Assume that the composition of federal outlays and receipts shown in the figure remained the same in 2019. In the figure, the categories "Defense and homeland security" and "Non-defense discretionary" are discretionary outlays, and all other categories are mandatory outlays. Also assume that the total spending was

$5.2

trillion. Complete parts (a) through (c).

A pie chart titled Federal Spending is divided into six sectors with labels and sizes as a percentage of a circle as follows: Medicaid comma government pensions and other mandatory spending comma 24 percent; Social Security comma 24 percent; Medicare comma 18 percent; Non defense discretionary comma 14 percent; Defense and homeland security comma 14 percent; Interest on debt comma 6 percent.

Federal Spending

SocialSecurity24%Medicare18%Interestondebt6%Medicaid,governmentpensionsandothermandatoryspending24%Defenseandhomelandsecurity14%Non-defensediscretionary14%

Question content area bottom

Part 1

a. About how much was spent (in dollars) on Social Security and Medicare combined in 2019?

$enter your response here

trillion

(Type an integer or a decimal.)

b. About how much was spent (in dollars) on all discretionary expenses (combined) in 2019?

$enter your response here

trillion

(Type an integer or a decimal.)

c. Suppose that over a period of several years, overall spending remained at the 2019 level of

$5.2

trillion, but the share of Social Security and Medicare spending increased from

42%

to

50%

of total spending. Assuming that all the needed cuts came from discretionary spending, how much would this spending decrease? Give the answer both in dollars and as a percentage.

Answer rating: 100% (QA)

a To calculate the amount spent on Social Security and Medicare combined in 2019 we add their percen... View the full answer