Explaining Analytical Methods
- Working Paper
Key Methods That CBO Used to Estimate the Macroeconomic Effects of the 2025 Reconciliation Act: Working Paper 2026-01
The 2025 reconciliation act included a wide range of provisions that affect policies governing federal revenues and spending. This working paper describes the key methods that CBO used to estimate the law's macroeconomic effects.
- Report
Effects of the Surge in Immigration on State and Local Budgets in 2023
CBO estimates how the surge in immigration that began in 2021 affected state and local budgets in 2023. State and local tax revenues grew, but the costs of providing services grew more.
- Report
Federal Financial Support for Public Transportation
In this report, CBO describes public transportation in the United States and explains how the federal government supports mass transit. The report also explains how financing subsidies provide additional federal support.
- Working Paper
Fiscal Substitution in Spending for Highway Infrastructure: Working Paper 2021-13
CBO provides estimates of how much state and local governments that receive federal grants for highway capital projects substitute that funding for their own spending on highway capital.
- Report
Issues and Options for a Tax on Vehicle Miles Traveled by Commercial Trucks
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.
- Report
Federal Support for Financing State and Local Transportation and Water Infrastructure
Sixty percent of state and local investment in transportation and water infrastructure is financed using tools that impose costs on the federal government: tax-exempt bonds, tax credit bonds, state banks, and direct federal credit programs.
- Working Paper
Fiscal Substitution of Investment for Highway Infrastructure: Working Paper 2018-08
The federal government provides grants to state and local governments for their transportation infrastructure. State and local governments use some of those funds to replace funds that they would have provided for such investment.