THE BUDGET RESOLUTION: TEN DO’S AND DON’TS

As Congress begins work this week on the fiscal year 2003 budget resolution,
The Concord Coalition has the following recommendations of things to do and
things not to do:

Things to do

As Congress begins work this week on the fiscal year 2003 budget resolution,
The Concord Coalition has the following recommendations of things to do and
things not to do:

Things to do

• Reaffirm the fiscally
  responsible goal of balancing the budget without using the Social Security
  surplus ¾
  understanding that it will take a few years to achieve.
  
• Recognize that in the
  post-September 11, post-surplus environment, all fiscal policy options should
  be on the table ¾
  from spending cuts to a freeze on tax cut phase-ins.
  
• Stick with CBO numbers
  rather than the more optimistic numbers used by the Administration (OMB) in
  the President’s budget.
  
• Adopt the
  Administration’s suggestion that the FY2002 emergency supplemental spending
  passed in response to September 11 ($20 billion) be excluded from the
  baseline.
  
• Establish
  a new budgetary enforcement framework to replace the expiring provisions of
  the 1997 Balanced Budget Act (discretionary spending caps and the
  “pay-as-you-go” rule for tax cuts and entitlement increases).

Things not to do 

• Do not use an Orwellian
  definition of “balance,” by excluding the cost of the recently passed stimulus
  bill or any other popular legislation from the calculation.
  

• Do not adopt back loaded
  initiatives that rely on unrealistic assumptions.
  
• Do not enact any new tax
  cuts or remove the “sunset” from last year’s tax bill unless it is done within
  the context an enforceable plan to balance the budget without using the Social
  Security surplus.
  
• Do not assume large
  unrealistic savings, as the President’s budget does, by holding non-defense
  discretionary spending below inflation over the next decade.
  

• Do not engage in empty
  rhetoric about Social Security “guarantees,” and trust fund “solvency.”
  Current law is unsustainable. The only way to actually do something
  about that is to change the law.