WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama’s budget do-over is certainly an upgrade. U.S. deficits a decade from now would be sharply lower than under his previous plan. But the approach is still full of accounting gimmicks, and ducks making necessary long-term fixes. That tactic may be good politics as the president heads into an election year, but it also shows a worrying lack of urgency.
The slight fiscal progress of Obama’s first attempt earlier this year mostly evaporated once the Congressional Budget Office re-ran the numbers. Debt as a share of the economy would have risen to 87 percent in 10 years versus 62 percent last year, according to the CBO. This updated version of his budget would aim to limit deficits to 2.5 percent of GDP in 2015 and 2 percent toward the end of the decade. That would more or less stabilize debt ratios at current levels and mimics the bottom-line numbers of the plan recently put forward by House Republican leader Paul Ryan.
0 comments:
Post a Comment