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In preparing for tonight’s State of the Union address, President Obama would do well to heed suggestions recently offered from two fiscal experts who have advised him in the past.Christina Romer, former chairwoman of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers,…

With health care reform back on the policy agenda this week, it is important for Congress to keep cost controls and the country’s enormous fiscal challenges at the forefront of the discussion.The law that was passed last year had the…

Proposals from President Obama’s fiscal commission and other bipartisan panels that issued reports last year are drawing renewed attention as the new Congress gets to work.Rep. Kevin Brady (R-Texas), for example, has introduced a bill that would cut federal spending…

An OMB report concludes that exemptions in the PAYGO law have been used for legislation adding hundreds of billions of dollars to the deficit. PAYGO generally requires legislation affecting direct spending or revenues to be offset, though last year's law…

Recent calculations by Gene Steuerle and Stephanie Rennane at the Urban Institute underscore Medicare’s financial challenges and the need to curb its growing costs. The new numbers show the relationships between what people of different ages and incomes pay into…

Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner has warned Congress that the statutory debt limit could be reached by the end of March. As of last week, total debt outstanding that is subject to the limit was $13.95 trillion, approximately $335…

Urban Institute scholar Gene Steuerle has run the numbers and found that for Medicare, retirees are getting a really good deal.In a fascinating set of calculations, Steuerle and colleague Stephanie Rennane, looked at both Social Security and Medicare and estimated the levels of benefits relative…

A recent Congressional Budget Office report warns that interest payments on the national debt could explode over the next decade.Dropping rates over the past two years resulted in declining interest payments as a percentage of GDP. Continued federal borrowing, economic…