JONATHAN COHN FEBRUARY 10, 2011
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It's cold outside and millions of Americans are struggling to pay their heating bills. The good news is that there's a federal program, called the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, that helps these people.
And the bad news? President Obama wants to cut its funding roughly in half.
OK, wants is probably the wrong word here. President Obama knows how important this program is to the individuals who depend upon it. He also knows that cutting social services funding can't be good for the anemic economic recovery.
But Obama has also proposed to freeze non-defense, discretionary domestic spending for five years. The trouble with that idea, as some of us have argued, is that it commits the administration to cuts like this.
National Journal's Marc Ambinder was the first to report the LIHEAP cuts, which senior administration officials and others familiar with budget discussions have since discussed with several news outlets. These officials say that the cut is not as bad as it sounds: The Obama proposal, to allocate $2.57 billion, is apparently the same allocation that the program got in fiscal year 2008. And, these sources say, energy prices are actually lower than they were in 2008, when Congress increased the funding. "In real terms, under our budget, LIHEAP funding will be at levels similar to the Clinton Administration," a senior administration official told Ambinder.
To be sure, it's likely the Republicans will end up calling for even steeper cuts, not just to LIHEAP but to other worthy programs. And it's possible that, by proposing less severe cuts now, Obama will gain enough credibility with moderate voters and lawmakers to defeat those proposals.
Then again, it's also possible that the Obama administration is effectively bargaining with itself.
Either way, it's worth noting just how absurd and bloodless this whole discussion about spending cuts has become. As far as I can tell, nobody seriously claims that it's possible to reduce LIHEAP funding without reducing its reach. The program has its share of fraud and waste, but, unless I'm missing something, it's not nearly enough to justify this big a cut.
Remember: Energy prices may be lower than they were in 2008, but the economy is in worse shape, too. That means more people need the help.
LIHEAP has some strong defenders, particularly in the Northeast and Upper Great Lakes. Ambinder's article included protests from two senior Massachusetts lawmakers, Representative Ed Markey and Senator John Kerry. Other Democrats are likely to chime in. Moderate northeastern Republicans, like Senators Scott Brown and Olympia Snowe, may join them.
They, too, understand the administration's political calculation. But they also understand the needs of their constituents. They are right to scream.
Update: I rewrote the section on the politics of the budget debate to clarify what I meant. I also added a reference to the fact that the economy is worse now than it was in 2008.
12 comments
These efforts to cut the deficit remind me of a line in Woody Allen's mocking biography he wrote after reading that the Earl of Sandwich invented the sandwich. With the Earl's first attempts at discovery frustrated with failure, he fell on hard times and (here's the line) had to "skimp on meals to save money for food."
- Nusholtz
February 10, 2011 at 9:09am
Cohn, I know you are working on being compassionate but when I lived in China no classes or homes were heated AT ALL. I was living in Shanghai and it got cold in winter, a couple of times the pipes even froze. Obviously in northern states people won't go without any heating but they can economize. People bundled up in layers, and I mean layers, my kids had more clothes than kid. Keeping the thermostat at 60 is fine.
- blackton
February 10, 2011 at 10:59am
blackton for pete's sake.
- Sophia
February 10, 2011 at 1:42pm
In case you weren't aware, sir or madam, people have died in northern American cities from lack of any heat at all. Keeping the thermostat at 60 isn't the issue. It's having any heat at all in winters that routinely dip below zero. People who are old, very young or ill simply die in conditions like that. Jeez. This is a primary issue with health care too - civilized countries simply do not allow their citizens to die on the streets - from illness, cold, or hunger. PS this isn't, thank goodness, China. You sound like Mr. Seattle, happily comparing America's poor to the destitute of Somalia. sheese. What is happening here?
- Sophia
February 10, 2011 at 1:46pm
And furthermore have you checked the cost of heat lately? Supposedly, the cost of living hasn't increased the past two years - uh huh.
- Sophia
February 10, 2011 at 1:48pm
Blackie, Sophia's right. I hope this is sarcasm. If not, then let's do it right: - eliminate democracy in the US - slash the pentagon budget - get out of every foreign military base - repeal all worker rights and environmental laws - have state seizure of key industries - screw the rest of the world, only look out for US interests and never ever consider our long-standing ideals in any way, shape or form - manipulate our currency - put up massive trade barriers and keep out imports - zero out Medicare and Social Security I could go on. If we turn off the heat for the poor, then I want the whole deal. Best part is the budget it really balanced so we can have more sacred and blessed tax cuts for all.
- tnmats
February 10, 2011 at 4:45pm
Oh for heaven's sake everyone, get a grip. They are not eliminating heating for the poor they are keeping the rates at where they presently are. I have been to public housing projects in the states, they blast out heat like a furnace. I have seen people who keep their windows open to get some air. The fact is keeping the subsidies where they are will result in people economizing and lowering the thermostat, not turning the thing off. I used to work for a company that dealt with the poor and I used to go to their homes, the heat in the winter was stifling, and why not since they weren't paying for it? People who have died have died because of slumlords not fixing boilers, not because they can't afford heat, or in some cases because old people are out of it, but lets not blow this out of proportion. I would much rather money be spent on insulation and energy efficiency in inner cities, not subsiding wasting energy unnecessarily. And I am not comparing America's poor to the destitute of Somalia, I am comparing them to myself. Are you saying America's poor is better than me? That because I don't blast my furnace (OK, I don't have one) I am at fault? By the way, for the last 15 years I have not had a furnace or a central airconditioner or anything other than a fan and I seldom have gotten sick. We have destroyed our health with over reliance on artificial environments. Americans have turned into a nation of wimps, oooh it is 2 degrees too hot or too cold. You fortify your constitution by exposing it to the environment, you weaken it by going from a hot place to a cold place constantly. Yeah, I know this is digression but as I said Obama isn't getting rid of the subsidies, at most people will turn their stats down from 72 to 68. Oh, the horror. And do yourself a favor and go to some projects and see how they heat the units.
- blackton
February 10, 2011 at 6:04pm
I know part of LIHEAP is weatherization, in that it sometimes pays a one-time upgrade cost that reduces utility bills for several years out. Maybe restructuring LIHEAP to focus more on weatherization would allow it to get more bang for its buck, long term?
- benjamin81
February 10, 2011 at 6:04pm
by the way, Americans produce 10 to 20 times more greenhouse gases compared to the average Chinese. Goddamn Central heating and central airconditioning are destroying our planet. That and huge lawns sucking down water. Ah America, where the right to waste must be guaranteed for everyone. But make a suggestion that not even reducing subsidies but keeping them at the present rate will cause people to economize and suddenly I am Hitler pushing people into a gas chamber.
- blackton
February 10, 2011 at 6:11pm
Blackton, you are talking out of your tuchas. Projects blast out heat? Yeah right. And ps not all poor people live in projects. Plus, blithely asserting that's ok for pipes to freeze is meshugah. It isn't. The damage that can do is incredible. Oh by the way - weatherization is great but what if you rent???? Most poor folks don't own homes. I do agree 100% that we must reduce greenhouse gases but this isn't the right way to go about that. I live in a city where, in the past, if people didn't pay their gas bill the heat got cut off willy-nilly regardless of how cold it got and people did die - we're not talking about 60 degrees, we're talking about NO HEAT and it gets REALLY REALLY COLD HERE as in below zero. I fail to see also why Obama consistently comes down on the wrong side of these economic issues. The fat isn't in the hands of the poor after all. Nor is the power to change the environment - Fact is the petrochemical industry is pushing back hard against any increased taxes OR the idea that we should look at energy change - go after THEM ok? Plus, people who have choices about whether or not to be cold shouldn't be pontificating about the virtues of freezing in the winter. Seriously.
- Sophia
February 10, 2011 at 6:44pm
Plus, people who have choices about whether or not to be cold shouldn't be pontificating about the virtues of freezing in the winter. Seriously. I am sorry, I had no idea people were forced to live in the north. In China because of the Hukou system people have no choice but to live where they are born, that is not so in America. If I were literally in danger of freezing to death I would move south. But again, you know this is not true (except for vagrants and mentally ill homeless people, but they don't provide subsidies to heat cardboard boxes) Again, you are ignoring that Obama is not proposing to abolish the assistence, but to keep it at the present rate, at worst it means instead of 72 on your thermostat you might be able to afford just 68 or 65. This is not freezing. As to gas companies shutting off gas, gas companies work with customers to space out the payments, you seriously have to shirk paying bills before this happens.
- blackton
February 11, 2011 at 1:24pm
I'm not sure either side here is all right. If we admit that current deficit levels are unsustainable, then there are going to have to be some cuts that are actually painful. With Sophia, I would rather go after sources like the petrochemical industry and I hope to see some of that, but it can't all come from that end, not with politics as it is. Blackton is assuming that the same people who now get the assistance will still get it, but less. Is that how the program works? Or will it mean that there will be a choice of cutting some people out of the program entirely? How the cuts are implemented is as important as how much money is cut. The anecdotes on both sides are not that instructive unless we know how it works in practice. If the lady in rural New Hampshire who formerly got a subsidy that allowed her to keep the thermostat at 70 now has to live with it at 65, I don't have a problem with that. But if the woman kept it at 68 but now has only enough to keep it at 60 for three weeks and nothing at all for the last week of the month, then people are going to die.
- Ouroboros
February 12, 2011 at 10:34am