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The National Taxpayer’s Union has summarized each of the major budget proposals for the U.S. federal government’s 2015 fiscal year. We threw together the following chart to make for a quick visual comparison of each:
As you can see, each of the budget proposals increase total spending over FY2014’s baseline level. Each of the proposals cuts discretionary spending below the level recorded for Fiscal Year 2014, while each increases so-called “mandatory” spending, which covers net interest payments on the national debt, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and the new Affordable Care Act exchange subsidies, over what is planned to be spend in FY2014.
The federal government’s 2015 fiscal year will begin on October 1, 2014.
Of these major proposals, so far, only the House Republican budget proposal has made it through the House of Representatives. President Obama’s budget proposal for federal spending in Fiscal Year 2015 was much more successful than his previous budget proposals, gaining two votes in favor, compared with the unanimous opposition to the President’s previous budget proposals.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Senate appears once again set to fail in its obligation under the law to produce any budget proposal for the next fiscal year. The U.S. Senate, controlled by President Obama’s political party, last complied with the requirements of the law to produce its own budget resolution in 2009 and in 2013.