Category: US Congressional

Source: US Congressional Budget Office

H.R. 5110 would amend the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 to allow schools to use federal education funds to purchase or use dangerous weapons (as defined in law) to train students in archery, hunting, other shooting sports, or culinary arts. CBO estimates that the cost to the Department of Education to implement the bill would be insignificant; any spending would be subject to the availability of appropriated funds.

Source: US Congressional Budget Office

H.R. 4278 would make several changes to disciplinary policies for employees of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).

The bill would:

• Allow VA to more quickly remove, demote, or suspend employees;
• Truncate the grievance processes for employees affected by adverse disciplinary action; and
• Require two studies of VA’s performance management processes and oversight.

Source: US Congressional Budget Office

CBO and the staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation estimate that enacting sections 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 107, 108, 109, 110, and 401 of H.R. 5378 would have no effect on direct spending or revenues.

Section 402 interacts with section 106. As a result, the PBM transparency requirements in section 402 would not have incremental effects on direct spending and revenues and are estimated to have no cost. CBO estimates that if section 402 was enacted by itself, the deficit would be $1.3 billion smaller over the 2023-2033 period.

Section 403 would clarify the authority to prohibit PBM contracts that restrict pharmacists’ ability to share information about drug prices in certain commercial insurance plans.

CBO has not completed an analysis of any effects on spending subject to appropriation.

Source: US Congressional Budget Office

S. 1199 would authorize appropriations to establish the Child Online Protection Board to adjudicate complaints against interactive computer service providers (such as Internet service providers, social media companies, and municipal broadband providers). The bill also would authorize the appropriation of funds to appoint guardians at litem (attorneys and social workers who protect child victims throughout court proceedings) and trustees who facilitate restitution payments owed to child victims.

Source: US Congressional Budget Office

Flooding is expected to increase in the future as the effects of climate change increase. In this report, the Congressional Budget Office examines how projected flood risk varies across communities with different economic and demographic characteristics in two multiyear projection periods, one centered on 2020 and the other centered on 2050.

In the 2020 projection period (generally capturing current conditions), the prevalence of flood risk is 9 percent—that is, 9 percent of properties face at least a 1 percent annual probability of experiencing a flood of a depth of roughly 1 foot or more, CBO estimates. A 1 percent annual probability is equivalent to having about a one-in-four chance of experiencing at least one such flood over a period of 30 years. In the 2050 projection period, 10 percent of properties face that risk. Projections of flood risk are uncertain, and CBO aims to provide projections that are in the middle of a range of possible outcomes.

By CBO’s estimates, flood risk varies with communities’ characteristics in the following ways:

• Median household income. In general, projected flood risk is more prevalent in communities in which median household income is lower. Communities in which the majority of householders are Hispanic or Latino are an exception: In such communities, flood risk tends to be less prevalent where median household income is lower. (A householder is a person in whose name a housing unit is owned or rented.)
• Race. Risk is more prevalent in communities with a greater share of White householders, but communities in which most householders are Black (except for those in which the median household income is high) face the largest increases in flood risk from 2020 to 2050.
• Ethnicity. The percentage of properties exposed to flood risk is generally smaller in communities with a greater share of householders who are Hispanic or Latino.
• Type of residence. Flood risk is much more prevalent in communities in which the majority of the dwellings are secondary residences than it is in communities in which most dwellings are primary residences. The difference is larger in coastal areas than in inland areas. In communities with a greater share of renters, projected flood risk is less prevalent.
• Composition of household. In communities in which a greater share of households include someone age 65 or older, projected flood risk is more prevalent. Projected risk is less prevalent in communities with a greater share of households with children.
• Geographic location. The percentage of properties exposed to flood risk in coastal communities is more than twice that in inland communities, and coastal communities are projected to have greater increases in risk from 2020 to 2050. Of all the communities CBO analyzed, coastal communities in which the majority of dwellings are secondary residences have the highest percentage of properties exposed to flood risk.

Because of the nature of the available data, this report cannot identify causes of those variations across communities’ characteristics. Those causes may be complex and multifaceted because they involve questions of where people settle and why, and where governments invest in adaptive infrastructure and why.

Source: US Congressional Budget Office

The Majority Leader of the House of Representatives announces bills that will be considered under suspension of the rules in that chamber. Under suspension, floor debate is limited, all floor amendments are prohibited, points of order against the bill are waived, and final passage requires a two-thirds majority vote.

At the request of the Majority Leader and the House Committee on the Budget, CBO estimates the effects of those bills on direct spending and revenues. CBO has limited time to review the legislation before consideration. Although it is possible in most cases to determine whether the legislation would affect direct spending or revenues, time may be insufficient to estimate the magnitude of those effects. If CBO has prepared estimates for similar or identical legislation, a more detailed assessment of budgetary effects, including effects on spending subject to appropriation, may be included.

CBO’s estimates of the bills that have been posted for possible consideration under suspension of the rules during the week of September 18, 2023, include:

• H.R. 663, Native American Child Protection Act, as amended
• H.R. 1530, Veterans Benefits Improvement Act of 2023
• H.R. 1590, To designate the clinic of the Department of Veterans Affairs in Gallup, New Mexico, as the Hiroshi “Hershey” Miyamura VA Clinic
• H.R. 2872, To amend the Permanent Electronic Duck Stamp Act of 2013 to allow States to issue electronic stamps under such Act, and for other purposes
• H.R. 3371, Wounded Knee Massacre Memorial and Sacred Site Act
• H.R. 3981, Veterans Education Oversight Expansion Act
• H.R. 5378, Lower Costs, More Transparency Act, as amended
• S. 112, To amend title 38, United States Code, to strengthen benefits for children of Vietnam veterans born with spina bifida, and for other purposes

Source: US Congressional Budget Office

S. 994 would amend the Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) program to permit the Department of Justice (DOJ) to award competitive grants to local law enforcement agencies for training programs for their recruits and officers. To be eligible, recruits and officers would need to serve in a local law enforcement agency within seven miles of their residence, or within 20 miles if they live in a county with fewer than 150,000 people, for at least four of the eight-years after they complete the training program. The act would require officers or recruits to repay the training costs if they do not meet the service requirements.

Source: US Congressional Budget Office

The federal budget deficit was $1.5 trillion in the first 11 months of fiscal year 2023, the Congressional Budget Office estimates—$0.6 trillion more than the shortfall recorded during the same period last year. Revenues were 10 percent lower and outlays were 3 percent higher from October through August than they were during the same period in fiscal year 2022.

Outlays in fiscal year 2023 were reduced by the shifting of certain payments—totaling $63 billion—from October 1, 2022 (the first day of fiscal year 2023), into fiscal year 2022 because October 1 fell on a weekend. If not for those shifts, the deficit through August would have been $1.6 trillion.

The deficit was larger in 2022 and is smaller in 2023 by amounts that are largely offsetting because of actions related to the Administration’s planned cancellation of outstanding student loans for many borrowers. The cancellation was never implemented because of the Supreme Court’s June 2023 decision prohibiting it. In September 2022, in accordance with the budgetary procedures used for federal credit programs, the Administration recorded outlays of $379 billion to reflect its estimate of the long-term costs of the debt cancellation, which increased the deficit in fiscal year 2022. In August 2023, the Administration recorded a roughly $330 billion reduction in outlays for the student loan program to reflect the Supreme Court’s decision. That action reduced the deficit for this fiscal year.

The outlay savings recorded by the Administration in August 2023 are less than the cost recorded in September 2022, primarily because a new income-driven repayment plan, which was finalized in June 2023, increases the cost of outstanding student loans. CBO provided an estimate of the cost of that plan in March 2023 and is preparing an update to account for additional rulemaking by the Department of Education and new projections included in CBO’s May 2023 baseline.

The recording of the reduction in outlays for the student loan program in August is the main reason for the upward bend in the 2023 line in Figure 1, which indicates a decline from July to August in the cumulative deficit for this fiscal year. That reduction also means that the difference between the cumulative 2022 and 2023 deficits for the first 11 months of the fiscal year is smaller than it would have been otherwise. Without it, the increase in the deficit for that period, adjusted for timing shifts, would have been larger—$1.0 trillion. The gap will narrow in September 2023 because of the large amount of outlays recorded in September 2022.

As reported in the Monthly Budget Review: July 2023, CBO updated its projection of the deficit for all of fiscal year 2023 to $1.7 trillion. Without the outlay savings recorded in August 2023 to reflect the Supreme Court’s ruling, that shortfall would be about $2.0 trillion. The deficit for fiscal year 2022 was $1.4 trillion. Removing the cost recorded in September 2022 for student loan debt cancellation, that amount would be $1.0 trillion. Excluding the effects of the changing plans for student loans, the deficit is on track to double from $1.0 trillion in 2022 to $2.0 trillion in 2023, CBO estimates.

Source: US Congressional Budget Office

CBO has projected gross federal debt through 2053, assuming that existing laws governing taxes and spending generally remain unchanged. In CBO’s projections, gross federal debt amounts to 124 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) at the end of fiscal year 2023 and 129 percent by the end of 2033. By the end of 2053, such debt reaches 192 percent of GDP.

Source: US Congressional Budget Office

S. 1153 would require the Department of Commerce (DOC) to establish a National Manufacturing Advisory Council to propose solutions to problems affecting U.S. manufacturing, provide advice about federal programs that affect manufacturing, and produce a strategic manufacturing plan annually. The bill also would transfer the functions of the U.S. Manufacturing Council at the DOC to the new advisory council.

Based on the cost of similar advisory committees, CBO estimates that it would cost the department less than $500,000 for staff salaries, travel costs, and other expenses; such spending would be subject to the availability of appropriated funds.