A Guide to Style and Usage - Congressional Budget Office
CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET OFFICE
CBO
A Guide to Style and
Usage
2013
I feel strongly that our reports should be lucidly written and comprehensible to noneconomists. We should break with the ponderous prose of most official economic writing and aim at giving Congressmen themselves something they can actually read and understand. We should assume that the reader is an intelligent, well-informed person without formal training in economics (the average Congressman is a middle-aged lawyer who may or may not have had an economics class 30 years ago in college). We should not be patronizing or talk down to the audience, but we should avoid jargon and explain all the concepts as we go along.
-- Alice Rivlin, Founding Director of CBO, 1975
Preface
Since its inception, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has stressed the importance of good, clear writing. This guide to style and word usage, the fourth in CBO's history, updates the 1996 publication A Style Guide for CBO. It reflects the evolution of the agency's style rules and should be followed in all CBO documents.
The bulk of the guide consists of entries, arranged alphabetically, that answer the most frequently asked questions about grammar, punctuation, and word usage at CBO. In general, examples of correct usage are shown in italics, and examples of incorrect usage are shown in quotation marks. Entries that consist of a word or phrase without further explanation are intended to illustrate a term's spelling, capitalization, hyphenation, or lack thereof. Definitions of common economic and budgetary terms come from the glossary periodically published with CBO's Budget and Economic Outlook.
The style guide concludes with a section about footnotes and references that shows in detail how to cite many types of source material. The notable addition to that section is information about citing online sources (which were not widely used when the previous guide was published).
Unless shown otherwise in the style guide, the spelling of words in CBO documents should agree with the latest edition of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (available at m-). When Webster's lists alternative spellings of a word, CBO's practice is generally to use the first one listed. For more details about grammar, punctuation, and word usage than are contained in this guide, good sources to consult are The Chicago Manual of Style and The New York Public Library Writer's Guide to Style and Usage.
Table of Contents
Alphabetical Guide to Style and Usage
1
Special Topics
Abbreviations
2
Active and Passive Voice
3
Foreign Phrases and Abbreviations
27
Hyphenation and Compound Words
33
Numbers
48
Plain English
53
Possessives
54
Pronouns
57
Footnotes and References
77
What to Put in References
78
Examples of References
81
CBO Publications
81
Books, Reports, and Working Papers From Nongovernment Sources
83
Articles in Periodicals
85
Government Publications
87
Legislation, Laws, Regulations, and Court Cases
90
Websites
94
Other Sources
94
A
a-. achromatic, atypical. See prefixes.
abbreviations. For information about when and how to use abbreviations, see the box on page 2. Some common terms and their abbreviations are listed separately and alphabetically in this style guide.
acquired immunodeficiency syndrome. See AIDS.
across. Do not use across to mean "between" or "among," as in "The new program would avoid inequities across crop types." Such constructions sound like jargon and are best avoided. Across, however, is an appropriate substitute for "throughout": Payments have been evenly distributed across the school district. Also see among/ between.
act. Lowercase when not part of a formal title: Referring to the provisions of ERTA, critics argued that the act would have grave repercussions. Uppercase in shortened titles: Congressional Budget Act of 1974, the Budget Act, the Balanced Budget Act. Names of Congressional acts are not italicized or underlined.
active-duty personnel
active voice. See the box about Active and Passive Voice on page 3.
act/bill/law/measure/resolution. A piece of legislation in the Congress is a bill until it is passed by either the House or the Senate; then it is called an act. A joint resolution, by contrast, continues to be called a joint resolution when it is passed by either House. Acts and joint resolutions become laws after passing both Houses of Congress and being signed by the President (enacted). Note that it is usually inaccurate to say "The Congress enacted a law." Except in very rare cases in which the Congress
overrides a Presidential veto, enacting a law requires action by both the Congress and the President.
One exception is a joint resolution proposing an amendment to the Constitution. Before a constitutional amendment takes effect, it must be approved by two-thirds of both Houses and ratified by three-fourths of the states. Presidential approval is not required.
Simple resolutions and concurrent resolutions do not become laws when they are agreed to. Instead, they serve to express the sense of one House (a simple resolution) or both Houses of Congress (a concurrent resolution) or to accomplish housekeeping functions.
All of the types of legislative vehicles discussed above may be referred to as measures. The Congress considers and disposes of measures.
Also see adopt/agree to/approve/enact/pass/ ratify.
acute care. No hyphen as an adjective: acute care hospital.
ad hoc. Not italicized. See the box about Foreign Phrases and Abbreviations on page 27.
adjustable rate mortgage (ARM)
adjusted gross income (AGI). Income from all sources not specifically excluded by the tax code, minus certain deductions. Personal exemptions and the standard or itemized deductions are subtracted from AGI to determine taxable income.
Administration. Uppercase when referring to the executive branch of the U.S. government: one of the Obama Administration's proposals, a program carried out by several Administrations. (Refer to a plan or budget of the Administration
CBO'S GUIDE TO STYLE AND USAGE, 2013
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