The Congressional Budget Office dropped its analysis of the $1.8 trillion social spending bill today, and the first thing to know is that they estimate it at $1.6 trillion over ten years.
So it's now officially the $1.6 trillion social spending bill. They also figure that it will raise about $1.3 trillion in revenue over ten years. The total effect on the deficit is $367 billion over ten years.
However, this doesn't count the revenue raised by going after tax cheats, which would raise at least $200 billion over ten years according to earlier CBO projections. That brings the effect on the deficit down to $167 billion over ten years, possibly even less.
That's about $16 billion per year, which comes to a net increase in the deficit of one half of one percent. That's 0.5%.
Note that this is a ceiling. If the tax cheats generate more revenue, as many economists think they will, the effect on the deficit could be close to zero.
This is about as good as it gets in the real world, and it ought to satisfy the hawkiest of the fiscal hawks. It's time to vote.
Joe Manchin has concerns! What's the rush? His people need to go over the bill with a fine toothcomb to ensure there's nothing there to upset the coal companies.
At least Gottheimer and company seem to be on side at last, meaning Sinema probably is too.
If the tax cheats generate more revenue, as many economists think they will,'
Larry Summers has a piece in the Washington Post arguing just that. He believes revenue estimates put out by CBO regarding beefing up the IRS are grossly underestimated, and don't square with the academic research on this topic. A couple of factors he cites are A) preemptive compliance strengthening (ie, would-be tax cheats who engage in less evasion because they know the odds they'll be caught have increased) and, B) the revenue-positive effects of better IRS customer service (currently some revenue loss is caused by honest taxpayers who can't get the assistance they need to file accurately).
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/11/17/cbo-build-back-better-irs-revenue-too-low/
Doesn't it still have to be fully revenue neutral in order to comply with reconciliation rules in the senate and avoid a filibuster or paygo not just " close enough "? And clearly it is not " as good as it gets in the real world ". That would be something that really does score neutral by cbo. They are not that far off and that certainly is not some sort of impossible target.
And , if this is such a miniscule issue, then should be easy for democrats to renegotiate to get it really neutral. If that negotiation is so hard , then really cannot argue that this difference is not important.
And is thus scoring the final house bill? And did not that include some extra goodies like leave provisions that manchin considers something he got agreement was out ? So won't they need to strip them back out in the senate to get manchins vote anyway? If so, how much spending will that cut and get them closer to target.
Maybe the question should be how much, if any , they still are over budget after things they will need to cut in the senate as manchin opposed and felt he got agreement to remove.
I expect if you take out things that manchin will insist on , that you will be back in balance if you count the irs presumed savings or close. And seems obvious solution is to just lower that salt cap as much as you need . That is controversial anyway and really goes against progressive principles as only helps the rich anyway. Even if you want to argue that some upper middle class affected by the 10000 salt cap now are not rich, anyone affected by say lowering it from 80k to 70k is certainly rich . While some of the democrats from rich liberal high tax state districts insist on salt relief , the hard progressive caucus is fine with a salt cap . And those rich district congressmen are not going to die on the hill for a difference of 70k or 80k.
I do expect the controversy will be on whether the democrats count the 200 billion irs savings in the cbo footnote. Which under current rules, cannot count..
But if democrats just vote to ignore the rules in general to not require revenue neutrality, that would look politically bad and a good potential republican commercial. And I doubt manchin will agree to that .
This is often expressed as simply what manchin and sinema require to support the bill. But to vote yes now means they have to both support the bill in concept AND agree to ignore the actual rules. And that is asking more.
But I think good chance democrats will ignore the rule that ignores the irs savings. That rule is more technical and explaining the reasons for it ( and there are good ones ) is not something easy to do for general public. Hard for Republicans to do a commercial that democrats ignored a rule that requires you to ignore something. That you can get away with politically. And manchin might go that far.
So I would think democrats, if they have any political sense, will find some way to renegotiate just enough to get a zero cbo score including the cbo irs ignored savings. And might be there just by removing provision Pelosi put back in after manchin negotiated them out .
"Doesn't it still have to be fully revenue neutral in order to comply with reconciliation rules in the senate"
Well, why don't you do your own research on that and get back to us? You wrote 580 words here, but couldn't bestir yourself to use teh google and answer that question. And no, I didn't read past that first sentence. Why should I?
He's a Concern Troll.
And a wordy one.
Perhaps because I did and found out best I could tell that those are the rules. That is why I asked of it is not the case, because I thought ot was. But I have enough humility to wonder if I am missing something and have ot wrong and maybe, if so, someone who knows more might explain where I am wrong.
So I could learn something I did not already know.
You might try it some time.
I believe that "revenue neutral" for the purposes of reconciliation means that the cost of the bill that comes out of reconciliation has to be the same as the cost of the bill that went in to reconciliation. It doesn't mean that the effect on the budget it zero.
Doesn't it still have to be fully revenue neutral in order to comply with reconciliation rules in the senate and avoid a filibuster or paygo not just " close enough "?
Then why didn't you say so, troll? Not that anyone would believe you without cites and links, which are apparently alien to you. You know, something along the lines of "This source (linked) says the BBB bill must be 'revenue neutral' where 'revenue neutral' is defined as {place definition here}. Does anyone know if this is really the case?" But you didn't do that, which leads me to believe that you didn't do any research at all. Particularly when on called you on this exact same issue once, did your homework for, and found the answer to the question 'you extensively reseached' in less than 30 seconds.
There's a reason why most people here detest you, and it's a good one, IMHO.
This is a complaint I've brought up more than once, a couple of times going so far as to do his research for him (Not that doing so was hard: In one case the answer to the 'question' he was asking was literally at the top of the search results to my very first query.)
TL;DR: He's not going to change his behaviour and he's going to keep sea lioning until he gets the boot.
Neither the CBO nor anyone else can project anything in economics to within 10% over 10 years. The CBO estimate is deficit neutral within the error of estimation.
Perhaps it will enable fixing the infernal menu tree which takes several minutes to navigate only to be told there is no one to take your call and you should go to the website, the problems with which were what drive you to the phone in the first place..,
It ought to satisfy the hawkiest of the fiscal hawks?
Oh, gosh yes.
It will be like they just sat on a plate of jello. Everyone loves jello!
It's 1.6 trillion of new spending over 10 years. 1.8+ overall.
Time for some perspective here (which Kevin has provided in some of his posts).
The 1.6 trillion bill is spending over 10 years. A reader at the Washington Post calculates what the cost per year would be if the rule for social spending was the same as the rule for military spending and tax cuts. From his letter to the editor:
"So, according to Media Rules Regarding Defense Budget Headlines, the Build Back Better Plan would cost $240 Billion a year.
According to Media Rules Regarding Spending for Regular Americans, the Defense Budget would cost $7.5 Trillion over 10 years.
For comparison, Trump's tax cut for large corporations and the wealthy are estimated by some to cost $2.3 Trillion over 10 years."
The current inflation is not helping your cause. Social spending just isn't in right now. In terms of Biden's legislative agenda, it's probably behind covid relief, infrastructure, voting act in terms of popularity.
A small package makes sense in this environment. Even then, it won't buy the votes like infrastructure will.
Hooray for us
No, not the BBB. There are details coming out about the infrastructure bill and one of them would allow the United States to adopt ADBs (Adaptive Driving Beams) for car headlights
https://autos.yahoo.com/adaptive-driving-beams-finally-going-155500631.html
Using LEDs, computers and sensors these LEDs would sense an oncoming car and darken the LEDs that would otherwise blind the other drivers. Then once that car had passed the LEDs would return to their normal brightness. This means for an old guy like me who hates driving at night I can use high beams all the time and not worry about how it affects the other drivers, but it keeps the road in front of me brightly lit. Europeans have had this tech for awhile. I believe NHTSB has to approve but is leaning that way
Here's a better explanation of the tech:
https://www.autoblog.com/2021/05/19/legalize-adaptive-driving-beams-opinion/
This is a stunning use of tech - and this old codger would welcome this with open arms
This old codger who ate his carrots all his life would greatly appreciate not being blinded.
Carrots improving night vision was just British propaganda to hide their use of radar to detect incoming warplanes during WW II.
Actually, carotene, which gives carrots their color, is a vitamin A precursor, which in turn is a constituent of rhodopsin, the photosensitive chemical in the rods of the human retina, which give us night (scotopic) vision.
Yes, but more carrots will not enhance night vision or strengthen your eyesight if you have sufficient levels of vitamin A already.
Half a percent, half a percent, half a percent onward.
I don't understand why Democrats don't insist on "fail-safe" provisions when theses taxing and spending matters are on the table.
In other words, when the Republicans, as under Trump, cut taxes by $1.5 trillion and claim (as they always do) that the tax cuts will "supercharge" the economy and wind up reducing the deficit rather than expanding it, why isn't there a provision which basically says "if the deficit gets larger, these tax cuts are reversed and taxes are raised on Wall Street to make up for the losses". This would change US tax policy overnight as the Rs know full well they constantly cut taxes assuming (quietly) that the revenues will never be made up, despite their outright lies.
If the Democrats had the wherewithal to insist on such provisions they would be able to preclude the tax cuts in the first place.
Reasonable point. But I still think my argument has PR power. “You say this will reduce the deficit? Put your money where your mouth is and guarantee it.”