The Obama administration, responding, we assume, to the putative message sent by the Massachusetts election result, has proposed that federal budgets be completely frozen for three years, and then only grow at the rate of inflation thereafter.
This is a step in the right direction.
Obama to Seek Spending Freeze to Trim Deficits
WASHINGTON — President Obama will call for a three-year freeze in spending on many domestic programs, and for increases no greater than inflation after that, an initiative intended to signal his seriousness about cutting the budget deficit, administration officials said Monday.
However, it does not go nearly far enough:
The freeze would cover the agencies and programs for which Congress allocates specific budgets each year, including air traffic control, farm subsidies, education, nutrition and national parks.
But it would exempt security-related budgets for the Pentagon, foreign aid, the Veterans Administration and homeland security, as well as the entitlement programs that make up the biggest and fastest-growing part of the federal budget: Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.
Good grief. Looks like they’re not really serious at all.
There are two big buckets of spending out there: mandatory and discretionary. This move by the Obama administration only applies to the discretionary portion, which is roughly one-third of the total budget. The other two-thirds of mandatory spending is not part of this proposal, which means that mandatory spending will continue to grow in future budgets.
It is worth noting that growth in the mandatory portion of the budget is what
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