entitlement reform

We all will—in about eight years.

Let’s be honest: Congress was never really going to reform entitlements under House speaker Paul Ryan. The subject is campaign poison—the only way lawmakers would act proactively is if congressional terms were measured in decades instead of years.

Are Republicans in the Trump era deficit-hawks-in-name-only? Or does the party still have faithfulness toward reducing the federal deficit in meaningful ways. Between last week’s Republican-forged budget deal that ended a severely flawed, but effective, system of spending caps and the advent of…

At first blush, universal basic income sounds like something dreamed up on a California commune or in a late-night college bull session. The idea: Just give people money. Ask nothing in return. Impose no requirement to work or to look for work. And don’t just give taxpayer money to people living in…

President Trump’s second annual address to Congress passed Tuesday night without him mentioning a sole word about entitlement spending, continuing a deviation from the economically conservative Congress he inherited.

He was twice on the cover of National Review. He was the subject of admiring profiles in the Washington Post, Time, and, yes, THE WEEKLY STANDARD. Throughout his first term as governor of New Jersey, he was described time and again as a “rising star” of the GOP and a certain presidential contender.…

There are fewer and fewer economic principles on which Democrats and Republicans can agree, and any point of consilience will surely be forgotten as some momentary partisan need overwhelms reason and sense. Surely, however, we can all agree on a few points:

There are fewer and fewer economic principles on which Democrats and Republicans can agree, and any point of consilience will surely be forgotten as some momentary partisan need overwhelms reason and sense. Surely, however, we can all agree on a few points:

Mick Mulvaney, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, will defend the White House's budget request in front of the respective congressional committees Wednesday and Thursday. The administration's goal on Capitol Hill this week, according to a White House source, is two-fold: to make a…

Committee chairs in Congress look at White House budget proposals with something between indifference and disdain. Congress, not the White House, writes the budget, or so the thinking goes. So why, besides the law mandating he submit one, does a president spend so much time and energy crafting a…

A week from Monday, when the post-inauguration revelries, which include a "Deplorables Ball", are no more, Donald J. Trump, the forty-fifth President of the United States of America, will for the first time become fully aware of the 115th Congress of the United States of America. Although he has…

Earlier Sunday on CBS's Face the Nation, incoming White House chief of staff Reince Priebus told host John Dickerson that President-elect Trump is going to abide by his promise not to reform entitlement programs:

The players in this election season are, it seems, not interested in talking about the deficit. Too much of a downer. Still, when the giddy days and nights of campaigning are done and the cold grey dawn of governing breaks, someone is going to have to face the facts. Namely, that spending is…

As Trump speeches go, his address to the Detroit Economic Club was a good one. Donald Trump cleared the low bar of actually staying focused on what is mostly a pro-growth economic policy. But for a speech on economics, it was also remarkable for what it didn't say. There was absolutely nothing…

Carly Fiorina says she disagrees with her Republican rival for president Donald Trump on the issue of Planned Parenthood. Trump told Fox News host Sean Hannity on Tuesday that "we have to look at the positive also for Planned Parenthood" and said abortions were just a "small part" of what the…

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with senior writer Steve Hayes on his recent story "The Coming GOP Divide."

After five decades of liberal antipoverty programs that have produced only failure and futility, it is more than time for a conservative response to the problem of poverty—one that emphasizes work, family, and economic freedom. 

John Boehner laid out the House Republican position in the upcoming legislative debate on the fiscal cliff in remarks Wednesday afternoon. "Mr. President, the Republican majority here in the House stands ready to work with you to do what's best for our country," Boehner said, calling the massive…

In 2008, Barack Obama promised to cut federal spending, cut wasteful programs, reform Medicare and Social Security, and create "5 million new jobs" in a "new energy economy." At Buzzfeed, Andrew Kaczynski has four videos of Obama making those promises at the town hall debate in 2008. Here, for…

A cynic would be tempted to compare the eurozone to Ryou-Un Mara, the rusty Japanese ghost ship that floated across the Pacific after last year’s earthquake. Some wrecks surprise us by staying afloat for a long time, but that does not make them less of a wreck.

Heritage Action, the political arm of the Heritage Foundation, released the following statement on the House Republican budget:

John Engler, the former three-term governor of Michigan and current president of the Business Roundtable, calls the House Republican budget proposal a "courageous exercise" and says it has "intriguing ideas" regarding tax and entitlement reforms.

Las Vegas

During Tuesday night’s debate, Michele Bachmann twice said that the federal government is spending about “40 percent more” than what it takes in. If only we were in that good of shape. The federal government has actually been spending about 75 percent more than what it takes in. For every $4 that…

“The fundamental question for you is not how we got here, but where you want the country to go,” said Douglas Elmendorf, director of the Congressional Budget Office, to the members of the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction (or the supercommittee) today. “What role do you and your…

Rick Perry's doubling down on his "Social Security is a Ponzi scheme" rhetoric during last night's debate could be beneficial for him in a Republican primary but hurtful in a general election. And while the Mitt Romney campaign was quick to pounce on the statement with its not-so-subtle "PERRY DOES…

Yuval Levin and Pete Wehner ask, in today's Wall Street Journal, whether the Tea Party will be willing to take on entitlements:

Michael O'Brien at the Hill reports:

In today's Washington Post, Robert Samuelson argues that it was liberal protectors of the entitlements, not the Tea Party, that "won" the most in last week's debt deal. The military, he says, was the real loser:

Students for Solvency released its first ad today, suggesting that failure to reform Medicare and other entitlement programs is tantamount to throwing our kids off cliffs:

At his press conference Friday, President Barack Obama repeatedly claimed that the American people support a “balanced approach” and “shared sacrifice” when it comes to a debt and deficit solution.

House Budget chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) will lay out his vision for America's foreign policy in an address to the Alexander Hamilton Society tonight in Washington. Crediting Charles Krauthammer's 2009 essay in THE WEEKLY STANDARD, "Decline Is a Choice," Ryan will insist the United States maintain…

Late last month, Senator Charles Schumer of New York led a conference call in which Senate Democrats briefed reporters about the ongoing budget battle. At the outset, unaware that his comments were already audible to reporters on the line, Schumer provided some marching orders, advising his…

Lately, I’ve been staying up late at night because I’m just too stressed over the state of the union. Unable to sleep, I often find myself toggling between scores of Excel spreadsheets, crunching all sorts of numbers to get my mind around the gaping budget deficit that is threatening the country.…

The White House communications operation has expended considerable effort over the past week to portray President Obama as serious about dealing with debt and deficits. Most of their scrambling came after House Budget chairman Paul Ryan presented a 2012 budget blueprint that included significant…

If there is one thing that political strategists, pollsters, and elected officials of both parties have agreed on for decades, it’s that entitlement reform is a sure political loser. Social Security is the “third rail”—touch it and you die. Suggest changes to Medicaid and you don’t care about the…

Connecticut senator and former Democratic vice presidential candidate Joe Lieberman, on Paul Ryan's budget: