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Tuesday, September 19, 2006
Accounting Secrets: The Deficit Unmasked
Rep. Jim Cooper (D-TN)’s article in Roll Call today points out that “The Financial Report of the United States,” a document so embarrassing to the While House that it published only 2,100 copies this year, reveals a true accounting of the deficit -— one that encompasses veterans’ benefits, civil service retirement, Social Security, and Medicare.
Cooper notes that a partial unmasking of the true extent of the nation’s financial condition was mandated this summer, when: [t]he Federal Accounting Standards Advisory Board voted 6-4 to include Social Security and Medicare obligations as liabilities on our national balance sheet. Incredibly, we elected officials have been promising the benefits without bothering to budget for them.
He also includes this unsettling forecast: Standard & Poor’s, the nation’s leading credit analyst, is projecting that the United States will lose its AAA bond rating by 2012 and fall to junk bond status by 2025.
Donald Marron, acting Director of the Congressional Budget Office, as recently as last month, called the nation's deficit "at least now and for next year, for several years going forward, deficits appear to be in a range that they're sustainable.”
Guess he didn't get one of the 2,100 copies of the report.
Posted by Dana Chasin
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