Talk:2014 United States federal budget

Suggestions for additional information to add:

• Greater context about the on-going financial crisis - how does this budget fit into that ongoing story?
• Statements from the 10 Republicans who voted against the budget about why they defected
• Statements from additional Democrats about their opposition to the budget
• Flesh out the chart comparing the House and Senate budget bills (with more footnotes and exact data) to help illustrate the difficulty of reconciling the two
• Stronger list of the provisions/elements of the bill, especially numerical details
• Public perception - maybe some public opinion polling data?

HistoricMN44 (talk) 13:54, 25 March 2013 (UTC)

Discussion of Edits

Oops - I had 2013 several places where it is indeed the 2014 budget. But the "Path to Prosperity" link is for the 2013 budget. We might spend some time figuring out how to distinguish among the many budgets that now have been given the name "Path to Prosperity." JimHarperDC (talk) 16:56, 25 March 2013 (UTC)

Single Article? Or Multiple Articles to Reflect Unfortunate Budgeting Realities?

I wonder about having a single article for what will actually be three different budget proposals. Forgive me, GRC, if you know this well already, but there almost certainly won't be a singular U.S. budget again this year. The president typically proposes a budget (the first Monday of February - didn't happen yet), then the House and Senate each produce their budget resolutions. The two of them are supposed to merge theirs in a conference report, but that hasn't happened in years. The passage of the conference report - identical budget resolutions - in each House would be a literal 2014 United States budget, but, again, there won't be one. So I don't know about having one article purporting to discuss it. I could definitely see an article the summarizes the multiple components of the budget process this year, linking to the (restored) articles on each of the budget proposals. (The coverage of budgets generally is a mess, and I suspect a lot of people looking for information about the current House budget proposal are going to the Path to Prosperity article which has scant information about the current year...) JimHarperDC (talk) 16:06, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

I have split the articles as best I can to reflect the fact that neither one actually is the 2014 US Budget. Not sure I split them in the best way possible, but... I plan to make a disambiguation page on this issue. HistoricMN44 (talk) 18:19, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

If we assume that the bills will not be enacted, there's still no reason to create separate articles. See Military Readiness Enhancement Act. Include both bills in the same article and discuss their differences.—GoldRingChip 20:10, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

I think it's reasonable to have an article on notable budget proposals. That said we should have an article about the budget in general. HistoricMN44 created one which is now at 2014 United States federal budget. Note that this isn't the first article of this type—see 2013 United States federal budget, etc. Harej (talk) 04:45, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

I put some thinking about documenting legislation and public policy issues on the WP:LegData page. I proposed a sort of hierarchy among articles when there is a major public policy issue. I think we'll benefit from your experience, though, GoldRingChip. An issue that starts as a bill might develop over years, as the Military Readiness Enhancement Act did, so let's talk about the best way to document issues and the bills that address them. GoldRingChip, I'm hoping to introduce myself offline - posted on your talk page the other day. I'd like to share what we're hoping to do and get your wisdom! JimHarperDC (talk) 16:32, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Merged into one article. Only one bill will ever be enacted, and the other(s) will be useful in discussing the enacted one. This is common practice in Wikipedia.—GoldRingChip 12:30, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

Reverted Merger

Moved from United States Senate fiscal year 2014 budget (S. Con. Res. 8)

This page was temporarily merged into a page 2014 United States Budget. This would cause confusion. Although S.Con.Res 8 is an important part of the budget process, it is not the budget itself. In fact, it is unlikely to ever become the budget due to the political situation in the United States. Merging this article with the article on the House bill would also create a very long and unwieldy article. I can explain further if need be. Thank you. I am going to create a disambiguation page to collect all the articles related to the 2014 budget process so that people can better understand the differences. HistoricMN44 (talk) 17:51, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

• Merged back. There is no reason to have multiple articles on the same proposed bill.—GoldRingChip 12:28, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

* They are not the same bill. S.Con.Res 8 is a U.S. SENATE bill, one that has no change of passing in the House. H.Con.Res 25 is a U.S. HOUSE bill, one that has no chance of passing in the Senate. They are completely different bills with different content supported by different parties. Furthermore, the United States fiscal year 2014 budget is NEITHER of these bills, but something else entirely. There are also at least THREE other competing proposals for the FY2014 budget - Obama's, the Republican Study Committee's, and the Congressional Progressive Caucus budget. IF there is ever an actual Fiscal Year 2014 budget (which is unlikely, since we haven't had an official budget in several years), it would deserve to have this page, not any of the competing proposals.HistoricMN44 (talk) 13:28, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

The problem is that they are all addressing the same topic and only one of them, if any at all, would ever pass. They should all be sections in the discussion of the same topic. That's how we've done it in the past.—GoldRingChip 13:34, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

I don't think that was made sufficiently clear. In the language of the opening summary (which I just changed), it said that Obama's budget proposal was in fact the official FY 2014 budget. It's not. The US budget is super important and I think it's key that the issue is a clear as possible that no such budget actually exists - just a bunch of competing proposals. If we ever did pass a budget, it would belong in this article, not the proposals themselves. Interested parties may want to expand on both the RSC and the CPC budget proposals, as well as Obama's proposal. Should all five proposals be included in the same article?? I think the way things are set up make it easy for people to get really confused. It would make sense to have a paragraph or two on each budget proposal on this page, but I don't think the very long detailed articles all fit here, especially not if we actually do get a real budget. If you've done it different ways in the past, can you point me to an article or two that you think is a really good example of this? I'm not trying to "cause trouble" or anything, I just don't really understand your thought process on this, sorry. HistoricMN44 (talk) 13:50, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Your changes clarify the article nicely. I think that captures the meaning of the budget. Should a budget be enacted, the other proposals would be kept in this article for the sake of this historical record. That's how it's done. Thanks for your help!—GoldRingChip 17:34, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Infobox

I've been trying to add an infobox about each piece of legislation. Can't figure why it isn't being rendered correctly. Anyone know?

Update - fixed now. I was missing a whole one "]" from it, lol. Thanks. HistoricMN44 (talk) 15:35, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for adding these! I removed the "agencies affected" since I don't think it's really useful to have such a long list, and the budget affects pretty much every federal agency anyhow. Antony–22 (^talk⁄_contribs) 00:51, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

That makes sense. I have a computer program that generates the boxes automatically for any bill in the 113th Congress, using XML files of the legislation. It includes the agencies as a matter of course. I'm glad you find the boxes helpful. HistoricMN44 (talk) 13:26, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

Budget Debates and Appropriations Debates are Different Things

For those of you interested in the government shutdown, please be aware that "the budget" and the recent appropriations debates are different things. The president proposes a budget early in the year, showing the overall levels of spending he'd prefer for the coming fiscal year. The House and Senate each produce their own budget resolutions in the spring. Ideally, the House and Senate come up with a joint plan, but they don't always do that. After the budget debate, the House and Senate begin work on actual appropriations bills that will spend the money. They are supposed to debate and pass these bills through the summer. The continuing resolution, which came up because ordinary appropriations bills were not passed, was an appropriations bill, not a "budget" bill. The government shutdown has occurred because the House and Senate failed to agree on appropriations, not because the House and Senate failed to agree on a budget. The current controversy around the government shutdown is fairly distant from the budget debate, which pretty much ended in the late spring. Please don't collapse "the budget" and "appropriations" in your edits! JimHarperDC (talk) 15:08, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

As it stands, the U.S. federal budget series of articles has been written to include all of budget proposals, appropriations legislation, and changes to tax legislation (but not authorization bills), the idea being to give an overview of all legislative activity related to fiscal matters for the given year. The word "budget" is popularly used to refer to all of these; it's possible that there's a more specific technical meaning of the term, but I don't think we want to rewrite the entire series of articles based on that. Antony–22 (^talk⁄_contribs) 21:55, 3 October 2013 (UTC)

I actually think we do want to rewrite the articles to make them accurate, but that's a big project that I hesitate to start given other demands on my time. It will require a lot of explaining to our editor friends who don't know that the budget process and the appropriations process are distinct - related, yes, but distinct. Do you think it's better to leave the articles inaccurate because that comports with popular belief? I regard the low quality of articles on these topics as symbolic of the public's ignorance generally about things legislative, which leaves them helpless to participate effectively. I kinda want to help fix that. JimHarperDC (talk) 11:47, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

I think there is a place for both budget and appropriations/tax legislation in these articles. I think it would be easy to separate these into two top-level sections for the four budget articles that have any substance (which are 1996, 2012, 2013, 2014), since they're already divided up along those lines by subsection. Antony–22 (^talk⁄_contribs) 19:59, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

I strongly encourage those interested in writing and editing articles in this area to understand the budget and approprations processes. Appropriations debates (including the one that lead to the shutdown) are related but distinct from the budget debate. Information about the appropriations debate and Obamacare and such are non-germane to this article. Here is a primer on the budget and appropriations processes to help you understand and work with these distinctions: http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R42388.pdf — Preceding unsigned comment added by JimHarperDC (talk • contribs) 14:31, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Because the appropriations bills are the implementation of the various budget proposals, they are germane to the scope of this article, even if they themselves are not considered to be a budget. My belief is that this series of articles is an appropriate place to tell the story of what appropriations bills were passed by each house of Congress, and mention briefly what the major points of contention were in passing them. Greater detail can go into subarticles for specific bills, if they exist, or topics like the government shutdown article, but they should be briefly mentioned here too. Unless you're proposing that there should be two separate series of articles for "20XX federal budget" and "20XX appropriations legislation", but I think it's easier for the reader to have it all in one article because it's so closely related. Antony–22 (^talk⁄_contribs) 18:11, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Appropriations bills are supposed to be guided in the amount of spending they contain by what are called "302(b) allocations," which spring from the macro numbers in any final budget. But appropriations bills aren't even required to stay within their 302(b) allocations, and in years when there isn't a finalized budget resolution - that's most years, recently - appropriations bills aren't even based on a 302(b) allocation. Think of the budget debate as a broad debate about the general priorities of the president and the parties, a debate which arrives at no conclusion. Appropriations bills are specific instructions to the Department of the Treasury about what it can cut checks for.

I think it would be a great idea to have an umbrella article that gathers the appropriations bills the way this article gathers the president's budget and budget resolutions. Obviously, given the relationship between the two processes, the budget article would point to the appropriations article and vice versa.

- Here are at least some of the appropriations bills that have articles. (I don't recommend collapsing them into one. They each have myriad issues within them that aren't covered sufficiently because there are so few Wikipedia editors familiar with these topics. But looking forward, we should cultivate more editrors, not create a practice of collapsing massively different subjects together into one long, impenetrable article.)

- Military Construction and Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2014 (H.R. 2216; 113th Congress)

- Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2014 (H.R. 2217; 113th Congress)

- Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2014 (H.R. 2609; 113th Congress)

- and of course the Continuing Appropriations Resolution, 2014 (H.J.Res 59; 113th Congress) and the Pay Our Military Act (H.R. 3210; 113th Congress)... JimHarperDC (talk) 21:54, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

I just don't feel like separating the budget and legislation into separate articles is a great idea, since they're both part of the same story about how the appropriations for each year come to be. Take a look at 2012 United States federal budget (which is a Good Article), for example, which discusses several budget proposals, the genesis of the Budget Control Act and its affect on that year's budget, the disputes about continuing resolutions that nearly led to a government shutdown, and the final appropriations legislation. It also contains tables comparing the proposed budgets to the enacted legislation. All of this forms one coherent story, and I don't see how that is improved by separating it into two articles.

I went back and edited all the substantial yearly federal budget articles to have clearly separate sections "Budget proposals" and "Legislation". Perhaps we could change the article titles to expand their scope to more clearly include both, maybe something like "20XX United States federal fiscal legislation" or something similar? Otherwise, we should probably solicit some more viewpoints from a relevant WikiProject to find a consensus, since I'm not sure we're going to come to an agreement just among ourselves. Antony–22 (^talk⁄_contribs) 04:05, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

I'd be happy to solicit more viewpoints---if they could come from people with domain knowledge. Such people are few, alas. The article on the 2012 United States federal budget illustrates this well. Take this sentence from the introduction of the article: "The actual budget for Fiscal Year 2012 was enacted in three appropriations bills in November and December 2011." A person who reads this would be surprised to learn from this CRS report that Congress did not complete action on a fiscal year 2012 budget (bottom of Table 1 on page 8). In early 2012, there was a prominent debate about whether the Senate had gone 1,000 days without a budget. According to the article you point to, a budget was enacted, when that's not the case. This imprecision and inaccuracy---total spending was appropriated in seven bills, not three---is part of why people are poorly positioned to participate in the debates about these issues. I don't believe an encyclopedia should allow concepts to be fudged the way they are in these articles. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JimHarperDC (talk • contribs) 13:43, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

I concur with JimHarperDC. I think you're missing his point that budgets and budget legislation are very, very distinct from appropriations and appropriation legislation. Conflating the two isn't helpful to readers. Jim also seems to be making the point that, especially in recent history, the "budget" each year (I put that in quotes because there hasn't been one) has been only very, very, very loosely connected to the actual appropriations that are ultimately made. I applaud all the work you've done on a complicated issue (and I hope what I'm doing helps readers as well), but I think we should aim for even higher standards than we have already, and that means making the distinction between a budget bill and an appropriations bill clear and understandable to readers.

Further, I'm not sure changing the titles as a way of trying to encompass everything is a particularly good idea. The title "2014 United States federal budget" is in fairly clear language that I think even kids could understand. Changing the title won't change the sloppy phrasing that conflates "budget" with "appropriations." One positive affect of having two articles would be the added clarity a separation would have - there are two articles because these two things/processes/groups of legislation are distinct from one another. HistoricMN44 (talk) 14:06, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

Of course, feel free to correct erroneous or unclear language in existing articles. That doesn't affect whether the articles should be split. Antony–22 (^talk⁄_contribs) 20:43, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

ACA discussion

There are some NPOV issues with the ACA discussions. Nate1727 (talk) 18:20, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Agreed; the issue has led to a discussion at my talk page. Antony–22 (^talk⁄_contribs) 03:23, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Public Law 113-46 is not the budget

Hi! I undid a revision someone made that listed Public Law 113-46 as the passed federal budget. PL 113-46 has its own article already. It is a continuing resolution appropriations bill, which means that it funds the government for a period of time (until January). It is not a budget bill, which would list all the planned expenditures for a year, but not appropriate any funds. This article is about budgets, not appropriations. Confusing the two is a fairly common mistake. I hope this clarifies it. Thanks! HistoricMN44 (talk) 12:49, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

Estimate of total debt

To state that United States federal debt equals 107% of GDP today is misleading. It would be better if Wikipedia concentrated on Federal debt held by the public. The government owes trillions of dollars to itself and this debt is not used by many people who estimate the total debt burden on Americans. You are reinforcing a right-wing meme.Amyzex (talk) 21:05, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

Good catch. Both numbers should be reported. Once I get a chance I'll try to find the public debt figure, but feel free to add it yourself if you can do it faster than me! Antony–22 (^talk⁄_contribs) 23:50, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

Discretionary vs. Mandatory Spending

I'm not sure, but how do you include Medicare and Medicaid in HHS spending and put it all under discretionary? Medicare and Medicaid are definitely not discretionary spending.