Obama’s Budget Proposal NASA impacts and overall debt levels

AFP – Phys Org – President Obama’s budget proposal give NASA $17.7 billion, a decrease of 0.3 percent or $59 million less than 2012, the steepest cuts — a near 39 percent decline — hit plans for robotic exploration of Mars.

The James Webb Space Telescope which will be 100 times more sensitive than its predecessor the Hubble space telescope, was on track to launch in 2018 at a total project cost of $8.8 billion, NASA said in December after a series of delays and cost overruns.

NASA would also get three billion dollars for developing new spacecraft and rockets to take the next generation of astronauts to space, after the space shuttle program ended last year leaving Russia as the sole taxi to the International Space Station.

Big projects include $1.86 billion for the continued development of a Space Launch System (SLS) heavy lift rocket and $1.2 billion for the Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle to “with a key initial goal of visiting an asteroid next decade.”

The Space Launch System will have starting costs of $62 billion to get to the beginning of main rocket development in 2015. The first rocket will launch in 2019 if it is on schedule. The first 130 ton capable rocket is scheduled for 2021. Given the history of this kind of rocket development costs to 2032 are more likely to be $120-250 billion and there would be delays to 2035-2045.

Less than $1 trillion deficits have been a year or two away for two years

President Obama is proposing a budget with a $1.3 trillion deficit this year. The deficits have been tracking more closely (and sometimes worse) than the Concord Coalition forecast of 2010. President Obama keeps promising deficits will shrink back to sub-trillion dollar per year levels. But those levels are always two years away.

MSNBC – As part of his $3.8 trillion spending plan for 2013, the president included an economic forecast that shows the nation’s gross domestic product moving ahead by 3.6 percent this year and 4.4 percent in 2013. Obama and his advisors also see the unemployment rate falling to 7.5 percent next year, with an inflation rate holding steady at about 2 percent through the rest of the decade.

Under Obama’s plan, the deficit would fall to $901 billion in 2013 and continue to shrink to $575 billion in 2018. Those numbers only happen if the GDP growth and employment numbers of the forecast happen.

President Obama on Monday unveiled a $3.8 trillion spending plan that seeks to pump billions of dollars into the economy while raising taxes on the rich to tame a soaring national debt now projected to grow significantly faster than previously forecast.

The president’s outlook for debt reduction has deteriorated markedly since September, when Obama told Congress that his proposals would hold annual deficits well under $600 billion after next year and permit the debt held by outside investors to rise to $17.7 trillion by 2021, or 73 percent of the overall economy.

The new concord coalition plausible baseline of deficits for 2013-2022.

If you liked this article, please give it a quick review on ycombinator or StumbleUpon. Thanks