Over Numbers, Both Campaigns Have Problems

[papau]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A22220-2004Mar24.html


washingtonpost.com > Politics > Elections > 2004 Election

In a War of Words Over Numbers, Both Campaigns Have Problems

By Dan Balz and Jim VandeHei Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, March 25, 2004; Page A05


<snip>Bush has failed to estimate the cost of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan for next year, for example, and his long-standing proposal for partial privatization of Social Security would require at least $1 trillion in transition costs that he has not accounted for in his fiscal projections.

Peter R. Orszag of the Brookings Institution has looked at the ideas and plans and found both campaigns wanting. "The administration's budget is somewhere between misleading and dishonest," he said, "and I just don't have enough information from the Kerry side to render a judgment." <snip>

Whenever Kerry talks about new spending, he cites the same revenue source to pay for it: rolling back Bush's tax cuts on those earning more than $200,000. Taken together, his proposed tax increases total between $800 billion and $900 billion, according to calculations by independent experts. The Bush campaign calculates the figure at $700 billion. <snip>

But while defending those estimates as accurate, Bush advisers objected when asked about the fiscal implications of Bush's Social Security reform plan, first unveiled in 2000. "There's been no plan adopted, so there's no way" to estimate the cost, said Marc Racicot, Bush's campaign chairman.

Nor has the administration offered an estimate of what the war in Iraq and Afghanistan will cost in the coming year, and the two congressional budget committees are far apart in their estimates.

The Kerry campaign has attacked Bush for only detailing a five-year budget, breaking with the Washington tradition of looking at a 10-year fiscal picture. One reason Bush does not detail 10 years, they say, is because the cost of his tax cuts explodes after 2010, when all of the reductions are fully phased in and, if Bush gets his way, permanently etched into the code. The Kerry campaign calls the missing five years, as well as programs Bush has refused to put a price tag on, "the secret budget plan." <snip>

[Centre_Left]

1. Funny

I find the debate over the accuracy of the spending "estimates" provided by Bush and Kerry quite amusing. Does anyone really think that politicians or government agencies are ever honest about the cost of their programs?

[German-Lefty]

2. I sometimes think they should have to find private sector money to bet

on their claims. For example politicians say "our new tax code will bring in X billion a year". It would be cool if a market could be used to keep them honest. So Mr. Rich offers to cover that estimate for Y dollars (after he won a bidding war). If the money falls short Mr. Rich has to cover the difference.

I'm sure someone can come up with a cleaner system that does this. The idea is to keep politicians and their appointees from pulling estimates out of their butt. Instead let someone put money where his mouth is.

I wonder if the lobby of these financiers would have positive or negative effect on government. The might lobby that the tax code is clear and clean and has less loopholes so they could make their estimates better.

Has anyone else heard ideas along these lines?