JAMES CAPRETTA Journalist Profile

Articles

Tag Archive: Budget cuts

2 weeks ago | aei.org | JAMES CAPRETTA |Samuel J. Abrams |Yuval Levin |Desmond Lachman

Op-Ed The House GOP’s Medicaid Plan Won’t Fix Health Care Op-Ed Trump’s Funding Axe Triggers a Convenient Free Speech Cry from Presidents and Deans Op-Ed Making DOGE Constitutional Post Economics Is Not Trump’s Strong Suit Post Congress Should Let DC’s Taxpayers Pay for Its Police Force and Schools Post A Specter of Uncertainty Haunts the US Economy Press Discussing DOGE’s cuts and public reactions to Trump’s policies: Pletka on NBC’s ‘Meet The Press’ Post Appropriations and the Rule of Law...
Tag Archive: budget reform

3 weeks ago | aei.org | Kevin Corinth |Marc Thiessen |JAMES CAPRETTA |Matt Weidinger

Report American Enterprise Institute An Evaluation of Cost-Saving Reforms to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Press Discussing the House budget bill and college protesters: Thiessen on Fox News’ ‘Fox News Sunday’ Multimedia Facing the Future: The Federal Budget Lacks Fiscal Sanity Op-Ed Democrats’ DOGE Delusions Article Budgeting for Fiscal Sanity Post A Trumpian Budgetary Fog Report Dysfunction in Federal Budgeting: Structural Factors and Selected Reforms Report American...
Tag Archive: Fiscal policy

3 weeks ago | aei.org | Yuval Levin |Kyle Pomerleau |James Pethokoukis |JAMES CAPRETTA

Op-Ed The Republicans’ Debt Delusion Post Tariffs Cause Short-Term and Long-Term Economic Pain Post America’s Economic Crossroads Multimedia Third Annual Health Solutions Summit: Improving Medicare’s Sustainability Op-Ed Without Spending Cuts, Brace for Slow Growth Multimedia Facing the Future: The Federal Budget Lacks Fiscal Sanity Working Paper A New Long-Run Economic Model Basis for Projecting the Finances of the US Government Article When Fiscal Policy Meets Mathematical Reality Article...
Third Annual Health Solutions Summit: Improving Medicare’s Sustainability

2 months ago | aei.org | JAMES CAPRETTA |Josh Gordon |Leslie Gordon |Lawson Mansell

AEI Senior Fellow James C. Capretta took part in the Third Annual Health Solutions Summit hosted by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget to discuss the Medicare program and its sustainability. As Medicare faces shortened window for solving its solvency problems, policymakers are looking towards solutions. Along with a panel of experts, James Capretta discussed not only which policies could alleviate the fiscal deterioration, but could why it vital that the problem be solved.
The “Current Policy” Baseline Is a Destructive Gimmick

2 months ago | aei.org | JAMES CAPRETTA |Julia Cataneo

The temptation to bend and break inexpedient rules and norms is ever-present in politics, but the current leaders of the GOP, starting with the president but extending well into Congress, seem to be indulging the impulse with frequency and gusto rather than resignation. The emerging plan to distort how the budget baseline is calculated when assessing the GOP’s tax and spending agenda is an especially glaring and damaging example of this pattern.
Budgeting for Fiscal Sanity – James C. Capretta

Mar 6, 2025 | lawliberty.org | JAMES CAPRETTA |Richard Samuelson |Helen Dale |Thomas Powers

If the 118th Congress is remembered at all, it will likely be for its ineffectiveness and dysfunction, which persisted until the merciful end. In its last days, as it rushed for the exits, it put off, once again, final decisions on federal agency budgets until at least mid-March (nearly six months into the current fiscal year). This delay included military spending, which has obvious security consequences.
Appropriations and the Rule of Law

Feb 11, 2025 | aei.org | JAMES CAPRETTA |Julia Cataneo

The Trump administration has targeted multiple federal agencies for substantial downsizing and budget cuts, which the media is prone to describe as having immediate and permanent effects. The implication is that the president is driving his agenda through Washington and nothing is going to stand in his way. But, in fact, nothing much of permanence has happened yet, or is likely to in the coming weeks.
The Budget Baseline as Trump 2.0 Begins

Jan 23, 2025 | aei.org | JAMES CAPRETTA |Julia Cataneo

A new forecast from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reveals the scale of the fiscal challenge that the second Trump administration has inherited from its predecessors, including Trump 1.0 and the Biden administration. Amid much talk about the problem, there is not yet an identifiable path for reversing the deterioration. Indeed, based on the policies surfaced to this point by the president and his allies, even more rapid borrowing looks more likely than sustained fiscal consolidation.
Reconciling More Spending on Defense with Long-Term Fiscal Stability

Jan 14, 2025 | aei.org | JAMES CAPRETTA

James Capretta’s chapter from Affording Defense: Investing in American Strength to Confront a More Dangerous World (American Enterprise Institute,2025),edited by Mackenzie Eaglen. To download this and additional chapters, please visit: www.aei.org/affording-defense/ A disruptive national election in the United States has opened the door to a new course for fiscal and defense policy.
National Health Expenditures in 2023 and the Implications for Further Reform

Jan 10, 2025 | aei.org | JAMES CAPRETTA |Julia Cataneo

In December, analysts at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) published the agency’s annual assessment of national health expenditures, in this case covering calendar year 2023. There is modest good news in the results but also plenty to suggest that additional cost-disciplining reforms are needed. The main takeaway is that annual national health expenditures (NHE), relative to the size of the US economy, have been relatively stable for some time now.