Steve Burns
WMAL.com
WASHINGTON – (WMAL) It’s a rarity – something both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump agree on.
Today in Philadelphia, Trump confirmed he’d like to increase military spending by way of suspending defense sequestration.
“As soon as I take office, I will ask Congress to fully eliminate the defense sequester, and will submit a new budget to rebuild our military,” Trump said Wednesday afternoon. “It is so depleted. We will rebuild our military.”
Sequestration sent D.C.’s economy into a tailspin over the last few years, but it has since recovered nicely, says Dr. Stephen Fuller at George Mason University’s Center for Regional Analysis.
“The economy adjusted to it in ways that are becoming evident, and it’s growing quite rapidly without all that money,” Fuller tells WMAL. “The rest of the economy seems to be adjusting to less dependency on federal spending.”
According to Fuller, at the height of federal spending in 2010, 40% of D.C.’s economy was either directly or indirectly tied to the government. Today, that rate stands at 32%.
“(The federal government) continues to be a strong foundation for our economy, our economy just doesn’t depend on it as much,” Fuller said.
Not all jobs lost since 2010 have been recovered, and Fuller says that still may not happen even with a sequestration suspension, mainly because a lot of formerly public employees have found the private sector more rewarding since then.
“We have a lot of small companies that spun out of federal work into the private sector,” Fuller said. “And they’re finding it much more rewarding economically and profitably to be in the private sector.”
(photo: CNN)
