What Would You Spend Money On: Fighting Over the Debt Limit or Child Care for Military Dependents?

Here we go again. After a three month hiatus, the debt ceiling has gone back into effect and the federal government officially hit the limit last Sunday. This means the Treasury has begun its extraordinary measures to keep us from defaulting. These measures will extend the time until we would actually default until sometime after the summer — but the debt limit brinksmanship still has consequences. In fact, the Government Accountability Office estimates [PDF] last time we were in this situation "delays in raising the debt limit in 2011 led to an increase in Treasury's borrowing costs of about $1.3 billion in fiscal year 2011." 

But what does $1.3 billion really mean? How about this: $1.3 billion is the annual base budget for the Department of Defense's Child Care and Youth Programs. This money goes to child care providers, as well as child and youth development programs. Next year it is estimated to serve more than 200,000 children of military families. 

This comes on the heels of another egregious money waster — the 37th vote to repeal the Affordable Care Act (a.k.a. "Obamacare") which passed the House last week. As I tweeted last week , the $52.4 million taxpayer dollars wasted on the first 36 repeal votes is more than twice the Dept. of Justice's annual budget for its sexual assault services program. 

It's time for Congress to stop wasting time and money. They need to get their priorities straight and focus on supporting the needs of hard-working women and families rather than on playing political games.