Republican candidates take to the stage to make their pitch to the American public as to whom “we the people” should place our confidence. The Federal debt is a problem. The Committee for a Responsible Budget published what it calls “Principles for a Fiscally Responsible Campaign.”
An excerpt follows:
Make Deficit Reduction a Top Priority
The next President will need to make reducing the debt a priority. The longer we put off making inevitable and necessary changes, the greater the potential harm to the economy and national security and the greater the risk of some type of fiscally-driven crisis.
Given the size of the fiscal problems they will inherit, the next President will have less fiscal space to enact new tax cuts and/or spending increases than prior administrations – even if they fully offset the costs of those policies – and will have to devote significant effort to reducing the debt. This will be especially true if inflationary pressures persist and interest rates remain high.
There are a number of credible fiscal goals that would leave the country in an improved fiscal situation if pursued. The next President could consider a debt or deficit target over their term, the budget window, or some other time period. For instance, they could work to hold the debt to below the size of the economy over the budget window and put it on a downward path over the long run, which would require roughly $6 trillion of deficit reduction through 2033.
