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2 weeks ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Here are this week’s reading links and fiscal facts:Real spending reform is still missing from the GOP’s budget plan. The Wall Street Journal’s (WSJ) Richard Rubin quoted Boccia on the House’s reconciliation bill: “While Republicans were campaigning on reducing spending and controlling the growth in the debt, once they put pen to paper, their real priorities demonstrate that they care a lot more about cutting taxes than cutting deficits.
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2 weeks ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Here are this week’s reading links and fiscal facts:OMB official signals impoundment is on the table. Politico’s Jennifer Scholtes and Katherine Tully-McManus report that an Office of Management and Budget (OMB) official indicated that President Trump may impound congressionally appropriated funds if lawmakers don’t enact necessary spending cuts. They write: “[Sen.
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3 weeks ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Here are this week’s reading links and fiscal facts:Seize the moment to rein in spending and avert fiscal disaster.
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1 month ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Social Security has been in the news lately—but for the wrong reasons. The Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) efforts to investigate an exaggerated fraud problem and subsequent legal battles have brought the program into the spotlight. But this coverage is missing the elephant in the room: Social Security is hurtling toward a benefit cliff—not just because of demographics, but because of a fundamentally flawed, self-defeating program design.
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1 month ago | 
cato.org | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
May 7, 2025 • Visual Feature May 7, 2025 • Visual Feature There’s a big problem with Social Security. Most people misunderstand its trust fund, believing it holds real financial assets that ensure future benefits—the equivalent of a piggy bank stuffed with dollar bills. But the truth is that piggy bank is empty.
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1 month ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Here are this week’s reading links and fiscal facts:A shrinking economy should be Congress’s wake-up call to halt tariffs and runaway spending. US real gross domestic product (GDP) contracted by 0.3 percent in the first quarter of 2025, per the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA). The trade deficit expanded to record highs (see figure below), largely a result of companies stocking up on imported goods before tariffs kicked in.
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1 month ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Here are this week’s reading links and fiscal facts:Another misguided Social Security proposal from Congress. Rep. Angie Craig (D-MN) recently reintroduced her bill to eliminate taxation of Social Security benefits, offsetting the lost revenues with transfers from the general fund. The bill would also eliminate the payroll tax cap, covering earnings above $250,000 from 2026, and since this threshold wouldn’t be indexed to inflation, by 2034, all earnings would be taxed. Rep.
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1 month ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Here are this week’s reading links and fiscal facts:End automatic tax withholding.
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2 months ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Here are this week’s reading links and fiscal facts:How persistent deficits harm everyday Americans. In a new study, Ernie Tedeschi, director of economics at the Budget Lab at Yale, analyzes the impact of a permanent 1 percent of GDP increase in primary deficits—roughly the cost of extending the expiring Trump tax cuts—on inflation and interest rates.
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Dec 19, 2024 | 
cato.org | Ivane Nachkebia
As part of the Cato Institute Report to the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), we submitted the following recommendations to address the looming Social Security insolvency and its impact on the federal budget. Social Security is not a savings system but a pay-as-you-go scheme, where taxes collected from today’s workers fund the benefits of today’s beneficiaries.
