U.S.: By the numbers: Obama’s budget cut plans deep, but not too deep
- $3.73
trillion the size of Obama’s latest budget plan, just released today - $1.1
trillion the amount Obama plans to cut from the deficit over the next decade
- 2/3 the share of deficit cuts that would come from cutbacks in various federal programs
- $7.2T the amount that would be added to the public debt – not the deficit – over the next decade
- $4T the amount Obama’s own deficit commission wanted to cut over the next decade source
- » Only one silo gets the cuts: Obama wants to effectively limit all non-security discretionary spending for the next five years, an area which only accounts for 12 percent of federal spending, at the cost of doing something about defense spending or programs like Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security – which, as popular as they are, account for huge chunks of the pie. The cuts are also much lower than what Republicans want, although they’re also hoping to avoid defense spending cuts, even though that’s a huge chunk.