Kaine, GOP’s Thune join on budget analysis bill

Sen. Tim Kaine is teaming up with South Dakota Republican John Thune to sponsor a bill that would require detailed analysis far into the future of Congressional budgets and major new legislation.

The bill would require analysis of the budget impact of measures on future generations — that is, 20, 50 and 75 years in the future. Congress now gets such analysis over a 10-year time frame. The bill would also require the Congressional Budget Office and the Government Accountability Office provide an annual analysis of the long-term impact high levels of debt will have on future generations.

The idea, called a generational accounting and fiscal gap analysis, is to look at all the government’s obligations, present and future, and the effect those obligations will have on current and future generations.

“More information is critical to making prudent fiscal choices,” Kaine said, adding that the bill “will help us evaluate these programs with the important perspective of how those decisions will affect future generations, not just our own.”

Thune commented that “For too long, politicians have kicked the can down the road by relying on deficit spending to pay for growth in government … It is far past time that young adults have a voice in Washington and it starts with Congress being transparent about the long-term impacts of budgets and major legislation.”

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