Budget Deal Opens ‘Age of Austerity’ for Federal Agencies

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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-03-22/congress-quick-fix-budget-only-dulls-pain-of-85-billion-in-cuts.html

The spending bill Congress passed shows $1.2 trillion in budget cuts that weren’t supposed to happen are now part of the political landscape.

Lawmakers approved the so-called continuing resolution March 21 averting a government shutdown while giving a handful of agencies more flexibility to meet the mandated reductions under sequestration.

Yet the budget ax still cuts deep: $85 billion this fiscal year in across-the-board reductions, forcing agencies to curtail services and lay-off or furlough employees. The cuts were designed to be so onerous Congress wouldn’t let them happen. Now some analysts say they may be enshrined in budget negotiations.

“The age of austerity is here because Congress didn’t really produce a meaningful change in the budget cuts,” Darrell West, director of the Brookings Institution, a Washington-based public policy group, said in an interview. “Most of the government is going to be on a serious diet going forward.”

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