CBO Blog

CBO’s economic forecasts have been comparable in quality to those of the Administration and the Blue Chip consensus. Large errors in CBO’s forecasts tend to reflect challenges faced by all forecasters.

In a presentation before the Treasury Borrowing Advisory Committee, CBO Director Phillip Swagel spoke about CBO’s latest 10-year budget and economic projections.

CBO examines choices lawmakers would face in establishing a federal tax on the miles traveled by commercial trucks—including choices about the tax base, rate structure, and implementation methods—and illustrates how such a tax might affect the federal budget.

Each quarter, CBO provides information about its work in progress. As of October 4, the agency was working on 140 cost estimates for bills in addition to 32 analytic reports and working papers.

CBO estimates that the total shipbuilding budget would average $31 billion per year, one-third more than the Navy estimates. The plan would require an increase of more than 50 percent compared with recent shipbuilding budgets.

The federal budget deficit was $984 billion in fiscal year 2019, CBO estimates. CBO’s estimate is based on data from the Daily Treasury Statements issued by the Department of the Treasury; the department will report the actual deficit for fiscal year 2019 later this month.

From 1995 to 2018, the share of people ages 55 to 79 who were employed increased from 33 percent to 44 percent. CBO examines the changing demographic characteristics of older people and the effects several factors may have on their rate of employment.

To explore how changes to financial regulation might affect the federal budget, CBO analyzed three illustrative policies. The agency found that the policies’ largest budgetary effects would stem from macroeconomic feedback. Watch the narrated presentation.

CBO Director Phill Swagel spoke about the agency's latest 10-year budget and economic projections at an event hosted by the Center for Strategic Tax Reform and on a panel discussion at IHS Markit’s 2019 Economic Policy Summit. CBO's Director discussed many of the same issues last week in a presentation at PwC.

In lieu of publishing a separate report providing additional information about CBO’s long-term projections for Social Security, the agency is publishing the data that it would have presented in that report.