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.
What About Education Cuts?
Deficit Challenge suggestions continue to pour in. Recently, one commenter suggested we cancel all new Education programs proposed or started under...
Financial Report of U.S. Government
The Treasury Department recently released its annual Financial Report of the U.S. Government, reporting on the budget deficit, net operating costs...
‘Line’ Items: A Lonely Road, Paying for Jobs
Highway to Nowhere – Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) has blocked a vote on temporarily extending unemployment and COBRA benefits, the Medicare “doc fix” as...
“Painful, Unglamorous, and Indispensible Work of Fiscal Discipline”
Those were some of the words uttered by House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) today at the Brookings Institution as the latest political leader to...
The Ever-Growing Announcement Effect Club
EPI's Lawrence Mishel joined the Announcement Effect Club with an article co-written with David Walker (already a member) in Politico last week. In...
Weekend Editorial Roundup
Here are the highlights from this weekend’s editorials on fiscal and budget policy: The New York Times chided Jim Bunning for holding up a bill that...
Two More FDIC Bank Closings
On Friday evening, the FDIC reported that it has taken over an additional two banks ( Rainier Pacific Bank, Carson River Community Bank) for a cost to...
So What Does "Current Policy" Look Like?
Here at CRFB, we love constructing baselines. Whenever CBO constructs its own budget baseline, in fact, we rush to adjust it. CBO's projections, as...
CBO/JCT Reports Roundup
A number of very interesting and relevant government reports came out the week of February 22, 2010.
Bunning is Right on Unemployment: “We Should Pay For It”
Last night, Senator Jim Bunning blocked an effort to pass a one-month “extenders” bill by unanimous consent. The bill includes temporary extensions of...
Obama Appoints Four More to the Deficit Commission
President Obama has named his remaining appointees to the Commission, including David Cote (CEO for Honeywell International), Alice Rivlin (former CBO...
IMF Paper Outlines Fiscal and Monetary Exit Strategies
The IMF just recently released a new report, Exiting from Crisis Intervention Policies, arguing that as the crisis winds down, it is more important...