The Pew Charitable Trusts

But while there may be growing GOP calls for a balanced budget amendment, difficult political realities face the proposal not only on Capitol Hill - where Democrats control the Senate and are unlikely to support such a measure - but in the states, where 38 legislatures would need to approve.

Republicans swept into power in many statehouses last November, but they still control both legislative chambers in only half the states, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures . So unless the Democratic Party nationally embraces the idea of a balanced-budget amendment, the plan's chances of success are slim at best.  A balanced-budget amendment passed the Republican-led U.S. House of Representatives in 1995 but fell a single vote short in the Republican Senate, as The New York Times notes .

While the political will for a federal constitutional amendment may not exist in both houses of Congress and 38 states, the concept of balanced budgets is nothing new for state legislatures themselves. All but one state, Vermont, have legal provisions calling for spending to match revenues, though there is considerable variation in the strength of those provisions.