Subject: txt pubmny - msm -
On Friday, the CBO estimated that the April's deficit would be $85 billion.
The press virtually ignored its report.
That's bad enough, but when reporters went out to economists for deficit estimates, their predictions were significantly lower.
For starters, here's what the Associated Press carried this morning:
The AP's $30 billion consensus sharply differed CBO's estimate, yet the rest of the AP's report failed to even acknowledge the existence of the variance, or for that matter of the CBO.
Other news sources also came in with lower April deficit estimates..
All I'll say is that it's mighty, mighty convenient that the early morning drive-time, get-ready-for-work reports based on the AP item above told radio and TV audiences that the year-to-date deficit would come in "about 7% lower than a year ago."
The fact is that after considering the $115 billion non-cash item noted in the last paragraph of the AP excerpt above, the true cash spending deficit is about $915 billion, or 14% higher than last year's year-to-date figure.
All of this is likely to get ignored in the rush of other afternoon and evening news, leaving many listeners and viewers believing that the government's financial situation is improving. It isn't.
Again, how convenient.
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