Last month, House Budget Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington (R-TX) unveiled a new 10-year balanced budget resolution intended to "reverse the curse" of ever-increasing public debt . This plan proposes to balance the federal budget in 10 years by reducing deficits by $16.3 trillion, resulting in a $130 billion surplus by fiscal 2033.

Today, taxpayers owe a national debt of more than $33 trillion. The annual deficit will exceed $2 trillion over the next 10 years, at which time the debt will be an estimated $46 trillion. The current debt-to-GDP ratio is 120.7%, which exceeds the largest level ever reached in peacetime and is equal only to the level of indebtedness during World War II.

To dig taxpayers out of this hole, Arrington's plan proposes limiting the growth of discretionary spending to no more than 1% per year and tearing down regulatory barriers to strong economic growth. The proposal estimates this spending cap would reduce discretionary spending by $4.6 trillion over the next decade. The resolution's recommendations for stimulating economic growth include extending the 2017 tax cuts, "permanently eliminating regulations that were temporarily waived during COVID-19, exempting small businesses from National Labor Relations Board regulations, and repealing corporate average fuel economy standards," among others. If such reforms were enacted, the committee projects that the economy would grow at an average rate of 2.9% over the next decade.

Growth at that rate would not only raise revenues at current tax rates but would also likely reduce the cost of automatic spending programs. After all, fewer people would rely on means-tested benefits such as Medicaid. Smaller deficits would create a positive cycle of growth by reducing the degree to which public debt crowds out private-sector capital and innovation.

Citizens Against Government Waste, or CAGW, has long supported a balanced budget. The House Budget Committee's resolution makes positive strides in that direction. The size and scope of the proposed spending caps provide Congress with an opportunity to cut many programs that belong in the wastebasket, especially those CAGW has identified in its Pig Book and Prime Cuts reports.

Positively, the budget resolution also proposes reducing mandatory spending programs, including Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, by $8.7 trillion over the next decade. As Arrington notes, "Runaway entitlement spending is what's driving the debt." The Hospital Insurance Trust Fund will be depleted in 2031, according to the Medicare Trustees 2023 annual report . According to the Social Security Trustees 2023 annual report , that fund will be depleted in 2034.

Saving these programs requires not only adjusting their benefit structure but also reining in improper payments. Medicare issued $46.8 billion in improper payments in 2022, according to a March 2023 Government Accountability Office report . Medicaid improper payments were $80.6 billion in 2022. House Republican proposals to reform these entitlement programs include raising the Social Security retirement age for new workers just entering the workforce, means-testing Medicare, and block-granting Medicaid funding to the states, allowing each to determine its own eligibility rules.

There are many opportunities to make specific savings recommendations from both government and private sector sources. The time has indeed finally come to reverse the excessive spending curse.

Alec Mena serves as State Government Affairs Associate for Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW), a private, non-partisan, non-profit organization representing more than one million members and supporters nationwide.