All You Need To Know About The Federal Debt And Deficit In A 3 Minute Video

 
"We have met the enemy and he is us"
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All you need to know about the federal debt and deficit in 3 minutes.

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The budget deficit next year is expected to be back below its 40-year average, says @USCBO. (http://t.co/RlKtopKWIY) pic.twitter.com/lbCs2K0YCt

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Lower corporate tax revenue, sparked by uncertainty over tax provisions, helped grow deficit. "Revenues to the government from company tax payments are expected to total $315 billion, down from an estimated $351 billion in April. The bigger budget deficit comes because companies are deferring tax payments while they wait for Congress to decide whether to revive expired tax breaks, CBO officials said. Lawmakers are expected to take up legislation after the November elections to renew through 2015 a mix of 50 temporary tax breaks, known in Congress as 'tax extenders,' that expired at the end of 2013....Businesses see the extension of the tax breaks as necessary while Congress dithers on a broader tax overhaul." Mark Felsenthal in Reuters.

Speaking of corporate taxes, Congress agrees on need to stem inversions. But it still doesn't agree on how. "Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) said in a statement that he and other lawmakers are now drafting a proposal that would combat the 'egregious cost-cutting ploy' of tax inversion....That proposal, which would limit how companies use the interest payment deduction, could emerge when Congress returns next month, a spokesman said....But Republicans have taken to blaming Burger King’s switcheroo on the U.S. tax code itself, which a spokesperson for Sen. Orrin Hatch, the Senate Finance Committee’s top Republican, decried as arcane and anti-competitive. Hatch, the spokeperson said, is working with other lawmakers on a separate proposal." Drew Harwell in The Washington Post.

Suddenly, Medicare doesn't look like such a budget-buster. "Every year for the last six years in a row, the Congressional Budget Office has reduced its estimate for how much the federal government will need to spend on Medicare in coming years....The changes are big. The difference between the current estimate for Medicare’s 2019 budget and the estimate for the 2019 budget four years ago is about $95 billion....The reduced estimates mean that the federal government’s long-term budget deficit is considerably less severe than commonly thought just a few years ago. The country still faces a projected deficit in future decades...but it is not likely to require the level of fiscal pain that many assumed several years ago. The reduced estimates are also an indication of what’s happening in the overall health care system." Margot Sanger-Katz and Kevin Quealy in The New York Times.

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"Politics and Economics: The 101 Courses You Wish You Had"
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2012/01/politics-and-economics-101-curricula.html