CBO's Director On the Debt Ceiling: Defaulting "a dangerous gamble"

The debate about the best approach to raising the debt ceiling is occurring while the country faces serious ongoing budgetary and economic problems. CBO is currently preparing its summer update to the Budget and Economic Outlook; pending further economic developments and possible changes in federal laws and policies, the budgetary and economic picture looks broadly similar to what we portrayed in our latest economic projections in January and our latest budget projections in March:

The budget is on an unsustainable path. Debt held by the public is already higher relative to GDP than it has been in more than half-a-century, and CBO projects that it will exceed its all-time high in about a dozen years under current policies.

Putting the budget on a sustainable trajectory in the face of an aging population and rising health costs cannot be achieved by repeating policies that may have been acceptable in the past; rather, we will need to make significant changes relative to the experience of the past several decades in popular programs, people’s tax payments, or both. (For background on the difficult and unavoidable tradeoffs, see CBO’s Budget and Economic Outlook and Long-Term Budget Outlook, with the key points highlighted in recent blog postings here, here, and here.)

Delaying the decisions needed to put the budget on such a trajectory poses clear dangers. Following the intensive public discussions of the past few months, a failure to agree on credible, specific policy changes would increase doubts about the ability of the government to manage its budget. That could, in turn, raise the perceived risk of U.S. government securities, which would lead to higher Treasury interest rates, higher government interest costs, and the possibility of dislocations in financial markets. On the other hand, the adoption of a credible plan for deficit reduction could reduce Treasury interest rates and raise output and income over the medium term and long term. (For discussion of the risk of a fiscal crisis, see this CBO issue brief; for analysis of the effects of deficit reduction on the economy and thereby the federal budget, see this letter that CBO published earlier this month.)

Moreover, and with a larger immediate impact on most Americans, the economy remains mired in a severe slump.

Three-and-a-half years after the recession started, roughly 10 million fewer Americans have jobs than if employment had continued to expand at its pre-recession pace. Total output of the economy this year will be about $700 billion less than would occur with high use of our labor and capital resources. In addition, 44 percent of the workers who were unemployed in the first half of this year had been out of work for more than 26 weeks—an unprecedented share in the period since World War II. CBO expects that the lingering difficulties of the long-term unemployed in finding jobs, as well as the loss in business investment during the slump, will weigh on the nation’s output for years to come. (CBO’s recent Outlooks and Updates have discussed the lasting effects of the downturn on future output and income; for a summary of the consequences of losing a job during a recession, see this CBO issue brief.)

Addressing the nation’s long-term fiscal challenges during a period of economic weakness poses particularly difficult policy choices. Reductions in tax rates or increases in government spending during the next few years would probably boost economic activity and employment in the short term, but the added debt would weaken the medium-term and longer-term outlook—unless such policies were accompanied by credible changes in policy that would reduce budget deficits over time. (CBO has analyzed the economic effects of alternative paths for fiscal policy in testimony to the Senate Budget Committee,last week’s letter to the Senate Budget Committee, and other reports.) Based on CBO’s analysis in a report last January and a letter that followed, certain short-term tax and spending policies would probably be much more effective at spurring output and employment than others.

With the federal budget and the economy both facing such serious problems, the additional problems that would probably be caused by a default on the federal government’s obligations could be especially damaging. We are on the brink of harming the budget and the economy, possibly undermining the international financial system, and doing significant damage to the credibility of legal commitments made by the U.S. government. At the same time, an increase in the debt ceiling that was accompanied by enactment of an effective plan for significantly reducing future deficits could have substantial positive effects on the budget and the economy over time.

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CBO's Director On the Debt Ceiling: Defaulting "a dangerous gamble"

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