Trump’s “taxpayer first” budget

Trump’s “taxpayer first” budget May 23, 2017

2018-Blueprint-p1-normal

President Trump has released his detailed budget proposal for 2018, an ambitious document that will encourage his supporters and enrage many of his critics.

His team was reportedly told to examine each line item and ask the question, “Would taxpayers want their money spent on this?”  The budget cuts many social welfare benefits and what was described as “feel good programs that don’t work.”

But it will save $3.6 trillion over ten years, at which time (2027) the federal budget will be balanced.  This, while still increasing defense spending and protecting Social Security.

Does a budget like this, described as a “taxpayer first” budget,  have a chance?

From Trump taxpayer-first budget proposes 3.6 trillion in cuts – Washington Times:

The budget that the Trump administration will roll out Tuesday does much more than balance in 10 years and boost military spending; it forces a major change in the way Washington looks at the spending by putting the focus on taxpayers instead payees.

President Trump’s team went through the budget line by line with a simple question: Would taxpayers want their money spent on this?

Turns out that plenty of times the answer was “No.”

The result was $3.6 trillion in cuts over 10 years — the most ever proposed by a U.S. president — to reach balance in 2027 without touching Medicare or Social Security retirement benefits, as Mr. Trump promised.

Still, cuts to education, social welfare and other programs while increasing defense spending by $54 billion raised eyebrows on Capitol Hill.

Mick Mulvaney, the president’s budget director, called it a “taxpayer-first budget.”

With the U.S. carrying a $20 trillion debt, he said, there is no excuse for continuing to pay for feel-good programs that don’t work.

“We cannot continue to simply measure our compassion or our success by the amount of money we spend. We are going to measure our compassion and success by actually helping people and by respecting taxpayers who pay for it in the first place,” he said.

For the budget’s math to work, the Trump administration relies on increasing economic growth to 3 percent, which is an ambitious goal above the 1.9 percent average of the past decade.

[Keep reading. . .]

The complete document is here.

Illustration:  The cover of the budget document, from the White House Office of Management and Budget, Public Domain

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