Still, until just last week, when the White House proposed to add US$100 million to the SEC's budget, Bush's budget staff had fiercely resisted efforts to significantly enlarge its "zero growth" spending blueprint for the agency beyond its current level of US$467 million, fund pay increases ordered by Congress, or even provide most of the relatively modest increases sought by Pitt.
In recent years, the agency has itself become a cash cow, taking in revenues of more than US$2 billion annually. A steady stream of Republican and Democratic leaders of the agency, including Levitt and Pitt, have proposed that Congress permit it to finance itself like the Federal Reserve. But Congress, which is able to maintain some control over the independent and executive branch agencies through the power of the purse, has never taken that view seriously.
House and Senate Democrats have proposed increasing the budget to at least US$750 million, and because of the current furor, officials expect that the White House may have no choice but to support the higher spending.
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