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CBO Blog
CBO Releases New Report: UMRA
The Short-Term Consequences of Deficit Reduction Under Different Economic Conditions
March 29, 2013Projected Spending and Revenues in Historical Context
March 28, 2013How Different Future Interest Rates Would Affect Budget Deficits
March 27, 2013Changes in Discretionary Funding During the Past Few Years
March 26, 2013The Accuracy of CBO’s Budget Projections
March 25, 2013Answers to Questions from Members of Congress
March 25, 2013U.S. Economic Performance
March 21, 2013How Has CBO’s Estimate of the Net Budgetary Impact of the Affordable Care Act’s Health Insurance Coverage Provisions Changed Over Time?
March 20, 2013CBO releases: Defense Budget Cuts
Snapshot of Guarantees of New Residential Mortgages
March 15, 2013CBO Testifies on the Social Security Disability Insurance Program
March 14, 2013Snapshot of the Highway Trust Fund
March 14, 2013CBO Testifies on Federal Financial Support for Fuels and Energy Technologies
March 13, 2013 Snapshot of Child Nutrition Programs
March 13, 2013Snapshot of Unemployment Benefits
March 12, 2013Snapshots of CBO’s Budget Outlook
March 12, 2013CBO’s Role in Budget Resolutions
March 11, 2013CBO Releases New Report: The Effects of Automatic Stabilizers on the Federal Budget as of 2013
CBO Releases New Report: Monthly Budget Review
CBO Releases New Report: Federal Grants to State and Local Governments
Presentation to the National Association for Business Economics
March 5, 2013
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As I mentioned in an earlier blog post, we think that some of our answers to follow-up questions from Congressional hearings may be of general interest, so we’re posting them. Following a recent hearing, we were asked by a Member of Congress: “Are there economic conditions under which deficit reduction would have a smaller effect on unemployment and GDP than under current conditions?” Here was our answer: |
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As I mentioned in an earlier blog post, we think that some of our answers to follow-up questions from Congressional hearings may be of general interest, so we’re posting them. Following a recent hearing, we were asked by a Member of Congress: “Based on historical trends of revenue and spending, is the primary driver of deficits over the next ten years historically high spending?” Here was our answer: |
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As I mentioned in an earlier blog post, we think that some of our answers to follow-up questions from Congressional hearings may be of general interest, so we’re posting them. Following a recent hearing, we were asked by a Member of Congress: “How would higher-than-expected interest rates affect federal budget deficits over the next decade? In particular, what would be the effects of these scenarios: |
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As I mentioned in an earlier blog post, we think that some of our answers to follow-up questions from Congressional hearings may be of general interest, so we’re posting them. |
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Following a recent hearing, we were asked by a Member of Congress: “Does CBO ever go back and review its estimates of the budgetary impact of legislation?” Here was our answer: Yes, CBO routinely monitors the budgetary effects of enacted legislation to help improve projections of spending and receipts under current law, as well as to improve cost estimates for new legislative proposals. |
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After CBO participates in Congressional hearings, the Members of the Committees before which we have testified often send us questions that they did not have time to ask during the hearings themselves. Our answers to such “questions for the record” are ultimately included in the reported proceedings for those hearings. |
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A few weeks ago, I participated in a panel discussion about why the world economy has been performing poorly. Below are my opening remarks, which drew heavily on CBO’s reports What Accounts for the Slow Growth of the Economy After the Recession? and The Budget and Economic Outlook: Fiscal Years 2013 to 2023, followed by some additional comments. |
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CBO’s report last month about its latest budget projections (The Budget and Economic Outlook: Fiscal Years 2013-2023) summarized various changes to the agency’s projections of federal health care spending. To elaborate on that summary, an earlier blog entry discussed the reductions that CBO had made in its projections of Medicare and Medicaid spending. |
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Before the recent financial crisis, federal agencies and the government-sponsored enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac guaranteed (meaning, assumed the financial risk for) about half of the total volume of residential mortgages originated each year. In 2008, as the financial crisis worsened and the government took control of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the situation changed dramatically: By 2012, more than 95 percent of new mortgages were federally guaranteed. |
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This morning I testified on the Social Security Disability Insurance (DI) Program before the Subcommittee on Social Security of the House Committee on Ways and Means. My testimony—which updates a CBO report from 2012 on the same topic—examines the reasons that the DI program has experienced rapid growth in its costs and number of beneficiaries and presents a variety of options for changing the program. |
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CBO projects that, starting in 2015, the highway account of the Highway Trust Fund will have insufficient revenues to meet its obligations, resulting in steadily accumulating shortfalls. That projection is based on two assumptions: that the taxes whose receipts are allocated to the highway account will continue at their current rates (most of those taxes are scheduled to expire at the end of September 2016) and that federal funding for highways will increase at CBO’s projected rate of inflation. |
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Under current law, total funding for child nutrition programs will grow from $20 billion in 2013 to $29 billion in 2023, CBO projects. That rise largely reflects projected increases in food prices and thus the cost per meal, although the number of meals served by those programs is also expected to grow. The School Breakfast Program is projected to see the fastest growth, because CBO expects that more schools will participate and will implement policies that make it easier for eligible children to take part in the program. |
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Benefits provided through the unemployment insurance system—a partnership between the federal government and state governments—tend to fluctuate automatically with the unemployment rate. In addition, in times of high unemployment, federal lawmakers often supplement regular and extended unemployment benefits with temporary programs. Since 2008, during and after the most recent recession, temporary programs have significantly expanded the benefits available to unemployed people; those temporary benefits are currently due to expire at the end of December 2013. |
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To expand CBO’s efforts to communicate the analysis we do for the Congress in new and easily accessible ways, we will start releasing “snapshots” of the budget outlook. These are straightforward graphs with short captions that, we hope, will provide quick and useful insights into aspects of the federal budget. The graphs draw directly from the baseline budget projections that we published last month in The Budget and Economic Outlook: Fiscal Years 2013 to 2023. |
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The House and Senate Budget Committees have announced that they will be developing and voting on proposed budget resolutions this week. Past experience indicates that CBO will receive lots of questions about those budget resolutions and about our “estimates” of their impact. So, let me explain a bit about them. |
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I was pleased to have an opportunity to speak this morning to the National Association for Business Economics about the budget outlook. |
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