A long-term budget for entitlements and required revenues

Entitlement programs in America have a long-term effect on the country’s fiscal and economic condition, but today’s budget-making procedures fail to provide an orderly pathway for helping to resolve disputes about long-term fiscal goals and commitments to Americans.

In “A long-term budget for entitlements and required revenues,”  Stuart M. Butler and Maya MacGuineas propose a procedure to establish a long-term budget for entitlements, and revenues to sustain them, as part of a reformed federal budget process. The procedure for enacting and revising the long-term budget would have two elements:

• Element 1: Congress would enact a 25-year spending plan for the major entitlements, along with a clear funding plan to cover their cost. A long-term budget would also include tax expenditures. The funding plan could include dedicated taxes (e.g., a payroll tax), other revenues, or specified savings from other programs. The long-term budget would be the default for these areas of spending and revenues unless Congress made explicit changes during a formal review conducted every four years after a presidential election.
• Element 2: To maintain the long-term budget as the default, we propose an “inside-outside” approach. A commission chosen by Congress and the president would regularly design and implement a package of spending and/or revenue adjustments to keep the long-term budget on track; but a bipartisan and bicameral congressional super-committee could develop an alternative package which would take effect if enacted using an expedited procedure.