's momentum in Congress for spending restraint. We'll be watching the fine print, but you can tell Republicans are worried about complaints from conservative voters because for a change they're trying to act, well, like Republicans.
In a first good sign, House leaders are rewriting their Fiscal 2006 budget resolution to increase the amount of "savings" to as much as $50 billion over five years. This is far from onerous, but it is better than the $35 billion Congress passed the first time around.
In another miracle, they are also moving to "deauthorize" 98 federal programs that long ago outlived their usefulness. These include such pork-barrel classics as the Robert C. Byrd Honors Scholarship Program. A deauthorization doesn't cut any spending, but it does reduce the likelihood that money will be spent on these fiscal dodos in the future. Political symbolism has its uses.
By far the most promising idea is for a spending cut of as much as 3% on every discretionary federal agency, program and department. The case for across-the-board cuts is especially persuasive given the boom times that federal agencies have enjoyed in recent years. As the nearby chart shows, spending for federal education programs is up 99% since 2001; international affairs and foreign aid is up 94%; community development 71%; housing programs 86%, and so on. The inflation rate over the same period was 12.5%.
This "cut," by the way, would only reduce spending from the "baseline" that already includes annual increases for inflation for 2006. A 3% sequester, as it's known in Beltway lingo, would save $36 billion in 2006. And because baseline spending levels would be reduced going ahead, the savings would magnify over time--to as much as $500 billion over 10 years.
(Excerpt) Read more at opinionjournal.com ...
I thought all of us whining conservatives didn't have an impact?
bump
If we can complain and get 50 Billion, we should push for 500 billion or a Trillion dollars.
50 billion over 5 years is spit compared to the GDP and Govt budget, we should push for lots more.
Works for me.
What exactly is a discretionary program or department?
"What exactly is a discretionary program or department?"
Anything not mandated by standing acts or laws. Basically anything but entitlements.
I worked it out once, and if I remember all you had to do was increase spending by half of current levels and it would take about 15 years or so to create a national surplus replacing the national debt, barring any unforeseen events of course.
I don't know the definition exactly, but it is anything that is not an entitlement or debt interest.
While this is a good sign, it amounts to little more than spitting into the wind if they only focus on discretionary spending. It is mandatory spending which has ballooned federal expenditures, that is the realm of the entitlement programs.
While discretionary spending has risen 110 percent since 1962, mandatory spending has risen 650 percent, or 6 times faster. In 1962, discretionary spending was 12.7% of GDP, mandatory spending was 6.1%, in 2004, the percentages are almost reversed, discretionary is 7.7% of GDP, mandatory is 11.6%. Of that 7.7%, 3.9% is defense spending, leaving 3.8% for international (0.3%) and domestic (3.5%) discretionary spending. In that domestic discretionary spending is homeland security, infrastructure and intelligence.
Until they start reforming the third rail of politics, no significant fiscal responsibility will be attained and, in the process, we will weaken this country and turn it into a European style welfare state.
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