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Republicans party has become the “Almond Joy Party”. Sometime they
act like a nut and sometime they don’t.
By Travis Waldron on Mar 21, 2012 at
9:35 am
When
House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI) released his Medicare-ending,
safety net-gutting 2012 budget plan last year, he was slammed by faith leaders who denounced
his cuts to programs that aid the poor and middle class. Ryan released the 2013
version of that budget yesterday, and he is again facing criticism from a
diverse group of faith leaders.
Ryan
often says it is “morally wrong” not to address America’s debt, but faith
leaders like Bishop Gene Robinson said the budget Ryan crafted fails basic
moral tests. “The Ryan budget robs the poor, the marginalized and the
vulnerable of the safety net so integral to their survival,” Robinson said. “By
any measure of civility and regard for one’s neighbor, it is an immoral disaster.”
Father
Thomas Kelly, a Catholic priest and constituent of Ryan’s, felt similarly:
“As
a constituent of Congressman Ryan and a Catholic priest, I’m disappointed by
his cruel budget plan and outraged that he defends it on moral grounds.
Ryan is Catholic, and he knows that justice for the poor and economic fairness
are core elements of our church’s social teaching. It’s shameful that he
disregarded these principles in his budget.”
That
the GOP cuts vital programs like Medicare,
Medicaid, and other safety net programs while giving tax breaks to the richest Americans is
“immoral” and “unconscionable,” other leaders said. “The poor are not
statistics,” Rabbi Jackie Moline said. “Whatever one thinks of Congressman
Ryan’s ideas, it is unimaginable to look into the face of a child who would go
hungry without government assistance and say, ‘Sorry — we need to reduce the
deficit.’”
Santorum: Ryan budget plan ‘a
great blueprint,’ but doesn’t cut enough
By Rosalind S.
Helderman
As
Democrats castigate a budget plan by
Rep. Paul Ryan (Wisc.) for its deep safety social net cuts and dramatic tax
cuts, criticism is coming more quietly from another corner: budget hawks who
believe the proposal would not cut deeply
or quickly enough.
Presidential
candidate Rep. Ron Paul (R-Tex.) termed the effort “very disappointing,” in a
Tuesday statement. And he’s now been joined by fellow GOP candidate Rick Santorum, who told Glenn Beck later
Tuesday that he believed Ryan’s spending plan is a “great blueprint” but he
believes “we need to cut government spending faster” than the $5.3 trillion
Ryan has proposed slashing over the next decade.
Santorum’s own plan calls
for $5 trillion in cuts over five years. And he has said he believes Ryan would
not move quickly enough on Medicare reform.
Ryan’s plan raises the Medicare
eligibility age to 67 and caps spending on those who turn 65 after 2023,
offering them a set amount with which to purchase private health insurance on
newly created federal exchanges. He would also offer seniors traditional
Medicare as an option, though it could cost them more than the cheaper private
plans.
Santorum
has said Medicare changes must be implemented immediately and not be imposed
only on future retirees.
In
the radio interview with Beck, Santorum said he spoke to Ryan about the budget
last week. He offered general praise of its concepts, which include deep cuts
to Medicaid and other domestic programs paired with a tax overhaul that would
reduce the top rates on individuals and businesses to 25 percent
“He’s
put forward a great blueprint for people to campaign upon and shows clearly
progress dramatic progress in the direction of shrinking the size of
government, and liberating the economy through lower taxes and less
regulations,” he told Beck.
But
of entitlement reform, Santorum said, “we need to move forward quicker” and he
called for faster spending cuts.
Santorum
was the only one of the presidential candidates not to release a statement
about Ryan’s budget on Tuesday. Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney
quickly embraced the plan in a statement and comments to reporters, as did
former House speaker Newt Gingrich.
Santorum’s
more muted response may be connected to tricky politics in the House. Ryan’s
budget faces a key vote on the Budget Committee he chairs on Wednesday. With
Democrats unified in opposition, he can afford only two Republican defections
or see an embarrassing defeat for what is designed to be the GOP’s leading
election year campaign statement.
One
conservative freshman—Rep. Tim Huelskamp of Kansas—has said he plans to vote
against the plan.
“It’s
good--but it’s not good enough or the type of bold statement I think Republicans
need to make,” he said.
By Rosalind S.
Helderman | 10:14 AM ET, 03/21/2012
GOP budget plan cuts deeply into
domestic programs, reshapes Medicare, Medicaid
By Rosalind S. Helderman and Lori Montgomery, Published:
March 20
House
Republicans laid down a bold but risky election-year marker Tuesday, unveiling
a budget proposal that aims to tame the
national debt by reshaping Medicare and cutting deeply into Medicaid, food
stamps and other programs for the poor, while reshuffling the tax code to
sharply lower rates.
Congressional
Republicans plan to use the document to demonstrate their willingness to tackle
the nation’s difficult fiscal problems head-on. They argue that restraining
future borrowing is a moral imperative and that entitlement programs for the
elderly and the poor must be redrawn both to reduce red ink and to ensure that
federal benefits continue to be available.
But
the document — which pairs deep spending cuts with a reduction in the top tax
rate paid by the wealthy — quickly provided new fodder for Democrats, who
argued that Republicans would slash the social safety net while protecting the
rich.
The
proposal, authored by Budget Chairman Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.),
calls for spending cuts and tax changes that would put the nation on course to
wipe out deficits and balance the budget by 2040. The national debt would
continue to rise but would shrink to the historic norm as a percentage of an
expanding economy.
But
because Ryan and other Republicans reject higher taxes in any form, that path
would require significant reductions in a host of popular federal programs.
Ryan
calls for turning over to the states responsibility for the major federal
programs for the poor, including Medicaid and food stamps, and giving
recipients a deadline to find work and get off the government dole — much as
welfare reform did to cash benefits in the late 1990s.
Federal
education and job training programs would be consolidated and “modernized,” the
plan says. And spending on Pell grants for college students would be reduced
and retargeted toward low-income students most in need of assistance.
All
told, Ryan proposes to slash federal spending by $5.3 trillion over the next
decade compared with President Obama’s latest budget blueprint, with the
biggest savings taken from health programs — including the repeal of Obama’s
initiative to expand health coverage to the uninsured — and entitlements for
the poor.
But
it might not be enough for many tea party conservatives, who are demanding that
Republicans balance the budget within the next 10 years. In an op-ed published Tuesday in the Wall Street
Journal, Ryan argued that the plan offers “real spending discipline.”
“It
does this not through indiscriminate cuts that endanger our military, but by
ending the epidemic of crony politics and government overreach that has
weakened confidence in the nation’s institutions and its economy. And it
strengthens the safety net by returning power to the states, which are in the
best position to tailor assistance to their specific populations,” he writes.
Ryan
says he will stage a vote on the plan in the House Budget Committee on Wednesday,
and that he has the necessary support to move it to the House floor. Even if it
were to win approval, the blueprint would be rejected by the
Democratic-controlled Senate. But Ryan said it would provide a foundation for
the GOP’s election-year push for a radically smaller federal government.
“We
owe the country an alternative path if we don’t like the path the president is
taking us on. Whoever our nominee is going to be owes the country that choice
of two futures. We’re helping them put this together,” Ryan said, adding that
he has spoken with the major GOP candidates, who have all told him he is “on
the right track.”
“Each
of these people running for president have all given their various ideas and
reforms that perfectly jive with and are consistent with what we’re proposing,”
Ryan said.
Reaction
from the White House was immediate and sharp.
“The
House budget once again fails the test of balance, fairness, and shared
responsibility,” White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer said in a
statement. “It would shower the wealthiest few Americans with an average tax
cut of at least $150,000, while preserving taxpayer giveaways to oil companies
and breaks for Wall Street hedge fund managers. What’s worse is that all of
these tax breaks would be paid for by undermining Medicare.”
On
Medicare — a key flashpoint in a debate over Ryan’s budget a year ago — Ryan
once again proposes to cap spending on future retirees, offering them a set
amount with which to purchase private health insurance on newly created federal
insurance exchanges.
In
reaction to Democratic criticism that the plan “ends Medicare,” Ryan has
tweaked that proposal: He now aims to preserve traditional Medicare as an
option, though seniors could be required to pay significantly more for Medicare
coverage if the program proved to be more expensive than the private plans.
Ryan
said “this kind of Medicare reform is the most humane, the most common-sense
and bipartisan way to save this vital program.” But though Ryan crafted the new
variation with Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden (Ore.), Democrats have made clear that
the veneer of bipartisanship will not inoculate him from a fresh round of
political attack.
“The
Republican proposal would end the Medicare guarantee, shift costs to seniors,
and let Medicare wither on the vine, while providing billions in tax breaks for
Big Oil and special interests, and destroying American jobs,” House Minority
Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said in a statement.
On
taxes, Ryan offers a bit more detail than he did last year about how
Republicans would reshape the tax code. The proposal calls for replacing the
current tax structure’s six brackets with just two: a 10 percent rate for
lower-income earners and a 25 percent rate for upper-income earners.
That
would be a reduction from the current top rate of 35 percent. Ryan also wants
to wipe out the alternative minimum tax. And he calls for lowering the 35
percent tax on corporate profits to 25 percent and granting U.S. corporations a
blanket exemption on profits earned overseas.
To
pay for those changes, Ryan proposes to wipe out a vast array of deductions,
credits and other tax breaks benefiting people and companies at virtually every
income level. Neither he nor House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp
(R-Mich.) on Tuesday spelled out specifics, but tax experts said their proposal
would almost certainly have to take a whack at expensive tax breaks such as
those for home mortgage interest, employer-provided health insurance and
retirement savings.
Republicans
have been urging an overhaul that would make the tax code simpler and easier to
understand while lowering rates, which they believe will spur economic growth
and prove a politically potent election-year message. Ryan’s proposal is
similar to ones offered by the GOP presidential candidates, former
Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney and former senator Rick Santorum of
Pennsylvania, though the candidates’ plans would dramatically reduce federal
tax collections while Ryan’s would maintain them at current levels.
Although
Ryan’s far-reaching blueprint presents many areas of ideological conflict with
Democrats, the most pressing battle is likely to be fought offer a relatively
small point: agency budgets for the fiscal year that begins in October.
Ryan
proposes $1.028 trillion in total agency spending — $19 billion less than the
cap set during last summer’s bitter showdown over raising the legal limit on
government borrowing, known as the debt ceiling. Ryan also proposes to instruct
six House committees to come up with proposals by May for generating additional
savings and averting across-the-board cuts set to hit in January.
Sen.
Patty Murray (D-Wash.), the Democratic leader of a bipartisan congressional
“supercommittee” that tried and failed to produce such a plan last fall, called
the move “outrageous and deeply disappointing.”
“By
desperately attempting to appease their extreme conservative base, House
Republicans are reneging on a deal their own speaker shook on less than eight
months ago,” she said. “They have shown that a deal with them isn’t worth the
paper it’s printed on and they are threatening families across America yet
again with the prospect of a government shutdown.”
House
Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) countered that the $1.047 trillion cap represents
an upper limit, not an agreement.
“People
have limits on credit cards. That doesn’t mean that you’re required to spend up
to the limit, it just says you can’t spend anymore than that,” Boehner told
reporters. “We all know that we’ve got a real fiscal problem here in
Washington. And, frankly, we think we can do better.
GOP budget would cut auto loans, high-speed rail funds
BY DAVID SHEPARDSON
DETROIT NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU
Washington-
A House Republican budget proposal would end all loan programs for green energy
efforts including canceling up to $16 billion in unawarded funds for auto factory retooling — and funds for
high-speed rail.
Rep.
Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin, chairman of the House Budget Committee, and his
colleagues proposed a budget alternative this week that would spend $5.3
trillion less over the next decade, as compared to the White House budget plan.
In
2007, President George W. Bush signed into law legislation creating the $25
billion Advanced Technology Vehicle Manufacturing Program — a
program to provide low-cost government loans to automakers to retool factories
to build more fuel efficient models. Congress funded the program in September
2008. But the Energy Department has awarded just $8.4 billion and hasn't made
a new award in more than a year.
The
department has been reluctant to award new loans in the wake of the failure of
Solyndra LLC, a solar panel startup that won $535 million in government loans
that has filed for bankruptcy and laid off 1,100 workers.
Ryan's
budget summary says it "would immediately terminate all programs that
allow government to play venture capitalist with taxpayers' money." Senate
leaders agreed this month not to consider an amendment filed by Sen. Bob
Corker, R-Tenn., that would have taken the remaining funding in the $25 billion
retooling program and used it to fix roads. A fight over 20 percent of the
funds in September nearly led to a government shutdown, but Democrats
successfully restored the funding.
The
bill also would cut transportation spending by a quarter, and would end all
high-speed rail funds, saying they have "failed numerous and clear
cost-benefit analyses." The budget says the government can't afford the
projects. "However worthy some highway projects might be, their capacity
as job creators has been vastly oversold as demonstrated by the extravagant but
unfulfilled promises that accompanied the 2009 stimulus bill, particularly with
regard to high-speed rail," the summary says.
Michigan
has won about $200 million in federal funding to make high-speed rail a reality
on the 135-mile section of the trip between Kalamazoo and Detroit — an effort
to speed trains between Detroit and Chicago.
"In
the wake of these failures, and with the federal government's fiscal challenges
making long-term subsidization infeasible, high-speed rail and other new
intercity rail projects should be pursued only if they can be established as
self-supporting commercial services," the GOP budget proposal says.
The
GOP budget proposal criticizes efforts to boost green energy, saying the
administration "blocks proven domestic energy sources while spending
recklessly on uncompetitive alternatives."
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GOP
Unveils Budget Plan Cutting More Than $6T Over Next Decade
Published April 05, 2011 | FoxNews.com
House
Republicans unveiled a budget proposal Tuesday
that they claimed would avert a debt-driven "economic collapse" by
cutting more than $6 trillion over the next decade.
The
proposal, unveiled by House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis., would
overhaul two major entitlement programs and impose caps on government spending,
with the goal of stabilizing and eventually paying down the debt. It is
literally trillions of dollars apart from the budget President Obama released
earlier in the year, and its release marks the start of what is expected to be
a drag-out budget fight in Congress.
"Our
goal here is to leave our children and our grandchildren with a debt-free
nation," Ryan said Tuesday. The congressman had tough words for Obama's
10-year budget plan, accusing the White House of speeding up the country's
"descent into a debt crisis" by growing government. He also
defended what is arguably his most controversial proposal -- an overhaul of
Medicare which would subsidize private insurance policies for seniors.
"The
open-ended, blank-check nature of Medicare's subsidy mechanism is threatening
the solvency of this critical program, and it is creating inexcusable levels of
waste," Ryan said Tuesday afternoon, in a speech at the American
Enterprise Institute. White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said that
while the president shares Ryan's goal of tackling entitlements and balancing
the budget, "We strongly disagree with his approach." He said the
plan would put a "greater burden" on seniors and others in
need.
Rep.
Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., Ryan's Democratic counterpart on the Budget Committee,
accused Ryan of leaning too heavily on spending cuts to make up for tax breaks
to corporations. "It is not courageous to protect tax breaks for
millionaires, oil companies, and other big money special interests while slashing
our investments in education, ending the current health care guarantees for
seniors on Medicare and denying health care coverage to tens of millions of
Americans," he said. "That's not courageous. It's wrong."
But
Republicans claim the tax code changes will spur economic growth, and that the
changes to Medicare will ultimately save the program. Obama's 10-year
budget proposal would cut deficits by $1.1 trillion, according to the White
House. Compared against Obama's plan, the GOP counterproposal claims to cut
deficits by $4.4 trillion. Republicans say they would cut spending by $6.2
trillion compared with the president's budget.
Ryan
says the "Path to Prosperity" plan will bring federal spending to
below 20 percent of gross domestic product, less than Obama's 23 percent and
consistent with the postwar average. Though it contains trillions in spending
cuts, it still would not come close to paying down the nation's currently $14
trillion debt by the end of the decade. However, a chart released by House
Republicans projects that happening by about 2050 under the GOP plan.
In
a Wall Street Journal column, Ryan cited a study released by the conservative
Heritage Center for Data Analysis projecting his plan will create nearly 1
million new private-sector jobs next year, reduce the unemployment rate to 4
percent by 2015 and add 2.5 million more private-sector jobs in the last year
of the decade.
The
plan, which Ryan outlines in a video made available on YouTube, also
proposes welfare reforms in the way of Medicaid block grants, a consolidation
of job-training programs and changes to food-stamp distribution. On the
Medicaid proposal, 17 governors wrote to Congress this week claiming the plan
would "shift costs and risk to states."
The
GOP plan also calls for reforms to the nation's "outdated tax code,
consolidating brackets, lowering tax rates, and assuming top individual and
corporate rates of 25 percent," Ryan wrote. "It maintains a
revenue-neutral approach by clearing out a burdensome tangle of deductions and
loopholes that distort economic activity and leave some corporations paying no
income taxes at all." Among some of the likely more controversial
plans are efforts to end the conservatorship of mortgage giants, an elimination
of Wall Street bailout authority and a rollback of "expensive handouts for
uncompetitive sources of energy."
The
GOP proposal coincides with the ongoing debate over the remainder of the fiscal
2011 budget. Both parties are trying to hammer out a half-year budget before
the deadline for a partial government shutdown Friday. Obama invited Speaker of
the House John Boehner to the White House Tuesday for a meeting with Vice
President Joe Biden, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and top negotiators on
the appropriation committees in the hope of fostering a solution for the rest
of the year. As for the GOP proposal for 2012, Ryan knows that it is
ambitious and expects Democrats to attack the plan, including revisions to Medicare's
entitlement system. Social Security would largely remain untouched.
For
Medicare, Ryan says the GOP proposal will be modeled after the "premium
support" system outlined in an earlier proposal co-authored by him and
former White House Budget Director Alice Rivlin. Such a proposal would provide
a fixed amount of government assistance toward premiums in the private health
plan of seniors' choosing. The program would go into effect for new
beneficiaries starting in 2022 and, according to Republicans, offer more money
for low-income seniors and less for the wealthy. "Our social safety
net is fraying at the seams," Ryan said Tuesday. Democrats have been
quick to pounce on Ryan's budget, accusing him of sparing oil and gas subsidies
at the expense of seniors.
"Paul
Ryan made clear that the Republican budget will protect Big Oil companies
subsidies over seniors health care," Jesse Ferguson, spokesman for the
Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said in a statement over the
weekend. "It's already becoming clear who will be the priority in the
House Republican budget -- special interests, not middle-class
families."
Fox News' Chad Pergram contributed to this report.
Paul Ryan, Jeff Sessions Warn
Obama's Budget Could Spur Greek-Style Debt Crisis
WASHINGTON
-- President Barack Obama's $3.8 trillion budget plan does nothing to address
mounting debt and could lead the country into a European-style crisis, key
congressional Republicans said Monday.
"Again,
the president has ducked responsibility. He has failed to take any credible
action" to address the debt crisis, House Budget Committee Chairman Paul
Ryan (R-Wis.) said on a conference call. "All we're getting here is more
spending, more borrowing and more debt that will lead to slower economic
growth. This is not a fiscal plan to save America from a debt crisis. It's a
political plan for the president's reelection."
Obama's
budget proposal, released Monday morning, maps
out $4 trillion in deficit reduction but
spends trillions of dollars on Democrats' priority areas, namely education,
infrastructure and transportation. At least $1.5 trillion in deficit reduction
would come through raising taxes on the wealthy and removing certain corporate
tax breaks.
Senate
Budget Committee ranking member Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), also on the press call,
said Obama's budget is "exceedingly deceptive" because it actually
creates $11 trillion in new debt. Obama is relying on "budget
gimmicks" to claim $4 trillion in deficit reduction, he said, when the
reality is his plan would only achieve $273 billion in deficit reduction over
10 years.
"Next
year, the United States could be like Greece," Sessions continued,
referring to the severe debt
crisis faced by that country as
a result of uncontrolled government spending. Ryan similarly warns
on the House Budget Committee website:
"The President's budget ignores the drivers of our debt, bringing America
perilously close to a European-style crisis."
The
reality is Obama's budget will not pass Congress and was not ever really
intended to do so. It serves more as an outline of Democratic Party priorities
and convenient talking points in the lead-up to the November elections. It also
gives congressional Republicans something specific to point to, and trash, as
they push their own policies ahead of the elections.
Republicans
are already criticizing Obama for using what they consider to be accounting
tricks to conceal how much money he is really spending. They object to his plan
to repeal $1.2 trillion in Budget Control Act cuts without counting that as new
spending; his proposal to stop planned cuts to Medicare doctors without
identifying how he will offset the costs; and his taking of credit for
discretionary caps that are already law. Republicans are also ripping Obama for
saying he is saving nearly $1 trillion over the next decade from winding down
the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Counting that money as "savings" is
a gimmick, they say, because those funds would never have been spent.
"All
of that is borrowed," Sessions said. "It's not as if there's extra
money in a pot; you just have to keep borrowing. Is it acceptable for the
president of the United States to mislead the American people as he's now done
again?"
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Paul Ryan’s path to nowhere
“Why don’t you balance the budget at 24 percent [of GDP] instead
of 19 percent?” I asked.
“I think it would do damage to the economy,” Rep. Paul Ryan
replied.
A senior fellow at the Center for American Progress and co-host of
public radio’s “Left, Right & Center,” Miller writes a weekly column for
The Post.
This simple exchange from a conversation I had with Ryan in his
office last October captures the uber-debate the country needs to have. That
is, once we get done dissecting the deceptions, hypocrisies and regressive
priorities in the Wisconsin Republican’s latest
blueprint.
For starters, Ryan’s assumption that higher levels of spending and
taxation would automatically hurt the economy can’t be right. If it were,
America would be a poorer country today than it was a hundred years ago, when
the federal government taxed and spent less than 5 percent of gross domestic
product. But we’re obviously vastly wealthier. That doesn’t mean there isn’t a
limit beyond which higher taxes and spending would hurt. Just that we’re not
close to that point. How can we be, when President Reagan ran government at 22
percent of GDP?
Federal spending has gone from recent norms of about 20 percent of
GDP to 24 percent under President Obama, thanks to the lagging economy and
spending on things like the stimulus and unemployment insurance. Ryan wants to
get it back to 20 percent in the next few years and return taxes to their more
recent norms of 19 percent, up from today’s recession-depleted 15 percent. (The
nonpartisan Tax Policy Center said Tuesday that Ryan’s proposals would in
fact fall dramatically short of 19 percent, but leave
that aside for the moment.)
At first blush, Ryan’s plan sounds perfectly reasonable —
until you remember that we’re about to retire 76 million baby boomers. “I think
the historic size [of government as a share of GDP] is about right, or smaller,”
Ryan told me that day.
“But how can that be,” I asked, “when we’re doubling the number of
seniors” on Social Security and Medicare, the biggest federal programs. “Because
we can’t keep doing everything for everybody in this country,” he said. “We
should trim down a lot of other stuff we’re doing.” This was unintentionally
revealing. Ryan has sounded this theme before. “We are at a moment,” Ryan said
in his State of the Union response in 2011, “where
if government’s growth is left unchecked and unchallenged . . . we
will transform our social safety net into a hammock, which lulls able-bodied
people into lives of complacency and dependency.”
But what hammock is Ryan talking about? The only thing slated to
grow the size of government in the years ahead is the retirement of the baby
boomers. The doubling of the number of people eligible for Social Security and
Medicare is what is driving all the increase in federal spending — along with the
spiral in system-wide health costs, which afflicts Medicare along with all
privately financed health care.
If those programs for seniors haven’t been a “hammock” until now,
simply doubling the number of people eligible for them can’t turn them into a
“hammock” tomorrow. When it comes to fiscal policy, we have an aging population
challenge, and a health-cost challenge. We don’t have a “hammock” challenge.
Ryan's Budget
Plan Could Cause Problems within Both Parties: Paul Ryan's budget plan--which
slashes everything from Medicare to corporate tax codes--may not sit too well
with both Democrats and Republicans
Alex
M. Parker U.S. News & World Report
March 21, 2012
Wisconsin
Rep. Paul Ryan's
budget plan is bold, but it may not be bold enough for some conservative groups
and members.
The
budget plan, announced Tuesday, would change Medicare into a voucher-based
system, drastically overhaul the tax code, repeal Obama's healthcare reform and
scale back many social welfare programs by converting them into block grants.
Despite
the large swath of items the plan touches upon, it would still take nearly 30
years to balance the budget and start paying down the national debt. While it
would cut the deficit more than President Obama's
budget proposal released earlier this year, it still may provoke some backlash
among those hoping for something bolder.
The
conservative group Club for Growth, an influential anti-tax organization with a
history of giving incumbent Republicans heartburn with competitive primary
challenges, previously warned against a budget which didn't balance the debt
within a 10-year window.
"Balancing
the budget within 10 years or less is vital to restoring confidence in
America's financial future and to avoid the fate of other nations that are
crippled by enormous debt," the organization said in a statement issued
last week. "The Club for Growth is Strongly concerned that any budget that
does not balance with this reasonable timeframe is simply an exercise in
futility." The Club for Growth has yet to issue a statement yet on the newly
unveiled budget.
When
asked about the date, Ryan blamed the data crunchers at the Congressional
Budget Office for failing to take into account the economic
gains from his tax policies. That's the so-called "dynamic scoring"
which conservatives have often clamored for, although Democratic critics claim
that it's a budget fantasy to make tax cuts look less costly than they really
are. Ryan's plan doesn't cut overall taxes, but it includes revenue-neutral tax
reform, which would drastically simplify both individual income tax rates and
the corporate tax code, reducing rates while also eliminating many tax
deductions and credits.
With Democrats sure to oppose the budget in lockstep, Republicans can't afford to lose many of their own. Already, the Republican leadership was forced to sharpen the discretionary budget cuts after more conservative members found them lacking.
With Democrats sure to oppose the budget in lockstep, Republicans can't afford to lose many of their own. Already, the Republican leadership was forced to sharpen the discretionary budget cuts after more conservative members found them lacking.
The
budget resolution doesn't go the president's desk or become law, but it is a
crucial step of the often complex formal Congressional budgeting process. For
the past several years, it's been overlooked in favor of budget standoffs and
last-second deals, and it's also become a valuable political campaign document
for both sides of the aisle.
The
plan is also enraging Democrats, who say the GOP is failing to follow through
on a deal struck last summer on overall discretionary spending levels. The
fight over the debt ceiling originally called for a $1.047 trillion
discretionary spending limit. Ryan's plan sets a lower figure at $917 billion.
"A majority of the Republican conference in the House voted for the [Budget Control Act] as did one half of the Democratic caucus," said Norm Dicks, the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee. "Republicans now find it difficult to pass a budget resolution at the BCA level. But an agreement set in law does not become null and void just because it is politically inconvenient."
Unlike the bulk of the budget plan, this isn't just for show. If passed by the House, Ryan's budget spending levels would be used in negotiations with the Senate under the normal appropriations process--which both sides have agreed to. With Democrats not in the mood to budge, the difference sets up a possible, though still unlikely, election-season showdown on Sept. 30, when current funding is set to expire.
Ryan claimed that his budget simply took into account the so-called defense sequester--automatic spending cuts which were triggered in November by the failure of the so-called "Super Committee." His budget would call for those cuts to be spread from defense spending to other areas such as agriculture, with individual committees assigned to find the savings in their own budgets.
"A majority of the Republican conference in the House voted for the [Budget Control Act] as did one half of the Democratic caucus," said Norm Dicks, the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee. "Republicans now find it difficult to pass a budget resolution at the BCA level. But an agreement set in law does not become null and void just because it is politically inconvenient."
Unlike the bulk of the budget plan, this isn't just for show. If passed by the House, Ryan's budget spending levels would be used in negotiations with the Senate under the normal appropriations process--which both sides have agreed to. With Democrats not in the mood to budge, the difference sets up a possible, though still unlikely, election-season showdown on Sept. 30, when current funding is set to expire.
Ryan claimed that his budget simply took into account the so-called defense sequester--automatic spending cuts which were triggered in November by the failure of the so-called "Super Committee." His budget would call for those cuts to be spread from defense spending to other areas such as agriculture, with individual committees assigned to find the savings in their own budgets.
"We
think it's being honest with people," Ryan said.
aparker@usnews.com
Twitter: @AlexParkerDC
Twitter: @AlexParkerDC
Ryan's mystery meat budget
House Budget Committee Chairman Paul
Ryan (R-WI) released a fiscal plan that promises trillions of dollars in tax
cuts and a nearly balanced budget within a decade, but never says how he'd get
there.
By Howard
Gleckman, Guest blogger / March 21, 2012
I
am weary of mystery meat. The latest serving was dished out yesterday
by House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI), who released a
fiscal plan that airily promises both trillions of dollars in tax cuts and a
nearly balanced budget within a decade, but never says how he’d get there.
Ryan
isn’t saying that his budget implies cuts of $4.6 trillion in popular tax
deductions, credits, and exclusions over 10 years, according to new estimates
by the Tax Policy Center. And
that ignores the $5.4 trillion in revenue lost from permanently extending
the 2001/2003 tax cuts.
Ryan
proposes big, specific spending reductions such as cutting Medicaid in half and slashing other
federal spending (except for Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid) by nearly 75
percent from current levels by 2050. But his budget still can’t add up without
eliminating or sharply scaling back those popular tax preferences. Which ones,
it seems, remain a state secret.
Ryan
rolled out a 2013 budget that promises to replace the current individual rate
structure with just two rates– 10 percent and 25 percent. He’d repeal the Alternative Minimum Tax and
abolish the tax increases included in the 2010 health law. For business, he’d
lower the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 25 percent and shift to a
territorial tax system, where multinationals would owe no U.S. tax on foreign earnings.
All
of this would reduce tax revenues by trillions of dollars over 10
years. The Tax Policy Center estimates that a similar corporate rate
cut, AMT repeal, and a two-rate individual system would reduce revenues by
about $4.5 trillion through 2022, even after accounting for the
$5.4 trillion cost of extending the 2001/2003 tax cuts. In 2022 alone, a
Ryan-like plan would reduce revenues by about $600 billion.
To
put it another way, TPC figures such a tax package would
generate revenues of about 15.8 percent of Gross Domestic Product in 2022.
His budget aims to collect about 18.7 percent. That means he’d have to
find about $700 billion in new revenues by cutting tax
preferences.
Keep
in mind that TPC did not model the actual Ryan plan, since it is not
specific enough to estimate. Instead, we looked at a plan
with the elements of his proposal.
But
the rough numbers are stark. And Ryan, who knows better, studiously avoids
naming names when it comes to eliminating tax preferences. Oh, his budget
includes a convincing and articulate explanation about what’s wrong with a tax
system with high rates and a narrow base. He just doesn’t say what he’d do
about it.
There
is a disquieting echo here of President Obama, who so recently did such a
great job explaining what’s wrong with our corporate tax system. The president
happily proposed a politically popular cut in corporate rates to 28 percent,
but identified offsetting tax increases that would cover only a fraction of the
cost.
All
of the major GOP presidential candidates have
played the same black box game—promising huge rate cuts without ever saying how
they’d pay for them.
Ryan
asserts there is “an emerging bipartisan consensus for tax reform that lowers
rates, broadens the tax base, and promotes growth and job creation.” Actually,
he’s wrong. There is an emerging bipartisan consensus to embrace lower rates
without ever saying how to pay for them.
The Christian Science Monitor has assembled a
diverse group of the best economy-related bloggers out there. Our guest
bloggers are not employed or directed by the Monitor and the views expressed
are the bloggers' own, as is responsibility for the content of their blogs. To
contact us about a blogger, click here. To add or
view a comment on a guest blog, please go to the blogger's own site by clicking
on taxvox.taxpolicycenter.org.
Howard
Gleckman, Contributor
I'm author of the book Caring for Our
Parents, and at Urban Institute
What the House GOP Budget Means
for Seniors
The
fiscal plan proposed yesterday by House Budget
Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI) would profoundly change the way seniors and
younger adults with disabilities receive health care and personal assistance.
For
many programs, it would reduce funding from today’s levels even though the
population of those over 65 will double by mid-century. In many ways, it would
end the Great Society’s vision of a federal safety net for these vulnerable
populations and place the burden of their care on states or their families.
This
budget will pass the House sometime in the next few weeks. And make no mistake,
though it has no chance of becoming law, this plan will be a touchstone in what
will be a game-changing debate over federal deficits and the role of
government.
The
House Republican budget would do the following:
Medicare:
It would replace traditional Medicare with subsidies that seniors would use to
buy insurance on the individual market. It would raise the age of eligibility
from 65 to 67. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the federal
government would spend about one-third less on Medicare by mid-century than it
would under current federal policies. That means health spending would become
remarkably efficient or seniors themselves would pay more.
The Affordable Care Act: It would repeal the 2010 health
law, including its important initiatives aimed at better integrating care for
seniors and others with chronic disease.
Medicaid:
Instead of automatic federal funding for a share of this program, states would
receive only an annual grant, which Congress could adjust at will. In return,
states would have the flexibility to operate Medicaid as they choose. CBO
projects that by mid-century federal funding for Medicaid would be only half
what it is today as a share of the economy, and less than one-quarter of what
it would be under today’s policies. The budget would cut planned Medicaid
funding by $800 billion over 10 years.
The
Ryan budget does not mention, or appear to recognize, the important role
Medicaid plays in financing long-term care supports for the frail elderly and
younger people with disabilities, even though it pays more than 40 percent of
these costs and these services represent a third of its budget.
Non-Medicaid services: These critical supports for
those receiving care at home, such as transportation, nutrition, and
counseling, as well as caregiver assistance—already under severe budget
pressure– would take the biggest hit. While the budget outline does not
make specific program cuts, it would likely mean federal funding for most of
these programs would be entirely eliminated. Some programs would be turned over
to the states. Others would disappear.
If
the Republicans win the coming election, the House budget will frame the way
they will govern. Not all of it would become law, even under a President Romney
or President Santorum, but a lot would.
Even
if President Obama is re-elected, services for seniors and the disabled will
likely face deep cuts. In last August’s budget debate and in the fiscal plan he
proposed in February, Obama showed that he too was willing to sharply
slow the growth of programs such as Medicare, Medicaid, and non-Medicaid
services.
He’d
preserve these programs in their current form, but he’d fund them at much lower
levels than under current government policy. The other day, an advocate
laughingly dismissed the idea that programs for seniors and others with
disabilities will face such dramatic cuts. That attitude is naïve and
dangerous. The parameters for the coming budget debate are clear: Substantial
cuts in services under an Obama White House or an historic remake of the safety
net and even deeper cuts under Republican government.
Either
way, seniors, service providers, and their advocates need to prepare for a much
different world.
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