Blog
Welcome to our blog – The Bottom Line, where you’ll find up-to-date commentary and analysis on the most important news in the fiscal world. Below is a list of our blog posts.
Keep the War Gimmick Out of Doc Fix Discussions
The war savings gimmick is back! As the debate over how to offset a permanent "doc fix" to Medicare's Sustainable Growth Rate formula heats up, the...
Line Items: An Appropriate Result Edition
One Debate Spent, More to Come – The long saga over the Fiscal Year 2014 budget came to an end as Congress approved of spending bills funding the...
Generals: Don't Turn Away from Reforming Military Retirement Benefits
One of the most contentious provisions in the Ryan-Murray budget agreement that became the Bipartisan Budget Act was a provision that reduced cost-of...
Washington Post: "Lawmakers Should Offer Up a Fiscally Responsible 'Tax Extenders' Bill"
We couldn't have said it better ourselves! A Washington Post editorial today called on Congress to break with the trend of recent Congresses and...
CBO's "Approaches to Reducing Federal Spending on Military Health Care"
Military personnel costs continue to increase as a share of the defense budget. One of the fastest growing components is military health care, where...
With Spending Bill Passed, More Fiscal Steps Ahead
Yesterday, the Senate passed the Omnibus appropriations act (72-26), following strong passage in the House (359-67). The bill will now be sent to...
The Debt Doctor: Coburn Announces His Retirement
Yesterday, Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK), M.D., announced that he would retire at the end of the year, two years before his Senate term would normally...
Event: The Moral Case for Addressing America's Fiscal Crises
A large national debt has far-reaching consequences. On the blog, we often talk about the economic consequences of debt, as they are perhaps the most...
Event: Divergent Views on Overhauling Social Security
Largely due to changing demographics, the Social Security Trust Fund will be exhausted within the next 20 years. To avoid this, most reform plans...
Winners and Losers from the Omnibus Legislation
Last month's Ryan-Murray budget deal set overall spending levels for the government at $1.1 trillion, but it did not set specific spending levels for...
The Omnibus Bill Has Passed the House
Lawmakers in the House moved quickly to pass the omnibus appropriations bill released two days ago with a 359-67 vote. Earlier in the day, the Senate...
War Spending in the Omnibus Bill
Among the many things we noted yesterday on the blog about the omnibus appropriations bill was the similarity between war spending in the bill and in...