Moneybox: The Supercommittee Failed. Hooray!

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Moneybox The Supercommittee Failed. Hooray! How the absence of a deal may cut the deficit more than a deal would have. By Matthew Yglesias Posted Monday, Nov 21, 2011, at 05:49 PM ET Today's the day when Washington officially comes to terms with the fact that the "Supercommittee"—a bipartisan, bicameral group charged with reducing America's long-term fiscal deficit—won't agree on anything. This is being termed a "failure," and by the standards of D.C.'s fetishization of bipartisanship, it is one. But in terms of deficit reduction, failure is actually better than success. For starters, the whole premise of the Supercommittee was that if it didn't agree on something, then $1.2 trillion of spending cuts would be quasi-automatically implemented through a mechanism known as "sequestration." The cuts are balanced 50-50 between the security and nonsecurity sides of the budget. And while they're hardly irreversible, neither is anything else in American law. It's not possible for Congress to metaphysically commit future Congresses to future courses of action. But what Congress did to resolve the debt-ceiling standoff was to change the default rule. The $1.2 trillion in cuts will happen unless Congress and the president act affirmatively to stop them from happening. In an American political system bogged down by bicameralism, the filibuster, and the presidential veto, the default rules matter a great deal. So if it's $1.2 trillion in spending cuts you want, then $1.2 trillion in cuts were already put on the schedule by the debt-ceiling deal. That the supercommittee didn't agree on an alternative to the cuts doesn't make it any more (or less) likely that the ... To continue reading, click here. Join the Fray: our reader discussion forum What did you think of this article? POST A MESSAGE | READ MESSAGES Also In Slate How the Roots Subtly Pranked Bachmann With an Unflattering Song on Jimmy Fallon TV Shows Like Hell on Wheels Are Getting Too Ambitious Why Do We Use Kool-Aid To Get Someone To Drink Something They Normally Wouldn't?	Advertisement
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