Sounds like a good start. But why is the time limit in October, when they took office in January? Let’s give the President 30 days to suggest an overall budget plan and 30 days more for Congress to create a budget plan plus a final 30 days (90 days total from taking office) to pass the budget plan.
A Budget Plan is a report that starts with a list of every constitutionally empowered department of the government, i.e. from Art I Sec 8, e.g.
· Treasury, · Commerce, · Citizenship, · Bankruptcy, · Mint and Currency, · Counterfeiting,
· Standards, · Post (Communications) Offices, · National Transportation Roads,
· Patents-Copyrights-Trademarks,
· Piracy and Terrorism, · War, Marque and Reprisal,
· Army,
· Navy,
· Military and Militia Regulation, · DC Governance, · Approval of Regulations, and
· Ratification of Treaties,
whether these functions and powers are merged into a single cabinet position.
The report informs the President for the beginning (previous ending) condition of the biennium just ended, first, of current inventory of all assets under the control of the budgeting entity with acquisition cost, market value and maintenance costs,
second, a complete list of all debts, borrowings and liabilities with amounts, rates and maturities,
third, a brief on the sources of income showing amounts received and expected receipts in a cash flow statement,
fourth, the expense and outflow of monies that includes all payments plus labor and materials,
fifth, a statement of the net “equity” position of the taxpayers that compares the result for the prior budget period and shows whether the entity is solvent, and
lastly, from these data a report on performance to the previous budget with a proposal for a budget for the next period. We should bear in mind that in many organizations a huge chunk of spending occurs in the last couple of months of the budget period so that all the money is used up. The proposed budget then uses the previous spent money plus adding a percentage “to account for inflation and added personnel” or expanded charter. This is not management that succeeds.
This report delivered as the Congress is being seated is used to create a biennial budget proposal for the President. Notice that budgets for the entire period of the Congress with as little overlap as possible will end last-minute omnibus reconciliation budget bills.
The Budget Plan shows budgeted spending and expected revenues from fees, leases, taxes and the like to pay for those expenses. It even shows a projected Cash Flow statement for the biennium broken out by constitutional department or power. A Budget Plan is a consolidation of proposed budgets from those departments but modified by Congress using oversight hearings to figure the optimum numbers.
The President takes office some weeks after Congress and should find by the end of January the Proposed Budget Plan from Congress which he can mark up the proposal based on the priorities as the President sees from the recent election. This marked up budget plan is returned to Congress for passage, or in the unlikely event the President agrees the Budget Plan can be signed and become law. Once the Plan is law, the appropriating bills that conform to that Plan can be passed.
After 30 days, Congress is expected to pass into law individual appropriating bills, and if they don’t, the defunding of government begins, starting with office budgets of Congress. They forfeit the money provided in the proposed Plan for office expenses, including staff and outside spending. After a further 30 days, Congressmen themselves forfeit their paychecks, first the House, and 30 days later, the Senate.
Can a continuing resolution be used? Sure, okay, but only once and only for 30 days, period.
The defunding occurs automatically on the same schedule after the only CR allowed. After both House Congressmen and Senators paychecks have been cut, then all funds from Treasury will halt. The defunding of all spending shall begin with the federal court system, but so long as they perform the jobs they were elected or hired to do, paychecks are simply deferred. Similarly, all government departments who perform their jobs will have their paychecks delayed, not forfeited - unlike Congress and staff who lose their paychecks and cannot be paid later, since they did not perform their jobs.
“Mandatory” spending and “Discretionary” spending are such misnomers. Military spending is not an option. Paying people not to work is an option. Delaying payments to employees hurts but it starts and ends with Congress doing its job. Many budget items should be entitled to later, delayed payment. Government stipends to House and Senate members plus later to Courts should not be simply delayed. We do need to revise the concept of what is Optional in government spending - referring to the enumerated powers above we do not see Social Security, nor Medicaid, nor any payments classified as mandatory. That’s dumb. If it’s not a constitutional power, how can payments for it be mandatory?
Notice that throughout the budgeting process the objective is to reach agreement, but bear in mind that a new rule for borrowing needs to be enacted. If anticipated revenue falls short of planned spending, then borrowing is required. Borrowing, however, will always be for less than 25 years and cannot be refinanced unless for a lower rate with the same final payback date. In addition, borrowing is allowed only for durable items whose durable life is expected to be longer than the repayment period, and the expected maintenance on the durable item is added to the budget going forward until the item(s) are retired or paid off.
A proviso for borrowing is that 2/3 of both Houses concur with the borrowing at a specified maximum rate and maximum repayment period.
Lastly, retiring assets is another form of revenue that is seldom used. Leases on US parklands are common, usually for a percentage of the sales of resources removed from the land. Selling off property at auction often does not raise much revenue because of the way those auctions are conducted. In a reformed process of asset disposal, a larger portion of market value (as listed in the entity’s inventory) should be the objective and should be possible. Getting 5 cents on the dollar for metal barriers taken from the border is asinine.
At some point we have to end taking money from people, holding in an account that Congress can tap into and then down the road return money to those people but by collecting more money from younger workers. We’d normally call that a Ponzi scheme.
Importantly, we need to end giving away money to foreigners, especially, and to states. If a state wants to spend money, let them. We don’t need to greenmail those states into loving DC.
Buying votes with payments of various types is not a proper function of government. DC can spend money to defend us and execute their proper powers shown in Art I Sec 8. They can’t send bribe money to Tehran or Baghdad or Ukraine or anywhere else in the world. International bribery is just as wrong as personal bribery, and it yields the same contempt as a result.