The congressional budgeting process is badly broken. Lawmakers routinely miss statutory deadlines, rely on continuing resolutions, and generally complete their appropriations work only after the fiscal year has begun. These recurring failures have weakened fiscal discipline and contributed to a national debt approaching $40 trillion.
Representatives Steve Womack (R-AR), Ed Case (D-HI), Bill Huizenga (R-MI), and Scott Peters (D-CA) recently introduced the Budgeting for a Better America Act (BBAA) (H.R. 9452), a bipartisan package intended to improve Congress’s budget process while addressing the nation’s long-term fiscal challenges.
The legislation brings together several budget process reforms that lawmakers have previously introduced as stand-alone measures. Its major provisions would establish a biennial budgeting framework, create a bipartisan fiscal commission, require greater disclosure of the government’s long-term obligations, and give lawmakers more timely information about the nation’s fiscal condition.
Replacing Annual Budgeting with a Two-Year Cycle
The bill would replace the current annual congressional budget process with a biennial framework. Congress would adopt a budget resolution during the first session of each Congress covering both years of the two-year cycle.
Biennial budgeting was also a central component of the Bipartisan Congressional Budget Reform Act of 2019 (S. 2765), developed by Senators Mike Enzi (R-WY) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI). That legislation became the first bipartisan budget-reform package approved by the Senate Budget Committee since 1990.
Like the Budgeting for a Better America Act, the Enzi-Whitehouse proposal sought to reduce short-term decision-making by requiring Congress to adopt a two-year budget resolution while retaining annual appropriations. Its bipartisan committee approval demonstrated that lawmakers across the political spectrum have recognized the need to give Congress more time for oversight and long-term fiscal planning. Congress would adopt a budget resolution during the first session of each Congress covering both years of the two-year cycle.
With the bill, the deadline to adopt a budget resolution would shift from April 15 to May 1 in the first year of the two-year cycle, providing Congress with more time to incorporate the latest economic and budget information.
The second session of each Congress would focus more heavily on program oversight and the study of long-term budgetary and economic challenges. This structural change could give lawmakers more time to oversee federal programs, evaluate their effectiveness, and examine challenges requiring long-term planning, including the looming insolvency of the Social Security and Medicare trust funds. More rigorous oversight could help identify waste, improve program performance, and inform reforms before fiscal problems become more difficult and costly to address.
Under Section 104 of the bill, each budget resolution must include information on the ratio of public debt to GDP, the annual deficit-to-GDP ratio, and a complete accounting of tax expenditure losses. It would also disclose total outlays and revenue losses associated with tax expenditures, providing lawmakers and the public with a clearer picture of the fiscal effects of deductions, exclusions, credits, and other preferences in the tax code.
The bill also makes sure to provide Congress with the ability to make budget fixes as needed during the two-year cycle. It would also allow the budget resolution to include reconciliation instructions for each fiscal year.
Creating a Bipartisan Commission to Reduce the Deficit
The bill also creates a bipartisan 18-member National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, charged with developing.recommendations to bring the annual deficit down to 3% of GDP within 10 years and move the government toward long-term fiscal sustainability.
This provision builds on bipartisan fiscal commission legislation already introduced in both chambers. Representatives Bill Huizenga (R-MI) and Scott Peters (D-CA) introduced the stand-alone Fiscal Commission Act in the House (H.R. 3289), while Senator John Curtis (R-UT) introduced its Senate companion (S. 4012). That proposal would establish a 16-member commission tasked with holding the debt-to-GDP ratio below 100% by 2039 and improving the solvency of federal trust funds over at least 75 years, with its recommendations receiving expedited consideration in Congress.
Under the Budgeting for a Better America Act, the commission would include 6 presidential appointees, 6 members from the Senate, and 6 members from the House. Its bipartisan structure is intended to encourage cooperation on politically-difficult questions involving federal spending, revenues, and entitlement programs.
Rather than issuing only general recommendations, the commission would be responsible for translating its proposals into legislative language for Congress to consider. This would give lawmakers a concrete package on which they could act instead of another fiscal report that can be acknowledged and then set aside.
Although a commission cannot guarantee that Congress will make difficult and necessary choices to address the nation’s unsustainable debt, it could, however, provide a structured process for examining the growing imbalance between federal revenues and spending commitments and for placing specific reforms before lawmakers.
Additional Budget Transparency and Accountability Reforms
The bill includes several additional provisions intended to improve fiscal transparency, congressional oversight, and coordination:
Long-term obligation analysis: The president’s annual budget would have to analyze the effects of long-term unfunded obligations in major entitlement programs over 25-, 50-, and 75-year periods. It would also examine how recently enacted and proposed legislation would affect those obligations.
Updated budget information: Beginning December 1, 2028, the president would submit an annual administrative budget containing updated current- and prior-year fiscal estimates and federal credit reestimates. This would give Congress more current information before work begins on the next budget cycle.
Fiscal State of the Nation hearing: The House and Senate Budget Committee chairs would hold an annual televised hearing with the Comptroller General to review the federal government’s audited financial statements, financial condition, long-term fiscal projections, and social insurance obligations.
Orientation for newly elected lawmakers: The Congressional Budget Office would provide new members of Congress with an introductory briefing on federal budget matters before they take office, giving them a common foundation for understanding the nation’s fiscal challenges.
House Budget Committee coordination: The chairs and ranking members of the House Ways and Means, Energy and Commerce, and Appropriations Committees would be added to the House Budget Committee. This change is intended to improve coordination among the committees responsible for taxes, discretionary appropriations, and major mandatory spending programs.
Conclusion
The Budgeting for a Better America Act clearly addresses the fundamental weakness that have undermined congressional budgeting for decades.While any meaningful fiscal reforms will ultimately depend on congressional action, this legislation provides a framework that encourages earlier and more accountable budget decisions.
The reform package would give lawmakers better tools to confront the debt. Biennial budgeting would allow more time for oversight and planning, while a fiscal commission would help develop deficit-reduction proposals, and expanded reporting would improve transparency around long-term obligations.
At a time of trillion-dollar deficits, rising interest costs, and the approaching insolvency of the Medicare and Social Security trust funds, Congress cannot afford to continue budgeting from one deadline to the next.
This bipartisan legislation would provide Congress with a more transparent, accountable, and forward-looking framework for confronting the nation’s fiscal challenges.