Penny and MacGuineas in the Press

Tim Penny, co-chair of the Peterson-Pew Commission on Budget Reform, was interviewed today for an hour on his home state public radio station. Saying that we're about to go over the cliff regarding the federal budget and its debt burden, Penny laid out the Commission's argument for beginning immediately to implement a plan for getting the nation's debt under control. Penny took a number of questions from callers, and didn't pull any punches in describing the necessity for action, and the extent of tough political choices that must be made. At the current rate of borrowing, the federal government will soon exceed debt levels not seen since World War II. As a portion of the country's economy, Federal debt held by the public will soon exceed 100%.

Today Maya MacGuineas also honed in on that alarming 100 percent projection for 2022, which is based on reasonable assumptions about what policymakers are likely to do on tax and spending policies. In other words, she wrote in the NY Daily News, we’ll owe loans that are equal to the entire value of all the economic activity generated in the United States in a given year….” Bottom line: “If we don’t wrestle this beast today, it will devour us tomorrow.”