While the next president must instantly come to grips with an epic fiscal crisis that could send the sputtering economy back into a tailspin, President Obama and Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney have little to say about how they would avert the disaster – a silence that has both budget and tax policy experts fuming.
Unemployment, the deficit, immigration, health care reform and women’s reproductive rights all get shout-outs from the two parties. But ahead of the first of three presidential debates on Wednesday, there is barely a murmur about the potentially disastrous effect of the mix of $607 billion of tax increases and across-the-board spending cuts known as sequestration – the dreaded “fiscal cliff” – that are set to automatically take effect beginning Jan. 2 unless Congress and the White House intervene.
“Instead of being fiscal cliff jumpers, Congress can dive into the hard work of cutting spending, finding revenue and reforming entitlements to turn the country’s fiscal situation around,” said Ryan Alexander, president of Taxpayers for Common Sense, an advocacy group that on Monday suggested more than $2 trillion of cuts in wasteful programs. “Cuts are possible if Congress and the president choose to put the country ahead of partisanship or parochial pandering.”
…Unless Congress and the White House reach agreement after the election to extend some or all of the expiring tax cuts and postpone or blunt the mandatory spending reductions, more than a million workers could lose their jobs as the economy spirals into recession – with the biggest hits in the defense and aerospace industry.
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