Here’s one of the wilder suggestions floating around for what the President could do if Congress fails to raise the debt ceiling.
Category Archives: deficits
Why Worry about the Fiscal Slope?
Lessons from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA)
Or, cognitive dissonance in the conservative world
Links for 2012-11-10
A few links to some items I found of interest.
Finding compromise
President Obama won a second term in office yesterday, receiving 50.3% of the popular vote But the Republicans held control of the House of Representatives and Americans remain deeply divided. Historically, the party in control of the White House loses some congressional seats in the midterm elections. That means that any legislation passed into law over the next two years, and likely the next four years, is going to have to be agreed to by both a Democratic President and a Republican House.
Going over the fiscal cliff
The “fiscal cliff” refers to a broad set of tax increases and spending cuts that under current U.S. law will take effect in January. A recent assessment by Bank of America Merrill Lynch estimates the tax increases in 2012 could come to $470 B and spending cuts another $250 B, for a combined fiscal shock of $720 B, or 4.6% of GDP.
Reducing oil imports
On Wednesday I noted that encouraging more U.S. oil production was unlikely to result in a significant drop in U.S. retail gasoline prices. Nevertheless, I believe that there would be some important economic benefits from lowering the U.S. oil import bill, as I discuss here.
To Make the Math Add Up, Romney Needs Ryanomics
Or more precisely, Ryanomics as interpreted by the Heritage Foundation/Center for Data Analysis.
A Debate in Foreign Affairs: Stimulus or Reform
From an exchange in the September/October issue of Foreign Affairs, with Raghuram Rajan, Karl Smith and myself. I write in my comment:
Federal receipts and expenditures
I was interested to take a look at the trends in receipts and expenditures of the U.S. federal government over the last 40 years.
The Ryan Plan and bipartisan compromise
I have a dream.