Our Stabilize the Debt budget simulator, which allows users to try their hand at deficit reduction, has become an important tool for understanding the magnitude of our fiscal challenges and considering potential solutions. We recently worked with the Dallas Morning News in encouraging its readers to try their hand at our simulator and in analyzing the results of those who voluntarily submitted their choices.

The new fiscal year has begun without a budget blueprint or any spending guidance enacted; the fiscal year 2010 deficit has been pegged at around $1.3 trillion, the second highest (behind last year) as a share of the economy since World War II; public debt is projected to rise to previously unseen levels; opinion polls consistently rate deficits/debt as a top issue; and candidates campaigning for office across the country are talking about the topic, though few are yet offering detailed plans to address it.

Here's CRFB's Chris Dreibelbis with Politico's Patrick Gavin, talking about our Stabilize the Debt! budget simulator. Watch out for the simulator hitting all three major video game consoles in 2011.

As Washington struggles with confronting the mounting federal debt, the public has been given the opportunity to register their thoughts through CRFB’s online budget simulator. The early results indicate that Americans are willing to make some of the difficult fiscal choices that the politicians are avoiding.

In his Sunday Wonkbook post, Ezra Klein highlighted CRFB’s Stabilize the Debt interactive online game, which allows visitors to pick and choose for themselves the policies and programs to cut in order to balance the budget and reduce the federal debt at 60 percent of GDP.

We are so pleased our Stabilize the Debt! simulator has been met with such a positive response. Thanks for all your emails and thanks Derek, thanks Reihan.  We already feel closer to getting the debt to a better place.

CRFB encourages you to check out our budget simulator: Stabilize the Debt!

It's no secret that America's finances are a mess. The problem of our mounting debt can't be solved overnight, but we need to start addressing it now. In this online simulator, visitors get to make the hard choices themselves in order to stabilize the debt at 60% of GDP by 2018.