The President's FY 1990 Budget: The Last Act in a Decade of Change

This article examines the budget requests of Presidents Reagan and Bush for fiscal year 1990, and how the federal budget has changed during the decade of the 1980s. The author concludes that the federal budget has become less controllable, as the priorities and composition of federal expenditures have shifted during the Reagan years. While the Reagan and Bush budgets do not differ significantly, the manner in which they were constructed does. The effort of President Bush to define his budgetary version of a "kinder, gentler" America may be more illusory than real. The author also traces the change in federal assistance to state and local governments, concluding that, apart from transfer payments, the federal role has markedly declined.