Today, the two co-chairmen of the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction (also known as the “supercommittee”), Representative Jeb Hensarling (R-TX) and Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), announced that the panel has failed to come up with an agreement to find $1.2 trillion in savings over the next 10 years. Created by the Budget Control Act that ended the debt ceiling debate in August, the Deficit Reduction Committee had been charged with delivering a plan to save at least $1.2 trillion by November 23rd.
Failure to reach an agreement will result in the adoption of automatic spending caps that will cut $1.2 trillion in discretionary spending over nine years, starting in January 2013. The cuts will be split 50/50 between defense and non-defense programs.
There has been talk in Congress about legislation to repeal the automatic cuts, but President Obama has said he would veto such efforts. Many Pentagon officials are concerned with how the automatic cuts will affect military readiness, so we may see efforts in Congress to address the military cuts separately from the domestic cuts.
The panel was unable to come to an agreement given wide ideological differences between the two parties on the issue of using revenue increases to reduce the deficit.
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