Here’s a comparison of various federal budget proposals circulating in Washington these days. For fiscal 2014, which begins on Oct. 1 of this year, the law in place (with another sequester) requires an across-the-board cut of $109 billion, with half coming from defense and half from domestic programs. Nothing would be cut from Social Security, Medicare, military pay, veterans’ benefits and a few other programs. Chances are that Congress will do some tweaks to protect the military budget. You’ll see that no proposal comes close to a balanced budget.
Continuing resolution with sequester
(in billions)Senate passed
(in billions)House passed
(in billions)Obama proposal
(in billions)Continuing resolutions with sequester
(in billions)
Social Security$813$860$854$860$854
Defense$651$600$560$618$588
Medicare$504$535$509$524$509
Medicaid$267$357$321$304$297
Net interest on debt$223$244$242$223$243
All other spending$1,227$1,119$1,045$1,249$1,127
TOTAL$3,685$3,715$3,531$3,778$3,618
Tax increases$44$20$0$31$0
Deficit$973$693$528$744$616
Total debt$17,249$18,008$17,777$18,247$17,886
SourceOMBSenateHouseOBMCBO