As the threat of sequester looms large, I must underscore the absurdity of the FAA’s contention that it has no choice but to inconvenience the traveling public if Congress cannot reach an eleventh hour settlement today.
Gary argued this last week, came under attack for it, and made an even more cogent argument last night. He is correct–the FAA is “contorting themselves to come up with the most painful way possible to account for those cuts.” And it need not be this way. Gary and I share the view that despite the definition of sequester, agencies have much greater discretion than is assumed in adjusting their budget. Allowing greater agency discretion would be far less of an exercise of executive authority relative to the Budget Control Act than is routinely exercised by this and past administrations. Has a rigid and one-sided interpretation of the text of a law ever stymied agency prerogative in the past?
Transportation researcher Robert Poole writes:
The Administration’s marching orders to all government agencies covered by the sequester law (including FAA’s parent, the Department of Transportation) seem designed to inflict maximum pain on the traveling public, in hopes of mobilizing aviation stakeholders, the media, and the traveling public to demand that Congress change the law. I have tried to figure out how a mandated cut of $600 million—under 5%– in the FAA’s $12.75 billion budget (excluding the exempted airport grants program) could possibly require all-hands furloughs reducing 47,000 daily personnel by 10% and the shut-down of 100 low-activity (mostly contract) towers and ending midnight shifts at 60 or more low-activity towers (which should have been done in any case). This appears to be a classic example of the “Washington Monument” strategy of trying to prevent budget cuts by proposing the worst possible method of coping—rather than finding 5% of the budget that could be eliminated or deferred with the least harm.
In an interview with Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood on CNN, Candy Crowley noted that even with the sequester:
- The FAA will have more money in this year’s budget than last
- The cuts bring the FAA back to their 2008 funding level in inflation-adjusted dollars
- The level of domestic flights has dropped by 27% since 9/11
- The FAA budget is up 41% since 9/11
The Secretary could not explain away these points.
Folks, this whole exercise is a tactic of fear and intimidation by the Administration to scare Republicans in Congress into relenting and to sway public opinion. If sequester happens and we do see travel delays in the coming weeks, it is not because these delays were necessary.
I am not arguing that sequester is a good thing. Surely, precision cuts are preferred to an across the board hacking of department budgets. I have several friends who are defense contractors and will feel the pain very soon if sequester happens. Nevertheless, agencies still do retain some discretion–if they choose to exercise it–and let’s face it: we are still talking about only a 5% reduction in the discretionary spending budget. It seems to me that until someone is willing to tackle entitlement spending this 5% cutback is just the first chop, with the lumberjack now sharpening his ax again.
You have great points and I agree with almost everything you wrote. But I think instead of just pointing the finger at entitlement spending, you should have said “. . . until someone is willing to tackle both entitlement spending and closing tax loopholes . . .”
I don’t hear anyone claiming we need further tax rate increases, but it seems like we have a lot of preferences that allow some special interest individuals and corporate welfare recipients to duck under the thresholds that the rest of us are subject to.
P.S. I’m a Medicare participant (entitlement) and what the President calls a high-income earner, so I could conceivably be affected by both types of changes. But I’m willing to pay my fair share in both areas as long as everyone else does too.
@Louis: Very fair point and I fully agree–loopholes must be closed and frankly I’m even in favor of paying a bit more in taxes if it will help us to balance our books.
Any ideas for how to change the current system of feedbacks where Congress is incentivized to institute so many loopholes/earmarks/pork/deductions [whatever you want to call them] in the first place? The worst loopholes seem to benefit relatively few at the expense of the many, with no apparent benefit for the greater good.
We’re going to wind up having to pay more taxes (on top of the January 1 hikes). Because we aren’t going to return to the long-run average of ~ 19% of the economy consumed by the federal government. We’re closer to 25% currently. We’re going to have to bring it down, but won’t get it back to ‘normal’.
Personally I’d love to see a return to the budgets of the Clinton administration, adjusted upwards for both inflation and population growth. Sadly ain’t gonna happen.
Congress (both Democrats and Republicans) have devolved into an entitled class. They are totally insulated from the effects of the laws they pass or don’t pass.
They need to have the same healthcare they’re prescribing for us, period.
No pensions and/or retirements. Let them get IRAs just like we have to.
If they can’t balance budgets they don’t get paid, period. Two years of it and they’re out, period.
There is no doubt that the FAA and other federal agencies have grown fat and need trimming but the way the Republicans are attempting to do it is wrong and while disruption is sometimes a good way to get people’s attention, this is not a great example of it. The reason is, the very Republican legislators who are proposing these cuts will feel none of it. They’ll get paid, they’ll get their healthcare, they’ll get their free postage, they’ll fly no matter what the cost, etc. These cuts do not affect them in any meaningful way except (hopefully) at the ballot box.
While I’m an Obama supporter I don’t excuse him either. He’s had and continues to have opportunities to lead through this and he’s been weak.
My guess is many Americans, like Louis (#1) will gladly make some sacrifices for the greater good but not if they’re made to feel like suckers as Wall Streeters and others walk away without sacrifice.
Take the money out of politics and make serving in Congress a public service where there are real consequences to non-action and maybe we’ll see some change.
The White House is even sending out memos to every federal department making sure everyone stays in line to inflict maximum punishment (aka scare the masses) so they can get back to spending borrowed/printed money and push us further into debt.
Change You Can Believe In!
I am inclined to agree with your take, here. Across the government, even with sequestration in place, the federal budget INCREASES more than $7 Billion in 2013. We now have the largest government in the history of mankind at an asotnishing $3.8 Trillion, but don’t have enough to pay our bills? We had no need to furlough civil servants in 2009, 2010, 2011, or 2012 when the budgets were as small as (gasp) $3.1 Trillion. If the administration had just asked the department heads to use their judgment to cut the $44 Billion out of their budgets, it NEVER would have been done this way and it never would have been noticed by the public. This is pure political theater and it is a despicable way to ruin the public’s trust of its leadership. BTW, while I agree that the tax system could be much simpler, we are really just rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. If spending weren’t careening so dangerously out of control, few would even notice how fair or unfair the tax system is. And despite the “loopholes” protecting all those greedy, evil capitalists, the top 20% still pay over 70% of the taxes in America, whereas the bottom 20% receive (rather than pay) taxes. So, while you are busy excoriating the rich, perhaps you could stop and think about all those social services they are funding.