News Release

WASHINGTON – The House and Senate yesterday gave final approval to a Fiscal Year 2008 budget resolution, crafted in part by House Budget Committee Chairman John Spratt (D-SC). 

“This budget resolution comes from months of hearings, hard work and negotiation," said Spratt. “The end product is a good budget – not perfect, maybe, but worthy of support, especially if the process is not to fail again, as it did last year.  Last year, no concurrent resolution passed and only two of eleven appropriation bills were enacted.

“Our resolution moves the budget to balance over the next five years.  Along the way, it posts smaller deficits than the President’s budget; it adheres to the Pay-As-You-Go principle, and contains no new mandatory spending that’s not paid for, and it funds 'program integrity initiatives' to root out wasteful spending, fraud, and tax evasion," Spratt said.

Within this framework, the 2008 budget does more for veterans’ health care, more for children’s health care, and more for education.

“We have a budget that we can be proud of,” said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who praised Spratt’s “excellent work” in crafting and negotiating the resolution.

Highlights of the FY08 Concurrent Budget Resolution

• Reaches balance in five years, and runs a surplus of $41 billion in 2012, in contrast to the President’s budget, which remains always in deficit.

• Allocates $954 billion to discretionary spending, or about $75 billion more than this year, most of which, $50 billion, goes to defense. This total includes $450 billion for non-defense discretionary, or about $23 billion more than this year. 

• Abides by the Pay-As-You-Go principles, and extends them, establishing a Senate pay-go rule and calling for statutory pay-go as well.

• Sets defense spending at levels the President requested, though it targets more resources to the troops and conventional forces.  It provides more for homeland security than the Administration requested, and funds the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission.  So, it’s strong on defense, internal and external. 

• Does not raise taxes. The tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003 remain in force, unaffected in any way by this resolution. As originally written and enacted, most expire on December 31, 2010.  These middle-income tax cuts are separated out, and extended when they expire. The resolution also installs a trigger that facilitates the extension of these tax cuts, so long as the House waives PAYGO and the tax cuts extended do not exceed 80% of the surplus projected by the Office of Management and Budget in 2012.   In addition, the resolution provides a one-year patch to prevent the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) from coming down on middle-income taxpayers; and calls for reform of the AMT, consistent with pay-go principles, to save middle-income taxpayers from this stealth tax. 

• Increases funding for veterans’ health care in 2008 by $6.7 billion or 18.3% above 2007. 

• Accommodates an increase of $50 billion to expand the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP) and cover millions of uninsured children.

• Provides $4.6 billion over current services for education, job training, and employment services, which includes funding for No Child Left Behind programs, special education, and student loans.

“Our budget’s basic objective is to get back to balance,” said Spratt.  “We have an agenda that’s ambitious, but framed in a fiscally sound way.”

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