CRFB's Maya MacGuineas Says U.S. Must Raise Debt Ceiling

Yesterday CRFB President Maya MacGuineas appeared on Bloomberg Television to talk about how imperative it is to address our dire fiscal outlook while at the same time raising the debt ceiling on time. MacGuineas argued that the current debt ceiling debate has been different than previous ones:

There are serious commitments not to actually increase the debt ceiling by enough people that it is going to be a much harder vote than it has been in the past--and let me be clear we do have to lift the debt ceiling as someone who believes strongly and firmly that we need to change our budgetary ways.  Failing to lift the debt ceiling would be potentially catastrophic and make all of these things much worse.  But at the same time we also do want to make changes to the budget.  We are on the precipice of deciding whether we want to make fundamental changes to our budget or kick it till after the election so we have a lot of big choices facing us right now.

According to MacGuineas, there is enough blame to go around for everyone in regards to how we got into this fiscal mess and the oncoming explosion in debt. In order to avoid a looming fiscal crisis, lawmakers from both sides need to come to the table and compromise.