Controlling the Deficit: The Debate Continues

The report discusses the important budget events of 2011. It begins with the House Republican budget and the president's response. The very different approaches to health and discretionary spending and tax policy are analyzed in detail. The policy debate continued into the confused debt limit negotiations of July. The Budget Control Act finally emerged. It capped discretionary spending and created a "super committee" that was to propose additional deficit reductions. The committee failed miserably. An automatic across-the-board spending cut is supposed to result from that failure. The report describes its effects on defense and nondefense spending.