Tag: Congressional Budget Office

Bipartisan Elephants, Endless Debt and Entitlements, Cats without Food … Oh My!

What IS all this fuss about?

Sometimes a picture is worth a 1000 rants.

CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES

CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET OFFICE – CBO

The Long-Term Budget Outlook

JUNE 2010 – (Revised August 2010)

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Image: Federal Debt Held by the Public as a Percentage of Gross Domestic Product

Under Two Budget Scenarios

CBO — The Long-Term Budget Outlook (pdf)

OK sometimes not … What does that Picture mean to me?

2035, Haah!  that’s like a quarter century from now …  you got to be kidding me …

It seems that Party who likes to apologize to Corporations  — for Our Oceans, getting in the way of, their Profits — is at it again!

Not only are they blaming the Victims of the Bush Great Recession, for not taking one of those non-existent Jobs (there is only 1 job to had for each 6 people that need one) —

The Leader of the GOBP Party is now telling American to brace for the Raising of the Retirement Age — his rationale: It’s the only way we’ll be able to pay for the Afghanistan War!

Jeesh!  Don’t they know that the Unemployed, have PAID FOR Unemployment Insurance,  just for times like these?

Don’t they know that American Workers have PAID FOR FICA Taxes, just so that we can retire with a meager shred of Dignity?  

Don’t they know that these are Social Contracts, that OUR Govt has MADE WITH US — in a effort to carry out the ideal “that all are created equal” —

that none should be cast aside, without hope, without opportunity, without a social safety net…

NO of course Not … the Party of No Way, has some very different type of Contracts in mind …

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities economists just confirmed the trends of the last 8 years — Most of the the Economic Gains went to the very Wealthy, while the rest of us struggled to just get by

TOP 1 PERCENT OF AMERICANS REAPED 2/3 OF INCOME GAINS In last Economic Expansion,

Income Concentration in 2007 Was at Highest Level Since 1928, New Analysis Shows

By Avi Feller and Chad Stone – September 9, 2009

Two-thirds of the nation’s total income gains from 2002 to 2007 flowed to the top 1 percent of U.S. households, and that top 1 percent held a larger share of income in 2007 than at any time since 1928, according to an analysis of newly released IRS data by economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez.

During those years, the Piketty-Saez data also show, the inflation adjusted income of the top 1 percent of households grew more than ten times faster than the income of the bottom 90 percent of households.

Wyden amendment gaining support

By Tony Romm, The Hill – 09/22/2009

An amendment to the Senate Finance Committee’s healthcare bill that would permit employees to shop around for health insurance policies is slowly gaining momentum on the Hill.

The idea, pitched by Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) last week, would open the proposed “insurance exchange” — where consumers can compare and purchase insurance plans — to Americans who already receive coverage from their employers.

…

What has made Wyden’s proposal especially appealing today, however, is the Congressional Budget Office’s recent cost estimate. By their math, his amendment would reduce the bill’s impact on the deficit by about $1 billion over the next 10 years.

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-…

I caught the Randi Rhodes show today. She was suggesting that all we have to do to pay for Health Care Reform, including a Public Option, was to just Roll Back the Bush Tax Cuts!

What a Brilliant Idea!

Thanks Rhandi … (So glad you’re back btw)

As it turns out, we just need to let the Bush Tax Cuts Expire, when they are due to “sunset” (ie. Don’t Renew them!)

When Would the President’s Tax Cuts Expire?

by Andrew M. Grossman – April 21, 2004

In 2001 and 2003, President George W. Bush proposed and Congress passed a series of tax cuts to reinvigorate the economy and reduce the government’s burden on workers’ paychecks. Because of opposition to these measures from some in Congress, they were implemented as temporary tax cuts, all of which will expire by January 1, 2011.

http://www.heritage.org/Resear…

“The nation is on an unsustainable fiscal course.”

That is the prognosis of Peter Orszag, the director of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, which he gave in a press briefing coinciding with the release of a CBO report today on The Budget and Economic Outlook: An Update.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that the deficit for 2008 will be substantially higher than it was in 2007, rising from $161 billion last year to $407 billion this year.

The CBO’s report was written before the government announcd the takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, so the impact of the cost of their bailout — a cost of up to $100 billion each — was not factored into the report.

The budget deficit projection gets worse.