Professor Mankiw Says

We are in a deep shit!

Now, he is a little more professorial about it, but he links to a piece that predicts a $14 Trillion deficit over the next decade.

If you start with CBO’s more pessimistic baseline budget outlook of $7 trillion in deficits (by the way, the equivalent pre-policy baseline estimated by the Administration is $6.259 trillion), then add in the CBO-estimated cost of policies that have a good chance of coming true in the future (but aren’t yet written into law), you can come up with a projection that is perhaps more “plausible” than both the Administration’s (optimistic) $9 trillion and CBO’s (naive baseline-constrained) $7 trillion.

De Mortuis nil nisi bonum and all, I am suggesting that we name the debt in honor of the liberal lion himself: "The Senator Ted Kennedy Memorial Budget Deficit!" Got a ring...

Posted by John Kranz at August 26, 2009 3:38 PM