The House narrowly passed Paul Ryan's dream budget and left for a three-week recess on Wednesday. Ryan's budget would withhold funding for Obamacare, balance the federal budget in ten years and overhaul the nation's so-called entitlement programs. The surprisingly close vote had 220 in favor, only two votes more than it needed to pass. The House also turned down a series of alternative budget resolutions proposed by both Republicans and Democrats, according to a March 21 Yahoo News article.
Ryan's budget would repeal Obamacare but would keep the tax levies associated with the program. According to a March 18 Newsmax report, many of the taxes associated Obamacare are already in effect and they include new tax burdens. Individuals making more than $200,000 and families making $250,000 in 2013 will have a 0.9 increase in Medicare taxes. Everyone above that income level will also have to pay 3.8 percent in new Medicare taxes on their investment income. In essence, Ryan wants to cut Obamacare benefits while he collects Obamacare taxes.
Ryan also wants to continue sequester level budget cuts for the next ten years to cut $4.8 trillion out of the federal budget. He also wants to cut spending from the Medicare trust fund and to cut discretionary spending on domestic programs.
While he wants to tax and slash the domestic budget, Ryan's budget increases military spending and denies the spending cuts that military leaders recommended.
According to a March 20 ThinkProgress article, "The Ryan plan also increases national defense spending to $554 billion in 2013, an increase of $8 billion over the $546 billion that was agreed to under the Budget Control Act."
The Senate is expected to turn the Ryan budget down and vote on a more Democratic budget plan later this week. The Senate plan balances the budget by slowing down federal spending growth, implementing discretionary spending cuts and increasing taxes.
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