Accordingly, it would be quite helpful to have mechanisms in place that assist the Congress in making mid-course corrections as needed. Four or five decades ago, such mechanisms  2  BIS Review 49/2004  were unnecessary, in part because much of the budget was determined on an annual basis.
Indeed, in the 1960s, discretionary spending, which is subject to the annual appropriations process and thus comes under regular review by the Congress, accounted for about two-thirds of total outlays. That share dropped markedly in the 1970s and 1980s as spending on retirement, medical, and other entitlement programs rose sharply.