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Another credit agency is downgrading Illinois after its lawmakers ended their session without addressing the state's $100 billion pension liability crisis. Now, Gov. Pat Quinn is calling the General Assembly back into session.

The $20.5 billion dollar state budget signed by Governor Hickenlooper this week includes $1.3 million dollars for the Office of Film, Television and…

The Congressional Budget Office projects the deficit will drop below 4 percent of GDP next year and below 2.5 percent in 2015. Still, despite the improvement in the short run, the federal government faces long-term deficits, mostly tied to health care costs.

After at least three years of red ink, most states have budget surpluses. It's a sign of a recovering economy and leaves states with a new dilemma: how best to spend the money.

Weekend Edition Sunday host Rachel Martin talks to NPR White House correspondent Scott Horsley about the what the changes in Social Security proposed by the administration will mean for retirees and those saving for retirement.

The sequester was supposed to affect nearly all federal programs equally. But with Congress showing it's ready to save the most popular programs, the ultimate effects may not be equitable.

The Senate passed the legislation on Thursday. President Obama will sign it, the White House says. This means the FAA will be able to shift funds so that the number of air traffic controllers on duty no longer needs to be reduced in order to satisfy sequestration.

Both President Obama and Republican lawmakers say they're willing to close loopholes in the individual tax code. The argument is over what should be done with the money after that.

There's $78 million of the agency's nearly $18 billion budget set aside for a program to capture a 500-ton asteroid in space and drag it back to orbit around the moon. And by 2021, astronauts could be visiting that asteroid to study it up close and gather samples.

The part of President Obama's fiscal 2014 budget plan getting the most attention is his proposal to change the way the government calculates inflation for Social Security beneficiaries. Economists call it chained CPI; some politicians call it fodder for the midterm elections.