The Internal Mechanisms of the Defense Budget Process - Fiscal 1953-1968,
Abstract
A mathematical study is made of the dollar amounts of the 5 successive versions of the defense budget contained each fiscal year in the Service requests, the President's budget, House and Senate floor actions, and final Congressional action. The total for each of 5 functional categories, 49 subcategories, and the overall total were analyzed for each version for each of 16 years, beginning in calendar 1951. The defense budgetary process was stable during this period of changes in administration and domestic environment. Analysis bears out some common beliefs: Service requests contain padding for Presidential cuts, the President's budget is padded for House cuts, and final action depends on simple bargaining between House and Senate. Two unexpected findings: (1) many items pass unchanged through the entire process, despite the clear evidence that (2) cutting or spending moods prevail at different times. (Author)
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Sep 01, 1970
- Accession Number
- AD0716805
Entities
People
- John L. Stromberg
Organizations
- RAND Corporation