Conservatives Demonstrate That Cuts Alone Won't Balance the Budget
Rep. Hal Rogers (R-KY), the chairman of the House Appropriations
Committee, released a partial list of the cuts that he says will be
included in an upcoming spending bill. Now in control of the House of
Representatives, conservatives finally have their chance to show the
world how they can balance the budget through spending cuts alone.
By Michael Linden, Michael Ettlinger | February 10, 2011
Conservatives for almost two years now have claimed that the federal
budget deficit is solely a spending problem—and that the solution,
therefore, is to just cut spending as deeply as possible. Before the
2010 congressional elections, then-House of Representatives Minority
Leader Boehner (R-OH) promised to find $100 billion in cuts in the
first year of the new Congress. Since then, the newly elected House
majority has been long on boastful claims but short on specifics.
Until yesterday. Finally, the chairman of the House Appropriations
Committee, Rep. Hal Rogers (R-KY), released a partial list of the cuts
that he says will be included in an upcoming spending bill. Now in
control of the House of Representatives, conservatives finally have
their chance to show the world how they can balance the budget through
spending cuts alone.
And as it turns out, they're finding it awfully hard to find even the
$100 billion they promised—let alone the hundreds of billions of
dollars more it would take to actually bring the federal budget into
balance. The cuts outlined today are extremely deep and extremely
damaging, cutting into the meat of important public programs—but they
still add up to only about $20 billion.
Indeed, the most definitive Republican plan to date to reduce federal
spending perfectly illustrates the dilemma facing those who would try
to cut their way to balance. Even a small down payment toward spending
cuts starts to bite quickly into things our country wants and needs.
Imagine what the full $100 billion would look like, but first let's
look at what $20 billion would do. Some of the deepest cuts announced
today include:
Slashing job training programs fully in half—despite the fact that a
skilled workforce is the key to our future economic prosperity, and
not to mention the fact that the unemployment rate is currently at 9
percent.
Steep reductions for scientific research and development investments
that are key to the nation's economic competitiveness, growth, jobs,
and health—among them funding for the National Institutes of Health,
Centers for Disease Control, the National Laboratories, the National
Science Foundation, the U.S. Geological Survey, the National Oceanic
and Atmospheric Administration, the National Institute of Standards
and Technology, and the Agricultural Research Service. All would have
to cut back, compared to the president's levels, some by as much as
one-fifth.
A 90 percent cut to community policing grants that go to cities and
towns to help improve the effectiveness of their police forces, on top
of a 20 percent cut to all other state and local law-enforcement
assistance. Additionally, the House budget will include a 22 percent
cut to the Office of National Drug Control Policy and a 23 percent cut
to the National Drug Intelligence Center.
A massive slashing of federal support for state and local water and
sewage projects alongside the complete elimination of high-speed rail
funding and a $230 million cut for the Federal Aviation
Administration, as compared to the president's previously proposed
levels.
Substantial reductions to services targeted at low-income children,
including cuts to the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for
Women, Infants and Children; grants to states to support maternal and
child health; and a near-halving of community health centers, which
treated more than 7 million low-income children in 2009. Amazingly,
the House budget would all but eliminate Poison Control Centers.
Cutbacks in food safety. Both the Food and Drug Administration and the
Food Safety and Inspection Service will see rollbacks if the House
budget is adopted.
These are not cosmetic adjustments. As Rep. Rogers himself said,
"These cuts are real and will impact every district across the
country." But, he argues, despite all the damage these cuts will do,
they are necessary to "right our fiscal ship and begin to reduce our
massive deficits and debt."
And how much fiscal ship-righting do we reap from these painful cuts?
Not a whole lot. All together, if the entire package of cuts were
implemented, the federal government would save about $20 billion
compared to last year's spending levels. Now $20 billion is not
nothing, of course, but it is only 1.3 percent of this year's fiscal
deficit and less than 3 percent of the average deficit over the next
10 years even under the rosiest of assumptions.
In short, for conservatives to fully balance the budget sometime this
decade purely by cutting spending, they are going to have to come out
with another 34 packages worth $20 billion a piece in spending cuts.
Are there another 34 packages of secret spending cuts waiting in the
wings? Rep. Rogers doesn't seem to think so. "We have taken a wire
brush to the discretionary budget and scoured every program to find
real savings," he admits. All that scouring results in significant
damage to vital services and programs but not a lot of deficit
reduction.
And that paradox is exactly why those who argue we can "right our
fiscal ship" without raising additional revenue are, and always have
been, blowing smoke. The new leadership in the House of
Representatives promised $100 billion in spending cuts—itself not
enough to come near to balancing the budget. And yet, after the budget
was "scoured" for savings, they can find just a fraction of that $100
billion.
Given the limitations they set for themselves—no defense cuts, no tax
increases—they were bound to fail at cutting their way to a balanced
budget. As Rep. Rogers explains, "Make no mistake, these cuts are not
low-hanging fruit." Certainly he's right about that. But if they've
already had to climb way up into the tree to find $20 billion in
spending cuts, where do they think they'll find the next several
hundred billion?
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2011/02/show_me_money.html
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