“How to Avoid Another Shutdown,” Op-Ed by David Louk in LA Times

An opinion piece by ISPS Policy Fellow (2012-13) and Yale Law student, David Louk, with co-author David Gamage, was published in the Los Angeles Times on October 20, 2013.

The piece argues that the U.S. needs to reform its budgetary processes to prevent the kind of crisis we saw recently, and suggests a default budget policy in which the previous year’s spending plan carries over:

“Implementing a default budget policy would take pressure off legislators to make last-minute bargains and would help restore and maintain the people’s confidence in their elected officials to keep government running.”

The op-ed is based on the authors’ research paper titled, “Government Shutdowns, the New Fiscal Politics, and the Case for Default Budgets,” available here.