Fox Business
04/17/2015
People often talk about controlling government spending, but they may not realize how the spending is classified and available for cuts as discretionary spending.
For fiscal year 2015, mandatory spending on programs such as Social Security and Medicare make up 65% of the budget proposed by the President. Since another portion goes toward interest on the Federal Debt (6% in 2015), only 29% of government spending is discretionary.
That discretionary spending totals 1.16 trillion dollars in the 2015 budget. However, there is another form of discretionary spending that falls outside this budget category — tax breaks... (more)
