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Amid bipartisan frustration over the federal budget process, Congress early this year created a special committee to develop reforms that could enable lawmakers to pass spending bills on schedule and in a more effective and thoughtful manner. There were high…

Returning to Washington this week, Congress and President Trump face a pile of leftover budget work that they should try to complete with a greater sense of fiscal responsibility than they have shown in the recent past. Even if the…

Since 2001 the Defense Department has received $2.2 trillion in special funding that has been on top of the basic defense budgets that Congress has approved through regular annual appropriations. That amounts to 20 percent of total defense appropriations over…

The Treasury Department’s final report for Fiscal Year 2018, showing a 17 percent ($113 billion) jump in the deficit, has drawn new attention to the nation’s worsening fiscal position and injected the issue into the midterm congressional campaigns. The sobering…

WASHINGTON -- The Concord Coalition today warned that the rapidly rising federal budget deficit -- totaling nearly $779 billion in Fiscal Year 2018 -- reflects a structural gap between spending and revenues that is largely ignored in Washington even as…

Social Security benefits for more than 67 million Americans will increase 2.8 percent next year, the federal government announced yesterday. The increase, which is tied to the government’s Consumer Price Index (CPI), is the highest in seven years. While older Americans…

With the federal deficit projected to exceed $1 trillion in Fiscal 2020, many economists worry that Washington’s heavy borrowing to cut taxes and increase spending could make it more difficult to counteract the next economic downturn. At an event this…

Students, educators and other residents of the Minneapolis and St. Paul area will try to develop plans to reduce federal deficits in an interactive exercise this Thursday, Oct. 4, at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs. The “Principles and Priorities”…