{"id":40054,"date":"2023-05-29T09:53:05","date_gmt":"2023-05-29T09:53:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fusefornews.com\/2023\/05\/29\/whats-in-the-us-debt-ceiling-deal\/"},"modified":"2023-05-29T09:53:05","modified_gmt":"2023-05-29T09:53:05","slug":"whats-in-the-us-debt-ceiling-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fusefornews.com\/?p=40054","title":{"rendered":"What’s in the US debt ceiling deal?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\"Kevin<\/picture><\/span>Image source, <\/span>Getty Images<\/span><\/div>
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The two parties finally reached a deal after weeks of trying<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

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President Joe Biden has urged Congress to pass a deal to raise the government’s borrowing limit and prevent a potentially catastrophic default on US debt repayments. So what is in the deal?<\/b><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Negotiators from Democratic and Republican parties finalised an agreement on Sunday night.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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If approved, it would allow the federal government to borrow money until well after the next presidential election due in November 2024.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Voting on the bill, the text of which was posted to a congressional website<\/a>, is set to start later this week in the House and the Senate.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Here are the highlights from the package of measures.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Debt ceiling suspended until 2025<\/span><\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
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Every so often, US Congress must vote to raise or suspend the ceiling, so it can borrow more to pay its bills. Currently it is $31.4tn (\u00a325tn).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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This includes paying for federal employees, the military, Social Security and Medicare, as well as interest on the national debt and tax refunds.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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But in recent years, this has become increasingly difficult, because the two sides cannot agree on the terms.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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In the deal reached on Sunday, they have not raised the limit to a certain level, but suspended it entirely until 2025.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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This allows them to pay their bills until that date and know that the next fight over raising the ceiling will not interfere with the presidential election.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Caps on spending, but not defence<\/span><\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
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Republicans wanted a freeze on overall spending for 10 years, with a rise in defence spending and cuts to other budgets.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The agreement keeps non-defence spending flat next year, with a 1% rise in 2025. This means departments that were set to get growing cash pots will instead have to reckon with a freeze.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Defence spending would increase to $886bn, which amounts to a 3% rise on this year, reports CNBC.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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There are no budget caps after 2025.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Unspent Covid funds returned<\/span><\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
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With the public health emergency officially ended in May, Republicans had argued for the relief funds that were not spent to be returned.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The Congressional Budget Office has estimated this will amount to about $30bn.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Welfare tinkered with, but no overhaul<\/span><\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
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A central demand of Republicans was to toughen up the distribution of welfare benefits by attaching strings that would mean able-bodied recipients having to work to get food and healthcare help.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Democrats were adamant this should not be on the table.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The welfare being looked at by Republicans included Medicaid (health coverage for poor Americans), the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Medicaid remains untouched in the deal, but the age at which work requirements are included for those on SNAP was raised from 50 to 54.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Funds to enforce tax rules on wealthy Americans<\/span><\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
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A win for Democrats was securing $80bn for a decade to help the Internal Revenue Service to enforce the tax code in last year’s Inflation Reduction Act on the richest.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Easier to get energy project permits<\/span><\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
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New rules will make it easier for both fossil fuel and renewable energy projects to get licences.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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This has long been advocated by Democratic Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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It will basically streamline the environmental review process and potentially get projects off the ground in a faster time.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Student loan relief untouched<\/span><\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
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Republicans had wanted this to be rescinded, but this bill keeps it in place.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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[ad_1] Image source, Getty ImagesImage caption, The two parties finally reached a deal after weeks of trying President Joe Biden has urged Congress to pass a deal to raise the … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":40055,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fusefornews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40054"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fusefornews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fusefornews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fusefornews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fusefornews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40054"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/fusefornews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40054\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fusefornews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/40055"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fusefornews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40054"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fusefornews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40054"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fusefornews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40054"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}