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Await Budget Seesaw
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GARY RATIILLER
P H O T O G R A P H Y
XVII) 50-15.s0
Find It All In 1
The Jewish News
r
Call 354-5959
ith all the self-congrat-
ulation going on at the
White House ceremony
marking the signing of
the "balanced budget" agree-
ment, it's a wonder legislators
and administration officials
didn't come home with bruised
backs and sore arms.
Several representatives of
Jewish groups played the role of
extras in the scene, staged to
show that the Republican Con-
gress and the Democratic ad-
ministration, after years of bitter
rhetoric and little action, finally
had put partisanship aside and
addressed the nation's most tena-
cious economic problem.
The Jewish activists followed
the script, but in private, some
tell a different story.
The budget agreement was
mostly political artifice, they said
— a position supported by many
Capitol Hill staffers and eco-
nomic analysts. Leaders from
both parties touted a miracle
cure, while doing little more than
applying Band-Aids to chronic
economic maladies.
If that analysis is accurate, the
implications are troubling- for vul-
nerable populations like immi-
grants and the elderly, and the
philanthropic agencies that are
called on to fill the void when gov-
ernment programs are slashed,
such as Jewish federations and
their associated agencies.
And in a cynical age, the ac-
tions of both parties may breed
still more distrust and more dis-
illusionment, a political trend
that can't possibly be good for the
Jews.
The budget agreement was not
all hot air.
Jewish leaders were pleased
that the package reversed some
of the worst provisions of last
year's welfare reform act aimed
at legal immigrants, although the
fix was far from complete. They
were happy that the changes in
Medicaid will not adversely af-
fect elderly Jews seeking nurs-
ing home care; some early
proposals would have made it
much harder for Jews seeking
care in specifically Jewish facili-
ties.
But few were fooled into be-
lieving that the agreement rep-
resented an end to the recurrent
rounds of wild government bud-
get-cutting that have strained
the Jewish social services net-
work, or to the social tensions
that have accompanied the po-
litically charged debate over gov-
ernment spending.
There is a broad consensus in
Washington that a balanced bud-
get became reachable primarily
because of the surprisingly ro-
bust economy.
In fact, some analysts say, un-
der current conditions the bud-
get would be balanced before
2002 without additional govern-
ment action or with just modest
budget cuts, thanks to soaring
revenues produced by the growth
surge, as well as four years of
cuts in government programs by
the Clinton administration, a
more active government buster
than even the Reagan adminis-
tration.
That surprising economic re-
ality gave legislators a chance to
do what they do best: enact
sweeping tax cuts that play well
at the polls, and provide an ar-
ray of special favors to wealthy
constituents.
"There's a
realization that none
of the underlying
problems have been
addressed."
— A Jewish official
That was the engine behind
the $150 billion tax cut package.
The rest of the agreement, ac-
cording to a Washington Post ed-
itorial, was merely "cover and a
gloss" for tax cuts that eventual-
ly could add to the deficit, not re-
duce it.
More importantly, the eco-
nomic bonanza allowed national
leaders to once again avoid any
serious effort to reform Medicare
and Medicaid, the huge entitle-
ment programs whose costs rep-
resent the single biggest problem
in the effort to bring spending un-
der control.
The Senate backed away from
even modest proposals to make
higher-income recipients pay a
bigger share; the House ducked
the issue entirely.
"There's a realization that
none of the underlying problems
have been addressed," said an of-
ficial with one major Jewish
group. "Congress and the ad-
ministration are getting a big
bounce out of the economy, but
as we all know, that's cyclical; no-
body thinks the boom will last
forever."
The frenzied budget-cutting
that began with the 1994 con-
gressional elections, this source
said, almost certainly will come
back for an encore. ❑