The Sequester Has Been Signed

 President Obama signed the order titled S-16 and known as the “sequester” into implementation today. He was required to sign the order before 11:59 pm.

           Sequestration describes a fiscal policy. It is a policy that makes sure Congress resolves the budget deficit rather than having appropriations put into bills and make reforming the deficit be problematic because it will be too late to change.  In theory, each agency has the same percentage taken by the Treasury. When it was introduced in 1985, sequestration was considered so terrible that Congress would pass a new budget resolution that would avoid sequestration all together, but when Congress fails to pass a new budget resolution or cannot agree on how to reduce spending, an automatic spending cut known as “sequestration” ensues. This is demonstrated in the introduction of the OMB report that states,

 “In August 2011, bipartisan majorities in both the House and Senate voted for the threat of sequestration as a mechanism to force Congress to act on further deficit reduction. The specter of harmful across-the-board cuts to defense and nondefense programs was intended to drive both sides to compromise. The sequestration itself was never intended to be implemented. The Administration strongly believes that sequestration is bad policy, and that Congress can and should take action to avoid it by passing a comprehensive and balanced deficit reduction package.”

     Now, 85 billion in spending cuts will be enacted which will start from Saturday all the way to October 1. The impact of the sequester has been raised over the last couple of weeks and what it will have on millions of Americans. Hagel says he hopes to preserve the Pentagon’s effectiveness, even though, his department is facing a 46 billion dollar cut. The military will suffer especially from the sequester especially because it is one of the biggest employers in the United States, and in the last quarter, it reduced spending by 22 percent. The sequester has been believed to increase unemployment, and furlough days are being discussed in the IRS.

The surprise that comes from “the sequester” is that it was never supposed to happen.