Perspectives on Proposals for Budget Process Reform/Does Anybody Know the Way to San Jose?

The federal ''budget process'' has been a fertile basis for ''reform'' movements since its inception. Proposals to reform the Congressional budget procedures are discussed. The most promising area for attention is at first glance a technical one: the way in which the broad and narrow decisions made in the budget process are translated into concrete legislative actions to enforce the apparent policy of the budget decision. The President's call for a so-called ''down payment'' on needed budgetary legislation was a signal of the Administration's desire to reenfranchise the current legislative machinery of the Congress in the budgetary debate. Hartman shares Moran's opinion that incremental budgeting as an operating plan for dealing with $200-billion-plus deficits is wholly inadequate. He does not believe there is any way to describe in advance the ingredients of an effective budget resolution.