20 Mar 2026 BPC Action Recommendations for Fiscal Year 2027 Appropriations in Budget and Appropriations

As Congress considers fiscal year 2027 appropriations, BPC Action believes it is achievable to both prudently invest in policy priorities while also improving government efficiency, centering fiscal responsibility, and lowering costs for households. To achieve this balance in FY27, BPC and BPC Action have made the following recommendations to House and Senate Appropriations Committee leadership: 

  • Prioritizing investments that grow the economy and help Americans thrive. Growing the economic pie makes the national debt more manageable and unlocks new resources for both the government and the private sector. Attention to helping workers thrive serves the goal of economic growth and ensures government is fostering the conditions for families to attain economic security and pursue opportunities. 
  • Identifying efficiencies that reduce waste and deliver better program outcomes. Efforts to reduce duplication, improper payments, fraud, and other inefficiencies can serve multiple worthy goals, including more responsible stewardship of taxpayer dollars and cost savings that allow programs to better deploy resources where they are needed. 
  • Making the hard choices required to address the nation’s long-term fiscal outlook. Discretionary spending accounts for only about one quarter of total federal spending, a share that continues to be squeezed by growing mandatory programs and net interest costs. The enormous size and growth of the national debt will require an “all of government” approach to correcting our fiscal course. At the very least, Congress should ensure FY27 discretionary spending grows no faster than inflation. Sooner rather than later, lawmakers must make difficult choices to both reduce spending and increase revenue. Our fiscal position also requires putting Social Security on a sustainable path well in advance of the trust fund’s expected insolvency in 2032, curbing health cost growth, and implementing closer oversight of discretionary spending programs to contain overall spending growth while ensuring key public needs are met. 
  • Addressing the rising cost of living through practical, bipartisan solutions. Increasing prosperity requires tackling the major cost pressures facing American households: expanding housing supply and lowering barriers to development; reducing health care costs through greater price transparency and strengthened competition; energy policies that help ensure reliable, affordable, clean supplies of energy; and higher-education pathways that improve value and reduce financial burdens for students. Confronting these drivers of household costs not only strengthens Americans’ economic security but also reinforces a healthier, more resilient economy. 
  • Enhancing the clarity and specificity of the laws governing the appropriation and expenditure of funds. Congress’s intent is best and most fully carried out when Congress expresses its will in legislative text, and in language that is clear and specific. Only by doing so can Congress ensure it retains and exercises its full Constitutional grant of authority over the power of the purse.  

We also call on House and Senate Appropriations Subcommittees to prioritize these specific programmatic recommendations for FY27: 

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