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Issues > Overview At a time of record budget deficits,
fiscally wasteful and environmentally harmful spending continues to be
rampant in Washington, D.C. Meanwhile, industry and its allies in Congress
and the White House are demanding even more taxpayer dollars for programs
that pollute our air and water, and scar our public lands. As a defender of American taxpayers
and the environment, the Green Scissors Campaign is standing up to polluting interests
and fighting to cut wasteful and environmentally harmful spending from the
federal budget. Introduction
The Green Scissors Campaign calls on
political leaders to make fiscal and environmental health a national
priority. Instead of bowing to the pressure of corporate interests and
jeopardizing the long-term economic stability of our domestic resource base, Congress
and the administration should commit to eliminating environmentally harmful
and fiscally wasteful programs. Recommendations offered in Green
Scissors 2003 outline a clear path toward fiscal and environmental
responsibility. It is time for the 108th Congress and the administration to
implement the important spending cuts proposed in this report. Green
Scissors 2003 outlines 68 recommendations that would do much to protect A Call for Fiscal
Responsibility
In the past three years, Congress and
the administration have increased discretionary spending by almost 25
percent, while reducing federal revenues. Unfortunately, many of these
spending increases have included funding for projects and programs that
please special interests, but needlessly waste taxpayer dollars. During the same period, our national
budget surplus of $5.6 trillion has vanished and our nation now faces a $1.8
trillion deficit over the next ten years. This massive and continuing draw on
the federal treasury undermines our economic security and threatens the
stability of essential government programs that many Americans rely on for
their basic human needs. Instead of rising to the challenge of
fiscal responsibility, Congress continues to spend money without regard for
its long-term effect. As such,
we now face a projected federal deficit of more than $300 billion for each of
the fiscal years 2003 and 2004, with continued deficits totaling $1.8 billion
into the next decade. Given these downward trends, and with cost estimates of
the war in Iraq in excess of $80 billion, federal lawmakers should embrace
every opportunity to cut unnecessary and harmful spending. A Call for Environmental Responsibility While the government's economic policies will leave its fiscal ledgers in the red for another ten years, its environmental policies are proving no less damaging. Indeed, it is as if the administration and Congress are colluding to undermine environmental protections - one tearing down long enshrined environmental laws, and the other dipping into the public purse to dole out massive handouts to polluting industries. The environmental impacts of these
devastating policies are just as stark as the economic ones. More than 131
million Americans alternate live in areas where smog pollution makes their
air unsafe to breathe, and every year over 45,000 lives are cut short by air
pollution. Thirty years after
the Clean Water Act was enacted, more than 40 percent of our rivers, lakes,
and estuaries remain unsafe for swimming and fishing. The National Academy of
Sciences estimates that every year 60,000 children may be born at a
significantly increased risk of neurological defects primarily due to mothers
eating mercury-contaminated fish. Logging, mining, road building, and other
development activities have destroyed more than half of our national forests.
Scientists throughout the world agree that global climate change looms as a
devastating threat to the future of the planet. Despite these distressing trends,
Congress continues to fund industries and programs that put undue pressure on
our health, our environment, and our economy. At a time in history when security
is on the minds of all Americans, our leaders appear to be actively working
to cultivate financial and environmental insecurity. This report details the
appropriate steps that can place us on an alternate path. The Campaign
Led by Friends of the Earth,
Taxpayers for Common Sense, and the U.S. Public Interest Research Group, the
Green Scissors Campaign works with Congress and the administration to end wasteful
and environmentally harmful spending. With strong bipartisan support, the
campaign has succeeded in cutting funding for wasteful federal programs by
more than $26 billion. Green Scissors 2003 Methodology Members of the Green Scissors Campaign
selected the programs in this report in consultation with a variety of
experts and advocates from the field. The campaign evaluated programs based
on a combination of factors including: cost to taxpayers, negative environmental
consequences, and current political status. Many of the programs highlighted
in this report involve complex issues, and are part of a broader debate. The
recommendations offered here were developed in consensus with Green Scissors coalition
members. The published Green Scissors 2003 report is structured to give a brief analysis of each program, and is grouped by category - agriculture, energy, international and military, public lands, roads and highways, and water. Full-page articles that offer a more in-depth analysis of Green Scissors recommendations can be found online at www.greenscissors.org. The
organizations and coalitions championing these reforms are excellent sources
of additional information on these issues. To learn more about a given
project, please consult the contact persons listed for each issue. Additionally, while we are pleased
with the diversity of issues covered in Green Scissors 2003, we would
like to acknowledge that this report is not a definitive list of
environmentally harmful and fiscally wasteful federal programs. How Savings Are Estimated Unless otherwise indicated, the figures in Green
Scissors 2003 represent a project’s total cost to federal taxpayers over
the life of the project. Where this information is not available, the savings
are estimated based on the five-year program cost (i.e. multiplying the
current year cost by five). Where appropriate, a distinct and suitable time
period is used in place of a five-year estimate. Because of the many
variables involved in arriving at a precise dollar value for each of these
programs, savings figures are generally intended to be illustrative rather
than definitive. These are conservative estimates, and program
phase-in periods are usually not accounted for unless Congressional Budget
Office estimates are used. "$N/A" is used for recommendations for which no reliable savings estimate is available, or when funding mechanisms are complex and indirect, and thus difficult to discern. |
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