海角大神

The Congressional Budget Office鈥檚 long-term budget outlook is a curious document. On one hand, a 30-year fiscal forecast will almost certainly be wrong. 聽But on the other, it provides a rough鈥攂ut important鈥攆ramework for thinking about today鈥檚 policy choices.

It is worth considering聽CBO鈥檚 latest fiscal forecast, just out today, as you think about the campaign promises of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. In that context, Clinton鈥檚 agenda is merely irresponsible. Trump鈥檚 is fiscal madness.

CBO鈥檚 bottom line: Under current policy, annual budget deficits will rise from 2.9 percent of Gross Domestic Product this year to an average of 3.9 percent over the next decade, 6.2 percent in the decade 2027-2036, and 8.1 percent from 2037-2046. The ratio of debt to GDP, an important indicator of the government鈥檚 ability to finance its obligations, will nearly double over those聽three decades, from 75 percent today to 141 percent in 2046. That debt burden would dwarf any in U.S. history, including the World War II period.

Because of that burgeoning debt and rising interest rates, CBO projects the government鈥檚 borrowing costs will increase nearly four-fold, from 1.4 percent of GDP today to 5.1 percent. That means the government will be spending as much on interest in 2046 as on the entire discretionary budget, including defense. 聽

Aging Baby Boomers

How will this happen? Due largely to rising health care costs and the aging of the Baby Boomers, spending for programs such as Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security will increase sharply, while tax revenues will rise only modestly. Because these trends are driven mostly by demographics, and because so much government policy is on autopilot (as my Tax Policy Center colleague Gene Steuerle often聽reminds us), Congress has no easy way to change this trajectory.

With this grim background, let鈥檚 think about the presidential race. 聽聽聽

Clinton, you鈥檒l recall, has proposed relatively modest new programs to address kitchen table issues such as health, education, and caring for aging parents, which she鈥檇 pay for by聽raising taxes on high-income households.

She鈥檇聽make the deficit聽slightly worse聽by聽offering what seemingly is a five point plan for every problem. But while she wouldn't聽do much more damage, she proposes no steps to improve the long-run fiscal situation, though the burden of the growing debt would surely haunt her presidency. (The Democratic platform is likely to endorse more ambitious initiatives. But it is a party platform, which means it will be largely forgotten by nearly everyone鈥攊ncluding Clinton鈥攕oon after the Democrats decamp from Philadelphia in a couple of weeks.

Trump, by contrast, has proposed a fiscal plan that TPC聽estimates聽would reduce federal revenues by $9.5 trillion over the next 10 years, and by $15 trillion in the decade after that. He鈥檚 proposing massive tax cuts for all, though the biggest beneficiaries would be high-income households.聽He鈥檇 cut taxes by an average of more than $5,000 in 2017 and聽more than $6,500 in 2025.

Greece, with worse weather

So far, he has identified no major spending reductions to offset these huge tax cuts, other than an unspecified cap on Medicaid spending. Indeed, he has vowed to maintain Social Security and Medicare benefits and probably would increase spending on defense and border security.

The long-run fiscal consequences of this? In the period 2026 to 2037, TPC estimates Trump would increase the debt by $34 trillion, or 80 percent of GDP. That would be on top of the already unsustainable debt levels projected by CBO.聽 The聽U.S. would become Greece, but with worse weather. And with much bigger consequences for the world economy.

That then, appears to be our choice. A candidate who, I suppose to our great relief, won鈥檛 make things much worse and one who would increase the federal debt to levels never-before imagined. 聽

This article originally appeared on聽TaxVox.