I
103D CONGRESS
1ST SESSION
H. R. 998
To achieve a balanced Federal budget by fiscal year 1998 and each year
thereafter, achieve significant deficit reduction in fiscal year 1994 and
each year through 1998, establish a Board of Estimates, require the
President’s budget and the congressional budget process to meet specified
deficit reduction and balance requirements, enforce those requirements
through a multiyear congressional budget process and, if necessary, se-
questration, and for other purposes.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
FEBRUARY 18, 1993
Mr. PENNY (for himself, Mr. VISCLOSKY, Mr. WILSON, Mr. SPRATT, Mr. LAN-
CASTER, Mr. OBERSTAR, Mr. MORAN, Mr. MAZZOLI, MR. HUGHES, Mr.
STENHOLM, and Mrs. UNSOELD) introduced the following bill; which was
referred jointly to the Committees on Government Operations, Rules, and
Ways and Means
A BILL
To achieve a balanced Federal budget by fiscal year 1998
and each year thereafter, achieve significant deficit re-
duction in fiscal year 1994 and each year through 1998,
establish a Board of Estimates, require the President’s
budget and the congressional budget process to meet
specified deficit reduction and balance requirements, en-
force those requirements through a multiyear congres-
sional budget process and, if necessary, sequestration,
and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
TITLE I—BALANCING THE
BUDGET
PART A—PURPOSE
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLES; REPEALERS.
(a) SHORT TITLE OF THIS ACT.—This Act may be
cited as the ‘‘Balanced Budget Enforcement Act of 1993’’.
(b) SHORT TITLE OF PART B.—Part B of this Act
may be cited as the ‘‘Deficit Elimination Act of 1993’’.
(c) REPEALER.—Parts C, D, and E of the Balanced
Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985 are
repealed.
SEC. 2. PURPOSE.
The purpose of this Act is—
(1) to mandate and achieve enough deficit re-
duction in each year through fiscal year 1998 to
eliminate the deficit by that year;
(2) from fiscal year 1999 onward, to mandate
whatever deficit reduction may be needed to elimi-
nate any deficit that may be projected;
(3) to achieve a portion of the mandated deficit
reduction by limiting the total level of discretionary
funding and the remainder by requiring a fixed
amount of deficit reduction from some combination
of entitlement and receipts changes;
(4) to establish a Board of Estimates to arbi-
trate between OMB and CBO;
(5) to require the figures in the President’s
budget and the budget resolution to meet the provi-
sions of this Act;
(6) to enforce each year’s discretionary funding
limits and entitlement/receipts requirements through
the Congressional Budget Act, including multiyear
allocations and reconciliation directives;
(7) to supplement Congressional Budget Act
enforcement with across-the-board cuts or sequestra-
tion whenever the discretionary funding limits or en-
titlement/receipts requirements of this Act are not
met;
(8) to provide a targeted sequestration that en-
forces the committee targets for entitlement reduc-
tions and receipts increases set forth in budget reso-
lutions;
(9) to create a backup comprehensive sequestra-
tion applicable in any fiscal year in which the com-
mittee targets in a budget resolution are not en-
forceable; and
(10) to provide that reconciliation savings and
sequestration savings shall be permanent.
SEC. 3. TABLE OF CONTENTS.
TITLE I—BALANCING THE BUDGET
PART A—PURPOSE
Sec. 1. Short titles; repealers.
Sec. 2. Purpose.
Sec. 3. Table of contents.
Sec. 4. Effective dates.
PART B—THE DEFICIT ELIMINATION ACT OF 1993
Sec. 100. Definitions and treatments.
Sec. 101. Direct spending and receipts: deficit reduction requirements.
Sec. 102. Discretionary funding limits.
Sec. 103. Balancing the budget in 1998.
Sec. 104. Preventing deficits after 1998.
Sec. 105. Spin-off law.
Sec. 106. Direct spending and receipts scorecard.
Sec. 107. Discretionary scorecard.
Sec. 108. Targeted sequestration.
Sec. 109. Comprehensive sequestration.
Sec. 110. Across-the-board reduction of discretionary programs.
Sec. 111. Exempt programs and activities.
Sec. 112. General and special sequestration rules.
Sec. 113. Sequestration through tax changes.
Sec. 114. Estimating assumptions, reports, and orders.
Sec. 115. The current policy baseline.
Sec. 116. Baseline assuming deficit reduction.
Sec. 117. Stabilization Reserve Fund.
Sec. 118. Modifications if war or low growth.
Sec. 119. Board of estimates.
Sec. 120. Judicial review.
TITLE II—TECHNICAL AND CONFORMING AMENDMENTS
Sec. 201. Amendments to the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control
Act of 1974.
Sec. 202. Amendments to the Federal Credit Reform Act of 1990.
Sec. 203. Amendments to the Rules of the House of Representatives.
Sec. 204. Amendments to the Standing Rules of the Senate.
Sec. 205. President’s budget and supplemental budget estimates.
Sec. 206. Amendments to other laws.
SEC. 4. EFFECTIVE DATES.
Except as otherwise specified, this Act and the amend-
ments made by it shall take effect on its date of enactment
and shall apply to fiscal year 1994 and subsequent fiscal
years.
PART B—THE DEFICIT ELIMINATION ACT OF 1993
SEC. 100. DEFINITIONS AND TREATMENTS.
As used in this part:
(1) The terms ‘‘budget authority’’, ‘‘new budget
authority’’, ‘‘entitlement authority’’, ‘‘outlays’’, and
‘‘deficit’’ have the meanings given to such terms in
section 3 of the Congressional Budget and Impound-
ment Control Act of 1974, and the term ‘‘receipts’’
shall be treated as a synonym for the term ‘‘reve-
nues’’ as it is used in that Act.
(2) The term ‘‘account’’ means an item for
which appropriations are made in any appropriation
Act and, for items not provided for in appropriation
Acts, such term means an item for which there is a
designated budget account identification code num-
ber in the President’s budget.
(3) The term ‘‘aggregate first-year spendout
rate’’ means the percent of new budget authority
that is expended in the fiscal year for which the
budget authority is provided.
(4) The term ‘‘Board of Estimates’’ or ‘‘Board’’
refers to the entity established by section 119.
(5) The term ‘‘budget year’’ means, with re-
spect to a session of Congress, the fiscal year of the
Government that starts on October 1 of the calendar
year in which that session begins.
(6) The term ‘‘budget-year session’’ means any
session of Congress that starts in the calendar year
in which that budget year starts.
(7) The term ‘‘category’’ refers to all direct
spending within the jurisdiction of a standing com-
mittee of the House of Representatives as so des-
ignated in the joint statement of managers accom-
panying the conference report on this Act, as modi-
fied from time to time by the Board of Estimates
upon the written recommendation of the Speaker of
the House of Representatives.
(8) The term ‘‘CBO’’ means the Director of the
Congressional Budget Office.
(9) The term ‘‘current policy baseline’’ means
the projection (described in section 115) of current-
year levels of new budget authority, outlays, receipts,
and the surplus or deficit into the budget year and
the outyears.
(10) The term ‘‘current year’’ means the fiscal
year that immediately precedes a budget year.
(B) The following shall be treated as negative
numbers:
(i) A surplus.
(ii) A deficit reduction or surplus increase.
(iii) A deficit or surplus change and a defi-
cit or surplus change target when the deficit is
reduced by, or the surplus is increased by, the
change.
(24) Proceeds from the sale of a Government
asset (except a loan asset) shall not be scored as
deficit reduction for any fiscal year with respect to
the budget-year session during which the law provid-
ing for the asset sale was enacted.
SEC. 101. DIRECT SPENDING AND RECEIPTS: DEFICIT RE-
DUCTION REQUIREMENTS.
The deficit reduction targets for direct spending and
receipts legislation are as follows:
Fiscal Year
Deficit Reduction (in billions of dollars)
1994 ........................................
-32.3
1995 ........................................
-61.7
1996 ........................................
-92.7
1997 ........................................
-125.6
1998 ........................................
-160.3
The deficit reduction target for fiscal year 1998 shall be
adjusted, if necessary, as provided by section 103.
SEC. 102. DISCRETIONARY FUNDING LIMITS.
(a) INITIAL AMOUNTS.—Subject to modifications
under subsection (b), discretionary funding limits, meas-
ured in terms of new budget authority, are as follows:
Fiscal Year
Limits (in billions of dollars)
1994 ............................................................
515.7
1995 ............................................................
515.7
1996 ............................................................
515.7
1997 ............................................................
515.7
1998 ............................................................
515.7
(b) ADJUSTMENTS TO FUNDING LIMITS.—Whenever
appropriate, adjustments to the discretionary funding lim-
its (and to those limits as cumulatively adjusted) for one
or more fiscal years shall be made to reflect the following:
(1) CHANGES
IN
CONCEPTS.—For any fiscal
year, the adjustments produced by any change in
budget accounting concepts (including scorekeeping
conventions, budget classifications, and definitions)
shall equal the current-year levels of new budget au-
thority using up-to-date concepts minus those levels
using the concepts in effect before the change. Such
changes in concepts may only be made in consulta-
tion with the Committees on Appropriations and the
Budget of the House of Representatives and Senate,
CBO, and OMB. A change in budget classifications
includes any change from the assumption that all
amounts provided in appropriation Acts are classi-
fied as discretionary except those included under the
heading ‘‘Mandatory Appropriations’’ in the joint ex-
planatory statement of managers accompanying the
conference report on this Act.
(2) CHANGES
IN
INFLATION.—(A) For the
budget year and each outyear through 1998, the ad-
justments produced by changes in inflation shall
equal the discretionary funding limit for each such
year multiplied by the inflation adjustment factor
(for the fiscal year immediately preceding the cur-
rent year) computed under subparagraph (B).
(B) The inflation adjustment factor shall be
calculated by subtracting 1 from the ratio of (i) the
level of year-over-year inflation measured for the fis-
cal year immediately preceding the current year, and
(ii) the applicable estimated level for that year set
forth below:
For 1992, 1.031
For 1993, 1.036
For 1994, 1.036
For 1995, 1.036
For 1996, 1.036.
Inflation shall be measured by the average of the es-
timated consumer price index for all urban consum-
ers for a fiscal year divided by the average index for
the prior fiscal year.
(3) EXPIRING HOUSING CONTRACTS.—For each
budget year through 1998, the adjustment shall be
the amount of new budget authority needed to renew
expiring multiyear subsidized housing contracts or
provide contracts to replace units lost due to prepay-
ments, with the per-contract renewal/replacement
cost equal to the average current-year cost of re-
newal or replacement contracts.
(4) EMERGENCIES.—If for any fiscal year ap-
propriations for discretionary accounts are enacted
that are designated as emergency requirements by
statute, the adjustment shall be the amount of those
appropriations that the President also designates, in
writing, as emergency requirements within 5 days of
the enactment of those appropriations. If any
amount previously designated as an emergency re-
quirement is rescinded, the adjustment shall be the
amount of that rescission.
(5) NEW LIMITS FOR 1998 AND THEREAFTER.—
The adjustment for fiscal year 1998 shall be the ad-
justment (if any) under section 103, and the limit
for any succeeding fiscal year shall be the limit es-
tablished under section 104.
(6) TRANSPORTATION TRUST FUNDS.—For any
fiscal year, the adjustment produced by the enact-
ment of any law that raises excise taxes dedicated to
a transportation trust fund shall be the amount of
the net receipts produced by that tax increase which
that law specifically appropriates for that purpose.
SEC. 103. BALANCING THE BUDGET IN 1998.
If at the start of the 1998 budget-year session the
baseline assuming deficit reduction (set forth in section
116) projects a deficit (or surplus) for that year, then the
direct spending and receipts deficit reduction requirement
for that year under section 101 and the discretionary
funding limit for that year under section 102 shall each
be changed by amounts that, when debt service effects are
added, will produce a balanced budget. These changes
shall be accomplished by the enactment of a spin-off law
described in section 105; or if no spin-off law is enacted,
then the direct spending and receipts deficit reduction re-
quirement for fiscal year 1998 under section 101 shall be
adjusted by two-thirds of the total required change (ex-
cluding debt service effects) and the discretionary funding
limit for fiscal year 1998 under section 102 shall be ad-
justed to produce an outlay change equal to one-third of
the total required change (excluding debt service effects).
Any adjustment in the discretionary funding limit (wheth-
er in a spin-off law or by application of the above formula)
shall be assumed to produce an outlay change equal to
the change in new budget authority times the aggregate
first-year spendout rate for fiscal year 1998 chosen by the
Board of Estimates.
SEC. 104. PREVENTING DEFICITS AFTER 1998.
Starting with the 1999 budget-year session, the re-
quired change in the level of direct spending and receipts
(relative to the current policy baseline described in section
115) for the budget year and a discretionary funding limit
for that year shall be established. That change in direct
spending and receipts and that discretionary funding limit
(plus the associated effect on debt service) shall produce
a balanced budget. That change and that limit shall be
specified in a spin-off law described in section 105; or if
no spin-off law is enacted, then the change in direct spend-
ing and receipts for the budget year shall be two-thirds
of the baseline level of deficit or surplus (excluding debt
service effects) and the discretionary funding limit for the
budget year shall be the baseline level of discretionary new
budget authority adjusted to produce an outlay change
equal to one-third of the baseline level of deficit or surplus
(excluding debt service changes). Any adjustment in the
discretionary funding limit relative to the baseline level of
discretionary new budget authority (whether in a spin-off