Republicans are doubling down on using an alternative accounting method for budgetary projections on their tax bill.
Using the “current policy baseline” method allows Republicans to effectively ignore the cost of extending their tax cuts — a $4.7 trillion write off.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) supported the “current policy baseline” this week.
“It’s a really important principle, and I hope that we can employ that because it makes a big difference in the calculations, and I think it also makes good, logical sense,” he told The Hill.
Economist Kent Smetters of the University of Pennsylvania said this logic was mind-boggling.
“It boggles the mind,” he said in an interview with The Hill. “It opens up a pandora’s box.”
The non-partisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (CRFB), a public finance think tank in Washington, called the policy baseline a “massive budget gimmick” in a position paper this week.
The maneuver would allow an extra $3.4 to $4.6 trillion of deficit increases through 2034, CRFB found.
It would also “set a dangerous and costly precedent that could be used to justify tens of trillions of dollars in future borrowing,” the group said.
— Tobias Burns
