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.
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MarketWatch: July 19-23
As of mid-morning Friday, U.S. and overseas markets await the results of the stress tests conducted on European banks, to be released at noon. Based...
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The Social Security Retirement Age
At a time when Social Security is increasingly getting lawmakers' attention for the possibility of reform, raising the retirement age is starting to...
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Reducing Improper Payments
Today, President Obama signed the Improper Payment Elimination and Recovery Act, hoping to make a dent in wasteful spending. Improper payments are...
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All Talk, No Game on Discretionary Limits
There have been a lot of numbers thrown around with regards budget resolutions, deeming resolutions, and discretionary spending limits. To keep it...
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The OECD Weighs In
The OECD recently published a great report on possible fiscal scenarios, and the results are exactly as expected: if the advanced countries of the...
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Senate To Pass Unemployment Benefits Extension
The Senate essentially voted to pass an extension of unemployment benefits yesterday, invoking cloture on the measure with the requisite sixty votes...
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Should We Pay for Tax Cuts?
The blogosphere exploded last week (see here and here) when a number of Republicans suggested that Congress need not offset the costs of tax cuts...
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Waiting for the Chairman to Speak
Ben Bernanke, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, will present his twice-yearly testimony to Congress tomorrow (the Senate) and then again on...
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REDUCE Legislation Aims to Cut Deficit by $70 Billion
Today, four Democratic congressmen—Reps. Gary Peters, John Adler, Jim Himes, and Peter Welch—introduced four-pronged legislation, called the REDUCE...
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It's Summerstime in the Fiscal Policy World
Larry Summers, the Administration's top economist (and former CRFB board member), has an op-ed in the Financial Times today, looking at why the...
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‘Line’ Items: International Sports Edition
Opens and Tours – Americans did not fare well in sporting events across the pond this weekend; leaving us Yanks to rely on past memories of success at...
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Steuerle Joins the Announcement Effect Club
CRFB board member Eugene Steuerle joined the Announcement Effect Club in a post on the Urban Institute's website. In the post, he talked about the...