After the 'sequester,' now what?

$85 billion in across-the-board cuts to defense and social programs took effect March 1. The cuts must occur this fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30. Here's how things look.

5. Q: Meanwhile, do government agencies have any flexibility as to what they must cut?

Some, yes. Spending by each federal department is guided by appropriations laws, which often provide a degree of leeway to transfer modest amounts of money from one department "account" to another. For the Department of Defense, for example, there's an account for Army "missile procurement" but there's another for Army "ammunition."

A second form of wiggle room is to "reprogram" within an account. Agencies can move money from one activity or project to another – even though the sequester in theory hits each activity to the same degree. The Army could, for example, spend more on one kind of helicopter and less on another in its "aircraft procurement" account.

But the flexibility goes only so far. Transfers among accounts are rare, and reprogramming doesn't accomplish much in a budget account in which the lion's share of money is already spent on one thing.

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