The US Congress remains far from the finish line of a budget deal
AFTER MONTHS of wrangling and short-term extensions, on January 7th America’s congressional leaders announced the outline of an agreement to avoid a government shutdown. If that sounds too good to be true, it’s because it is. Although the latest news from House and Senate leadership is a step forward, serious disagreements persist and Congress remains far from the finish line.
Mike Johnson, the Republican House speaker, told his colleagues over the weekend that the leadership had agreed to $886bn for defence and $704bn for other discretionary spending for the 2024 fiscal year. That is in line with a deal negotiated last year between Mr Johnson’s predecessor, Kevin McCarthy, and President Joe Biden. In exchange for raising the debt ceiling, total discretionary spending would be limited to $1.59trn in 2024.
In a separate announcement on January 7th Chuck Schumer, the Democratic Senate majority leader, said that the top line was actually $1.66trn, with $772.7bn in non-defence discretionary spending. But that figure is also in line with the Biden-McCarthy talks: an extra $69bn was included as part of a side deal during the same debt-ceiling negotiations. Some of that extra money came from moving around existing funds.
2024-01-08 17:53:26
Original from www.economist.com
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