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.
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly in the Bipartisan Budget Act
On Wednesday, we published an analysis of the Bipartisan Budget Act, which would replace a portion of the FY2014 and FY2015 sequester with mandatory...
Erskine Bowles to Kiplinger: Beware the Ticking Debt Bomb
Today, Kiplinger's Personal Finance published a new interview with Fiscal Commission co-chair and CRFB board member Erskine Bowles. In a discussion...
Spending Agreement "Splits the Difference" for 2014
On Tuesday, Sen. Patty Murray and Rep. Paul Ryan announced a budget deal that set discretionary spending levels for the next two years, removed some...
WaPo: A Flawed Deal is Better Than No Deal
So far, reactions to the budget agreement have been mixed. As we said in our report yesterday, Understanding the Bipartisan Budget Act, the deal...
Diving Deeper Into the Budget Conference Agreement
With the details on the agreement reached by Budget Committee chairs Paul Ryan (R-WI) and Patty Murray (D-WA) made fully available yesterday, CRFB has...
Line Items: Deal with It Edition
We Have a Deal – Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) announced a budget deal late Tuesday after weeks of negotiation and a few days...
Updated: Summarizing the Ryan-Murray Deal
Update: See our full analysis of the deal here On December 10th, Budget Committee chairmen Patty Murray and Paul Ryan announced an agreement to set...
3-Month SGR Fix Proposed
With the end of the year fast-approaching and the looming prospect of a 24 percent cut to Medicare physician payments on January 1, the House of...
Lawmakers Must Abide by PAYGO...Here's Why
In recent weeks, we've used our blog to call for strict adherence to pay-as-you-go (PAYGO) principles for extending emergency unemployment benefits...
Could Postal Reform Be in a Budget Deal?
As budget talks continue, negotiators could turn to postal reform for budgetary savings. The United States Postal Service is currently in bankruptcy...
Why Do Doctors Choose a $2,000 Drug Over a $50 One? $117
A good piece in the Washington Post over the weekend takes a look at why Medicare physicians continue to use an expensive drug to help prevent...
Will the Budget Deal Raise User Fees?
As the budget conference committee continues its work on finding a bipartisan solution to replacing a portion of the sequester with better targeted...