John Spratt: “I have one chart here which runs the risk of being a little complex, but it tells a great deal about where we are. First…”

“I have one chart here which runs the risk of being a little complex, but it tells a great deal about where we are. First of all, it shows the surplus that we thought we had that OMB estimated in January of 2001 as $5.637 trillion. A few weeks ago, OMB came back to us, the Office of Management and Budget, and says, whoops, we were wrong. We have to make economic adjustments to that surplus of $3.174 trillion. What that means is that the adjusted surplus, the real surplus in economic reality now is $2.463, not $5.63 trillion. Then if we look at these enacted policies, and these are things done today, legislated, which have committed the available surplus, we will find they add up to mostly the tax cuts, $2.6 trillion. As a consequence, we have already committed all of the available surplus still remaining after economic adjustments from the $5.6 trillion surplus last January. In fact, we are $19 billion over and above that surplus if we do not do another thing, just sit still and do not increase any policies.”