Let’s Remember How We Got Here

by Stuart Shapiro

As the debt ceiling crisis, rapidly actually becomes a crisis, it is important to remember how the debt got so big.  As the graphic above shows,

under Mr. Bush, tax cuts and war spending were the biggest policy drivers of the swing from projected surpluses to deficits from 2002 to 2009. Budget estimates that didn’t foresee the recessions in 2001 and in 2008 and 2009 also contributed to deficits. Mr. Obama’s policies, taken out to 2017, add to deficits, but not by nearly as much.

Republicans like to whine that Obama can’t keep blaming Bush for the economy, the debt, whatever.  But he can, because it happens to be true.  In a couple of days, he may not have to blame Bush anymore; he can blame Boehner instead.

By: Stuart Shapiro

Stuart is a professor and the Director of the Public Policy
program at the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers
University. He teaches economics and cost-benefit analysis and studies
regulation in the United States at both the federal and state levels.
Prior to coming to Rutgers, Stuart worked for five years at the Office
of Management and Budget in Washington under Presidents Clinton and
George W. Bush.