WASHINGTON — The price you pay for everything from airline tickets to a cut of USDA Choice beef could go sky high if Washington lets deep federal spending cuts take effect Friday.
The $85 billion in automatic cuts this year will result in unpaid furloughs for hundreds of thousands of federal workers. That includes airport security screeners and meat inspectors, which will disrupt airline flight schedules and meat supplies, warn analysts.
The furlough of inspectors at the Department of Agriculture, which faces a $2 billion cut, could cause “wild gyrations” in the prices of beef and other meats, said Terry Roggensack, a Chicago-based commodities analyst for the Hightower Report.
“Prices could rise up very rapidly. It’s possible,” he said, adding that the mere threat of beef shortages could spur grocers to raise prices.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano predicted furloughs of Transportation Security Administration workers could stretch wait times to four hours or longer at airports.
Meanwhile, Republican lawmakers blasted President Obama’s daily drumbeat about the brutal cuts, saying he was just trying to strong-arm Congress into passing more tax hikes.
“The president proposed the sequester, yet he’s far more interested in holding campaign rallies than he is in urging his Senate Democrats to actually pass a plan,” said House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio).
“Mr. President, you got your tax increase. It’s time to cut spending here in Washington,” he said, referring to the tax hike on the wealthy approved last month.
Obama was instrumental in creating the sequester in 2011. It helped him postpone battles over federal spending until after the 2012 election.
The sequester, which would indiscriminately slash $1.2 trillion over a decade from the Pentagon and federal agencies, was supposed to force a budget compromise to reduce federal debt, now at $16.5 trillion. The compromise never materialized.
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, a Republican, accused Obama of “trying to scare the American people. What’s next, is he going to threaten to open the federal prisons?”
Jindal was at the White House with other members of the National Governors Association for a meeting with the president.
Obama told the governors of the horror in store for America if he doesn’t get more tax hikes on the rich.
“The uncertainty is already having an effect,” said Obama.