Faith-based reflections on the federal budget
[2-15-05]
The Presbyterian Washington Office has
published a clear, concise analysis of the President's proposed budget for
2006, focusing on slashes in Medicaid, the Food Stamp Program, child care
for low-income families, education, and community food and nutrition
programs. That is coupled with the President's proposal to make his huge
tax cuts permanent, to the benefit of the affluent. Added to that is
increased military spending - and that's not counting the cost of the wars
in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Bulletin includes a
"Faith
Reflection on the Federal Budget," from the Interreligious
Working Group on Domestic Human Needs. The signers of the statement raise
the crucial question of the budget: "[D]oes it uphold values that will
strengthen our life together as a nation and as part of the global
community?"
Finally, the Bulletin reminds us of a
resolution adopted by the 1997 General Assembly,
which set forth "guidelines for the church and government to follow in
promoting the general welfare of the poor."
ALSO:
Religious leaders call
the budget 'unjust'
Cuts will
have severe impact on domestic programs and the poor
Quarterly Bulletin
The Washington Office of the
Presbyterian Church (USA)
President's Budget Plan for
2006 Reduces Social Programs,
While Pushing More Tax Cuts for the Affluent
February 15, 2005: The Bush Administration
sent the first budget of its second term to Congress on February 7. It
relies heavily on cuts in social programs to meet the expansion demands of
the Pentagon, while failing to mention at all some of the most expensive
items being proposed.
Of particular concern to the faith
community are planned slashes in Medicaid, the Food Stamp Program, child
care for low-income families, education, and community food and nutrition
programs. In a total budget of $2.57 trillion, the Administration proposes
to make the tax cuts of the last few years permanent at a cost of $1.1
trillion over ten years, a plan that would primarily benefit affluent
households, while eliminating about 150 federal programs and reducing
discretionary spending in all areas except defense and homeland security by
approximately one percent. The Washington Post summarized the issue in words
that express the concerns of the religious community, saying: "...the risk
is that the budget ax will fall most heavily on the poorest and most
vulnerable Americans, those with the greatest need for government help but
the smallest voice in the corridors of power."
Not included in the budget at all are the
cost of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and the President's plan to
divert part of the funds for Social Security into private investment
accounts for wage earners. Continued funding for the two wars will be sought
through special supplemental appropriations requests later in the year,
while the costs for revising Social Security will not begin for a few years.
Defense spending not related to Iraq would
rise from $400 billion in the current fiscal year to nearly $500 billion by
2010, while all other discretionary spending would be cut from the current
$391 billion to $389 billion and frozen at that level through 2010. The
result of capping non-defense spending would be an actual cut, considering
anticipated inflation over the same period, of 14% by 2010 in areas such as
education, housing, environmental protection, and transportation.
A particularly contentious area is the
Administration's proposal to revisit the Farm Bill passed by Congress in
2002 after a long and difficult debate. This legislation reauthorized many
of the programs run by the U.S. Department of Agriculture that provide food
to the nation's neediest people and help farmers to maintain production.
Congress has no wish to return to the debate over the Farm Bill and is
likely to resist vigorously Administration proposals that would require it
to do so, for example the plan to drop between 200,000 and 300,000 families
from the Food Stamp Program. Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS), a powerful member of
the Senate Agriculture Committee, has charged the Administration with
unfairly targeting cotton and rice growers in the Southeast, saying he will
never agree to these proposals.
Similar objections have come from Sen.
Arlen Specter (R-PA), Chair of the Senate Subcommittee on Labor, Health and
Human Services and Education. In a Washington Post column, Specter said that
"the President's budget puts at risk critical funding for the National
Institutes of Health and other important priorities of the subcommittee"
including research at NIH that has led to "enormous progress" in advancing
cures for Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases, cancer, heart disease and
many other debilitating or deadly ailments. Noting that the U.S. faces
"enormous deficits", Specter concluded that discretionary spending "has
taken hits year after year. Congressional budgeters and appropriators have
not sufficiently recognized that education and health care are capital
investments."
TEMPORARY ASSISTANCE TO NEEDY FAMILIES
The Administration's budget would continue
to fund TANF at $16 billion per year, the figure established originally in
the legislation that created the program in 1996. While advocates for the
poor had feared a possible budget cut, maintaining funding at the previous
level will place a greater burden on the majority of states, where welfare
rolls are once more rising.
The House will begin hearings on February
10, leading to consideration of legislation to reauthorize the Temporary
Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) program, the nation's primary vehicle
for providing cash assistance to extremely low-income families. Rep. Wally
Herger (R-CA), Chair of the Ways and Means Subcommittee on Human Resources,
has introduced a bill (H.R. 240) that is identical in most particulars to
legislation that passed the House in 2003 but failed to reach a vote in the
Senate. Herger's bill would increase work hours and tighten up requirements
with regard to education and training, while not providing significantly
increased funding for child care. Most studies of T ANF have shown that the
absence of child care is the major barrier to employment for women seeking
to leave T ANF for work. The President's budget would actually decrease
current funds available to subsidize child care for low-income families.
Bills to reauthorize TANF have been
introduced in the Senate by Sens. James Talent (R-MO) and Rick Santorum
(R-PA). While similar in many ways to the House measure, the Santorum bill
would also make permanent the family-related aspects of the President's tax
cuts from the first Bush Administration, expand government
marriage-promotion efforts, and incorporate provisions of the CARE Act,
encouraging, faith-based initiatives in providing social services.
SOCIAL SECURITY
The details of the President's proposal to
reconfigure the Social Security program are as yet unknown. The one thing
that is certain is that Mr. Bush is determined to change the program for
future generations so that workers will be able to divert at least four
percentage points into private investment accounts out of the 12.4% of their
wages set aside for retirement security. Currently, workers and their
employers each contribute 6.2% of salaries up to $90,000 annually to the
trust fund that pays pensions to retired workers, widows and dependent
children of eligible deceased workers, and some disabled people. It is
unclear how this proposal will affect recipients other than retired workers.
The President's budget did not include any
costs for this transition to a partially privatized system, but, should
Congress agree to creating the personal accounts sought by the
Administration, it is certain that the cost will be in the trillions of
dollars. The program will have to continue paying benefits to participants
in the current plan, even though diverting funds into private accounts will
decrease the trust fund from which benefits are paid. Recent projections
hold that -- even under the current program -- expenditures from the fund
will begin to outpace income in 2012. Redirecting one-third of the fund's
anticipated income into private accounts will only exacerbate the problem.
How to resolve the difficulties facing
Social Security is likely to be the major domestic issue facing Congress
this year. Since this is one of the most important programs that exists to
prevent poverty among the nation's disabled and elderly, it is crucial that
all aspects of the program and all possible solutions be thoroughly
examined.
-Mary A. Cooper
Published by the Stewardship of Public Life
(SPL) advocacy program of the Washington Office, Presbyterian Church (USA),
100 Maryland Avenue NE, Washington, D.C. 20002, (202) 543-1126,
www.pcusa.org/washington
INTERRELIGIOUS WORKING GROUP ON DOMESTIC
HUMAN NEEDS
A Faith Reflection on the Federal Budget
As communities of faith, we are grounded in
a shared tradition of justice and compassion, and we are called upon to hold
ourselves and our communities accountable to the moral standard of our
Biblical tradition. We speak out now because we are concerned about our
national priorities. The federal budget serves as a fundamental statement of
who we are as a nation. The decisions we make about how we generate revenue
and spend resources test our commitment to these values. Thus, we hold that
the federal budget should be viewed and evaluated through a moral lens: does
it uphold values that will strengthen our life together as a nation and as
part of the global community?
Community and the Common Good
But seek the welfare of the city where
I have sent you... and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare
you will have your welfare (Jeremiah 29:7, NRSV).
Our nation's wellbeing is dependent on the
wellbeing of all its members. In order to form a more perfect union, the
preamble to the U.S. Constitution commits this nation to promoting the
general welfare. In faith language we would call that the "common good ."
The budget should reflect a commitment to the common good by ensuring that
the basic needs of all members of society are met. At this time, when more
than 45 million Americans are uninsured, over 8 million are unemployed and
over 12 percent live in poverty, additional cuts to critical human needs
programs cannot be justified.
Investments in education, job training,
work supports, healthcare, housing, food assistance and environmental
protection promote opportunity for all and strengthen families and
communities. These should be budget priorities.
Budget decisions must be evaluated not just
in the short term, but with respect to their long-term effects on our
children's children, the global community and on all of creation.
Concern for Those Who Are Poor and
Vulnerable
Give the king your justice, O God...
May he judge your people with righteousness, and your poor with justice...
May he defend the cause of the poor of the people and give deliverance to
the needy (Psalm 72:1-4, NRSV).
Government has special responsibility to
care for the most vulnerable members of society. All budget decisions and
administrative procedures must be judged by their impact on children,
low-income families, the elderly, people with disabilities and other
vulnerable populations.
Whatever one's position on the war in Iraq
or on the tax cuts, these policies are driving the deficit. Attempting to
pay off the deficit by cutting programs that affect needy populations, when
these programs did not lead to the deficit, is unjust.
Economic Justice
Woe to those who make unjust laws, to
those who issue oppressive decrees, to deprive the poor of their rights and
withhold justice from the oppressed of my people (Isaiah 10:1-2, NIV).
God has created a world of sufficiency for
all; the problem is not the lack of natural and economic resources, but how
they are shared, distributed and made accessible within society.
Our government should be a tool to correct
inequalities, not a means of institutionalizing them. The federal budget
should share the burdens of taxation, according to one's ability to pay, and
distribute government resources fairly to create opportunity for all.
Endorsing Organizations
(as of 2/11/05)
American Baptist Churches USA
American Friends Service Committee
Bread for the World
Call to Renewal
Central Conference of American Rabbis
Church of the Brethren Witness/Washington Office
Church Women United
Conference of Major Superiors of Men
The Episcopal Church, USA
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
Friends Committee on National Legislation
Institute Justice Team - Sisters of Mercy of the Americas
Jesuit Conference USA
Jewish Council for Public Affairs
Leadership Conference of Women Religious
Mennonite Central Committee U.S. Washington Office
National Advocacy Center of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd
National Council of Churches of Christ in the USA
NETWORK, A National Catholic Social Justice Lobby
Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Washington Office
Union for Reform Judaism
Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations
United Church of Christ Justice & Witness Ministries
The United Methodist Church - General Board of Church and Society
Women of Reform Judaism
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Presbyterian GA
policy statement:
General Assembly: The 1997
General Assembly adopted a resolution designed to offer "guidelines for the
church and government to follow in promoting the general welfare of the
poor" (Minutes, 1996, p. 553).
The guidelines
include:
1) Maintain at least the 1996 level of
welfare funding for as long as needed in the transition to a work-based
welfare system.
2) Oppose any tightening of eligibility
requirements for public assistance that would make persons in need even more
vulnerable.
3) Provide adequate funding for job
training that leads to employment at a family-sustaining wage.
4) Where necessary, provide state-funded
employment options, including sheltered workshops, for the least employable.
5) Provide additional state funds as
necessary to prevent children and parents from being denied assistance when,
despite their best efforts, adults reach a program time limit but cannot
find work at adequate pay.
6) Exempt single parents with a child under
age one from work requirements.
7) Provide adequate funding for child care
and transportation assistance to recipients in the Temporary Assistance to
Needy Families (TANF)... program, as well as to low-income working families,
in order to make job training and employment viable.
8) Decline to implement a "family cap" that
would exclude cash assistance for children born to a welfare recipient.
9) Provide exemption of teen-parents from
the requirement that they live with a parent or guardian unless the home is
known to be safe for both the teen-parent and the child.
10) Provide adequately for disabled persons
and immigrants who may lose eligibility for means-tested programs.
