The Boehner/Obama Fiscal Brawl
Listening to Barack Obama and John Boehner over the past few days put me in mind of two testosterone-addled 22-year olds preparing for a bar fight, rather than the President of the United States and...
View ArticleHow a Delay in the Debt Limit Will Change America’s Fiscal Politics
By now, you know the great taxmageddon story: At the end of the year, a lame duck Congress and a new or newly re-elected president will face the confluence of three extraordinary challenges—the...
View ArticleShould We Delay the Tax Cut Debate Until Early 2013?
Over the past week or so, Bill Clinton, Larry Summers, and Glenn Hubbard have all made the same suggestion: Congress should extend all of the 2001/2003 tax cuts, due to expire at year’s end, into early...
View ArticleObama Proposes Nothing Radical on Taxes. Too Bad.
President Obama today urged Congress to extend the 2001/2003 tax cuts for households making $250,000 or less and insisted lawmakers let those provisions expire for those making more. As the president...
View ArticleIf Congress Goes Over the Fiscal Cliff Your Taxes Will Likely Go Up
If Congressional gridlock sends the U.S. government tumbling over the fiscal cliff later this year, Americans could face an average tax hike of almost $3,500 in 2013. Nearly 9 of every 10 households...
View Article2013 May Be the Year of Perpetual Fiscal Crisis
If 2012 was the year of modest economic recovery and surprising Democratic election success, 2013 may be the year of perpetual fiscal policy crisis. After watching the still-unresolved partisan battle...
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Congress Kicks the Fiscal Can off the Front Stoop
In the end, it looks like Congress isn’t even going to kick the fiscal can down the road. Assuming the House passes the deal agreed to by the Senate on New Year’s Eve, lawmakers will barely get that...
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Is the Trillion-Dollar Platinum Coin Clever or Insane?
Jim Hamilton’s Mock Up of a Trillion Dollar Coin Policy wonks are debating whether a trillion-dollar platinum coin would be a clever or insane way for President Obama to play hardball with Republicans...
View ArticleA Budget Deal is Staring Them in the Face, But Here’s Why Lawmakers Won’t...
There is an obvious solution to Washington’s perpetual budget crisis. But it is unlikely to happen because all the incentives—both political and economic—are completely wrong. First, the solution: The...
View ArticleFive Key Facts about the House Debt Limit Bill
On Wednesday, the House will vote on a bill to delay the upcoming debt limit showdown. The bill includes no spending cuts, no tax increases, and no platinum coins of unusual size. Instead, it will...
View ArticleWhat You Should Know About the Budget Outlook
The Congressional Budget Office released its latest Budget and Economic Outlook earlier this week. As always, the Outlook provides insight into the fiscal status of the federal government. My three...
View ArticleFinancial Markets Snooze Though the Deficit and Debt Debate
Fiscal hawks (including me) often warn about what would happen to financial markets if Washington doesn’t get the deficit under control, and, worse, can’t manage its debt limit mess. I am convinced...
View ArticleSpending in Disguise
Republicans are demanding a deficit-reduction package that’s entirely spending cuts. Democrats insist that revenues must also be included. Are these positions completely irreconcilable? Not if both...
View ArticleHiking Taxes on Corporate Jets: Obama’s Version of Waste, Fraud, and Abuse
President Obama’s proposal to raise taxes on corporate jets is the Democratic version of “waste, fraud and abuse”—a political attack on a target of opportunity that has little significance in the real...
View ArticleJohn Boehner’s Moment of Truth
In July 2000, under immense pressure from President Clinton, the Israeli government made Yasser Arafat a remarkable offer: It would recognize a Palestinian state that included Gaza, more than 90...
View ArticleDebt Limit Madness
Let me see if I have this right: Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has effectively embraced the debt limit plan first offered months ago by President Obama. Under the McConnell/Obama...
View ArticleLet’s Eliminate the Debt Limit
My latest column at the Christian Science Monitor: America’s leaders need to get to yes on a budget deal – one that marries substantial deficit cuts with a much-needed increase in the debt limit. But...
View ArticleTom Coburn: Tax Subsidies Are Socialism
Give Sen. Tom Coburn(R-OK) credit. In a city where obfuscation and misdirection are the coin of the realm, the conservative Republican lets you know exactly where he stands. While most of his party...
View ArticleThe Senate Gang of Six’s Budget Plan Aims at Taxes
The Senate’s bipartisan on again/off again Gang of Six has proposed an ambitious tax and spending package that closely follows the plan offered six months ago by the chairs of President Obama’s fiscal...
View ArticleWhat Would the Gang of Six Really Do to Taxes?
As my Tax Policy Center colleague Donald Marron noted the other day, trying to sort through the various baselines in the Gang of Six’s bipartisan Senate budget plan is amusing, but not necessarily...
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