U.S. Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) recently introduced his own “Three Penny Plan” federal budget that will balance within five years by assuming the repeal of the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2021 and utilizing the “Three Penny Plan.” Dr. Paul’s budget includes instructions that would pave the way for the expansion of Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) to help Americans more easily cover their health care costs.
“When I started offering these kinds of budgets four years ago, we could balance with a freeze in spending. Not cut anything, then we went to just a penny, then two, now it is three,” said Dr. Paul. “We cannot keep ignoring this problem, this budget sets a goal for balance and provides Congress with necessary tools to achieve that objective.”
“Senator Rand Paul has long been a champion of balancing the federal budget and protecting the American taxpayer,” said Frontiers of Freedom President George Landrith. “Too often opponents of fiscal responsibility argue that to balance the budget would require draconian cuts. But Senator Paul’s proposal only requires a budget cut of 3 pennies on the dollar each year for the next five years and then limits spending increases thereafter by 2 percent per year.”
“Senators should support Rand Paul’s balanced budget plan to expand HSAs, reject tax hikes, and reduce spending by 3 pennies for every dollar,” said Americans for Tax Reform President Grover Norquist.
“I’m glad to see Senator Rand Paul continue his work to address the rampant growth in federal spending and the national debt,” said American Legislative Exchange Council Chief Economist Jonathan Williams.
Dr. Paul’s plan requires that for every on-budget dollar the federal government spends in Fiscal Year 2021, it spends three pennies fewer each year for the next five years. Senator Paul’s proposal doesn’t change anything about Social Security, but reduces spending by $67.4 billion in Fiscal Year 2022 and by $7.2 trillion over ten years.
The media and the left are playing up the economic damage from the shutdown. No doubt, there will be some disruption. But it won’t be economic armageddon, not by a long shot.
Fears of shutdowns at airports and national parks have been prominent in media coverage. No doubt, some will be inconvenienced.
But will it lead to an economic meltdown, as some have suggested? Not likely.
Let’s start with a few facts. Shutdowns have occurred before, most recently in 1995 and 1996, and in 2013. In each case, these relatively short shutdowns had minimal economic impacts. Continue reading
In the first two months of the new fiscal year, tax revenues are up. But so is the deficit. Why? Because spending continues to outpace revenues. So why do tax cuts keep getting blamed?
The latest monthly budget report from the Congressional Budget Office shows the deficit jumping $102 billion in just the first two months of the new fiscal year.
That sure looks like the deficit is “soaring,” as one news outlet claimed. But as the CBO makes clear, almost all that deficit increase was the result of quirks of the calendar. Depending on where weekends fall, significant sums of spending can get shifted into different months.
A true apples-to-apples comparison, the CBO says, shows that the deficit climbed by just $13 billion. Continue reading
by Ali Meyer • Washington Free Beacon
The Old-Age and Survivors Insurance and Disability Insurance Trust Funds will be depleted in the next 17 years, according to the Social Security Administration’s trustees report.
By 2034 the combined asset reserves of both funds are expected to be insolvent. Alone, the Disability Insurance Trust Fund will be insolvent by 2028.
According to the report, the trust funds have a total asset reserves of $2.85 trillion. Even though the trust fund reserves are growing, the cost of the program will outweigh the revenue by 2022.
“It is time for the public to engage in the important national conversation about how to keep Social Security strong,” said Nancy A. Berryhill, acting commissioner of Social Security. “People understand the value of their earned Social Security benefits and the importance of keeping the program secure for the future.” Continue reading
“In Washington it is common to tout the budget surpluses of the Clinton years as some momentous achievement, as though the point of economic policy is to run budget surpluses. Of course the point of economic policy is to produce an economy that improves the lives of the people in a sustainable way. Clinton badly flunked this test.”
by Dean Baker
The truth is often painful but nonetheless it is important that we live in the real world. Just as little kids have to come to grips with the fact that there is no Santa Claus, it is necessary for millions of liberals, including many who think of themselves as highly knowledgeable about economic matters, to realize that President Clinton’s policies sent the economy seriously off course.
In Washington it is common to tout the budget surpluses of the Clinton years as some momentous achievement, as though the point of economic policy is to run budget surpluses. Of course the point of economic policy is to produce an economy that improves the lives of the people in a sustainable way. Clinton badly flunked this test.
The Clinton economy was driven by a stock bubble. This is not a debatable point. The ratio of market-wide stock prices to corporate earnings was well over 30 to 1 at the peak of the bubble in 2000. This is more than twice the historic average. Continue reading