Cost Estimates Improvement Act
H.R. 991, the Cost Estimates Improvement Act, would require the primary federal budget scorekeepers—the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT)—to include the costs of servicing the public debt in their official estimates of proposed legislation. Specifically, the bill would add a new Section 403 to the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, stating that any estimate prepared by the CBO under Section 402 and any estimate prepared by the JCT shall, to the extent practicable, include the costs of servicing the national debt. This represents a mandate to quantify debt service costs (primarily interest payments and related debt servicing activities) as part of budget analysis, with a clerical amendment adding a new labeled section in the Act’s table of contents. The goal is to provide a more complete view of the long-term fiscal implications of policy changes.
Key Points
- 1New requirement: CBO and JCT estimates must include debt servicing costs to the extent practicable.
- 2Scope: Applies to estimates prepared by the Director of the CBO under the Congressional Budget Act and to estimates prepared by the Joint Committee on Taxation.
- 3Limitation: The inclusion is limited by “to the extent practicable,” acknowledging that some debt service effects may be difficult to quantify precisely.
- 4Legislative housekeeping: Creates a new labeled section (Section 403) and corresponding table-of-contents entry in the Congressional Budget Act of 1974.
- 5Short title: The act is cited as the “Cost Estimates Improvement Act.”