Hensarling Entitlement Cap Amendment Would Require Deep Cuts In Entitlement Programs

Publication Date: June 2004

Publisher: Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (Washington, D.C.)

Author(s): Robert Greenstein; Richard Kogan

Research Area: Banking and finance

Keywords: Federal budget; Economic projections; Fiscal future; Income diversity

Type: Report

Abstract:

Rep. Jeb Hensarling will offer an amendment to budget-process legislation on June 24 to establish an “entitlement cap” that limits total expenditures for entitlement programs other than Social Security and requires such programs to be cut $1.55 trillion over the next ten years. The amendment is scheduled to be the fourth amendment considered to the budget bill being brought to the House floor (H.R. 4663).

Under the amendment, which also will be included in a Hensarling “substitute” to be offered as one of the final amendments to the budget legislation, a cap would be set each year on allowable expenditures for entitlement programs other than Social Security. The cap would be set at a level well below what entitlement programs would cost under current law, necessitating deep cuts to reduce costs to the level of the caps. In any year in which Congress and the President did not cut entitlements enough to fit within the cap, automatic cuts in entitlement programs would be triggered.