Transcripts For CSPAN2 CBO Director Keith Hall Testifies On The Budget And Economic Outlook 20170221

Weve had in decades. Live at 9 p. M. Eastern on cspan and cspan. Org. Listen live on the free cspan radio app. The director of the Congressional Budget Office testified before a House Committee on the economic and budget forecast. Keith hall was question on wide range of issues relating to Economic Growth and the government. The hearing rant about two hours. The hearing will come to order. Welcome to the committee on the Budget Hearing on the Congressional Budget Office is budget and outlook. I want to thank everyone for being here this morning. We are holding the to discuss the Congressional Budget Offices budget and economic outlook, which gives us a 10 year projection of our spending, National Debt, and how the economy is going to perform over the next decade. The report forms the cornerstone of the work we do here at the house Budget Committee, and i want to thank everyone at cbo for all their hard work in producing this report. Id also like to welcome cbo director keith hall. Director hall, i appreciate you taking the time to testify today and i look forward to your insight as we discuss this report. The discussion we will have today is a serious one, because as cbo indicates, we face enormous fiscal and economic challenges. Deficits are beginning to rise again and Economic Growth continues to be subpar, legacies of the last administrations policies that encouraged more spending, more debt, and more government. These challenges have a real impact on every person in this country. The numbers were reviewing today affect the ability of every american to buy groceries, obtain a loan to start a small business, or get a good return on their retirement plan. We know this to be the case because cbos report is telling us what would happen if we kept president obamas policies in place. Without any changes to current law, the deficit would rise from 587 billion in fiscal year 2016 to 1. 4 trillion in fiscal year 2027. During that same period, our National Debt will jump to 30 trillion. To put that in human terms, thats 93,000 for every american. For a lot of folks, thats about what it costs to buy a home. Cbo tells us that this everincreasing debt spiral will hamper Economic Growth and consign the country to a lower standard of living. As a grandmother, i want my grandchildren to have every opportunity i did. But on our current path, the dream of a good job, owning a home, and sending their kids to college is becoming harder and harder. Much of this unsustainable fiscal path is driven by projected spending for medicare, medicaid, and Social Security over the next decade. But without reforms these programs are going to fail our seniors who have worked hard and paid into them their entire lives. To compound these problems, Economic Growth is set to average at a morbid 1. 9 over the coming decade, well below the historic average of just over 3 . Slow Economic Growth hurts our country in multiple ways, it means fewer jobs and less opportunity for americans, and it means smaller paychecks and less Financial Security for those americans who do have a job. In fact, more than 5 million americans are working parttime because they cant find a fulltime job. That means weve got welders, computer technicians, nurses, and people in all sorts of industries who want to contribute to our economy, but theyre being let down by the rules and regulations coming out of washington. The problem is particularly acute among men. One of the key symptoms of this subpar economic recovery has been the decline in the Labor Force Participation rate of those in their prime working age. And heres a story from a gentleman named chris back in my district in tennessee. He said he was laid off last year, and in his letter to me he said, i worked at this job for 7 years and im a hard worker and have never tried for any government assistance. Im positive ill have a job soon but ive been without a paycheck for months now. If i have to wait any more i will have no money for utilities or to support me, my wife, and 7 year old. Now its pretty clear that chris is exactly the type of worker that makes our economy the best in the world, and hes a good husband and father who just wants to take care of his family. Chris wants to make our country stronger, and its our job to help give him that opportunity. A job is so much more than a way to pay for rent and put gas in the car. A job helps us define ourselves. It gives people a sense of purpose, helps build strong communities, and can break cycles of poverty. When americans have a steady job, they know the dignity of work. Cbos report tells us what will happen if we do nothing, but that is certainly not the only choice we have. We can choose to get our fiscal house back under control. And we can choose to get our economy growing again so that it works for the men and women of this country. And here at the house Budget Committee, that is exactly what we intend to do. Director hall, again, thank you for being here. I look forward to your testimony and how it can help guide us in forming the best policies to hold the federal government accountable, grow the economy, and serve the American People. With that, i yield to the Ranking Member, mr. Yarmuth. Thank you, chairman black. And thank you, director hall, for a drink before today to outline cbs updated economic and budget outlook. Longterm outlook remains troubling of course. We are a few away from an increase in federal deficits and debt driven by the increased healthcare and retirement cost of an older population. Your report outlines our circumstances as a new Administration Takes office. Total deficits over 10 years are essentially the same picture projected in august that you reject this years deficit to be lower than last years and mixtures to be lower still. And as you report says the economy is currently on solid ground. Thats a much better starting point than president obama faced eight years ago. President obama inherited an economy in free fall. The country was in the midst of the deepest recession in generations losing nearly 800,00800,000 jobs per month. In its january 2009 outlook, cbo was projecting a deficit of more than 1 trillion and the economy was projected to shrink by 2. 2 . That turned out to be optimistic. In contrast President Trump is inheriting a healthy economy. The economy has added 15. 8 million private sector jobs since 2010. The Unemployment Rate is less than half its 2090 and the budget deficit has fallen by more than 800 billion and nearly 2 3 reduction of the show 800 billion and nearly twothirds reduction of the show of the economy. This years cbo report projects the economy will grow at a 2. 3 rate. Job creation will also grow at a steady rate and the deficit will shrink over the next two years. What a difference eight years makes. President obamas economic agenda is also paying dividends on many other fronts. Tens of millions now have the Economic Security that comes with having Health Coverage and thereby being free from fears of an accident or illness and eat them into bankruptcy. Stock market has tripled in value, the Auto Industry has recovered from a near death experience, manufacturing is added jobs for the First Time Since the 1990s and wages have begun to grow at a healthy pace. The financial industry is better capitalized and more secure with stronger protections for consumers. We have dramatically reduce our dependence on foreign oil and increase our production of renewable energy. Housing prices have largely recovered and millions of homeowners are no longer underwater on their mortgages. I could go on and on and i probably should because i know my colleagues on the other side of the outlook present an alternative reality. Im dealing in facts and factors of this congress and the new Trump Administration by getting ready to take our country down a far different path. Republican leadership is moving to repeal the Affordable Care act with no plan to replace it. 32 Million People will lose Health Coverage, premiums will double and we will return to the days when Insurance Companies decide who lives and who dies. Hous. House republicans are plang deep tax cuts and a rollback of financial protections. Recent republican president s have tried this approach. Each time it resulted in skyrocketing deficits, a recession and a financial crisis, the most recent of which brought our country to the brink of total collapse. I was briefed by paulson ever naked in 2008. I know how close our nation came to having the light schema. The American People cannot afford for us to make the same mistakes again. Finally i want to raise the issue of immigration. Its been heartwrenching to see the Immediate Impact of the president s executive order during the past week. It is discouraging that the first immigration action of this white house separated families compelled by the innocent and will fail to make our nation safer by every logical measure. That being said i was a member of the gang of eight in 2013, four democrats and four republicans. We drafted comprehensive Immigration Reform legislation that we were confident at the bipartisan votes to pass the house. The only thing missing was the political will of Republican Leadership to bring it to the floor. Beyond addressing humanitarian and security needs, cbo has repeatedly told us comprehensive Immigration Reform would mean a larger economy and a smaller budget deficit. It is my hope that my colleagues across the aisle will recognize these factors and enact the Immigration Reform with a desperately need. We cant solve the challenges face as a nation whether its immigration, healthcare, the economy or passing the congressional budget out acknowledging and continue on that path. Return to where we were and abandon all the progress weve made would be devastating not just for American Families today but generations to come. With that, director hall, i look forward to your testimony and i yield back. In the interest of time if any of the members at Opening Statement to ask you to submit them for the record. I would like now to recognize the director of the cbo, doctor keith hall. Thank you again for your time today and giving has received your written statement and it will be made part of the formal hearing record. You have five minutes to deliver your oral remarks. You may begin when youre ready. Thank you. Chairman black, Ranking Member yarmuth and members of the committee, thank you for inviting me to testify about the Congressional Budget Offices most recent analysis of the outlook for the budget and for the economy. I would discuss a few highlights of updated budget and Economic Projections which were released last week pick after my brief remarks i will be happy to take your questions. The Economic Forecast that underlies cbos budget projections indicate that in real terms Gross Domestic Product will expand at an average annual pace of 2. 1 over the next two years, if current laws remain generally unchanged. After rising last year at an annual rate of 1. 8 . We expect that growth to boost employment virtually eliminate the remaining slack in the economy and drop the Unemployment Rate to 4. 4 by the Fourth Quarter of 2018. Further ahead according to cbos projections come gdp will expand at an average annual rate of 1. 9 over the second half of the coming decade. That growth rate represents a significant slowdown on the average of the 1980s, 1990s and early 2000s. Mainly because of the Slower Growth projected for the nations supply of labor which largely results from ongoing retirement of baby boomers and the relative stability in the Labor Force Participation rate among working women. As slack diminishes over the next two years we expect the rate of inflation to rise to the Federal Reserve school of 2 and to stay there on average. We also anticipate the Federal Reserve will steadily raise the target for federal funds and that Interest Rates over the next few years will be significantly higher than they are now. Cbo is current Economic Projections differ a bit from those published in august 2015. The agency expects gdp in 2016 to be modestly lower than projected last summer it also expects lower Interest Rates in the next five years of projects a high rate of Labor Force Participation throughout the next decade than projected in august. In fiscal year 2016 for the First Time Since 2009 the federal budget deficit increased in relation to gdp. Cbo projects over the next 10 years if current laws remain generally unchanged budget deficits will eventually follow an upward trajectory. The results are three main trends. First, strong growth and spending for retirement and Health Care Programs targeted to older people, especially Social Security and medicare. Second, rising Interest Payments on the governments debt and third, modest growth in revenue collections. By the end of that. The achingly deficits would drive up debt held by the public from its already high level. Moreover, three decades from now if current laws remain in place, that debt would be nearly twice as high relative to gdp as it is at this year and would reach a higher percentage than any previously recorded. Such high and rising debt would have serious negative consequences for the budget in the nation including an increased risk of a fiscal crisis. Our estimate of the deficit for 2017 is well within her august estimate primarily because we now expect lower mandatory spending. The current projection of the curative deficit for the 20172026. Its about the same as with published in august. Im often as specific about projection for medicaid and federal subsidies for Health Insurance purchased in the marketplaces established by the Affordable Care act. By cbos estimates an average of 12 Million People under the age of 65 will have Health Insurance in any given month in 2017 as result of expansion of medicaid under the aca. In addition cbo and the staff joint committee on taxation estimate that this year 9 Million People per month on average will receive subsidies for nongroup coverage purchased through the marketplaces. An additional 1 million are projected to be covered by unsubsidized insurance purchased through the marketplaces. We estimate 27 Million People under th the age of 65 will be uninsured on average in 2017. Cbo and gct currently estimate and 2017 federal spending for people made eligible for medicaid covered by the aca will be 70 billion, and that net federal subsidies for coverage opting to the mark places will be 45 billion. For the entire 10 year period 20182027, if current current laws remain in place costs would total 1. 9 trillion. It is important to note cbo baseline is not intend to be a forecast of what will happen rather, its meant to write an neutral benchmark of policy makers can use to assess the potential effects of policy decisions. Cbo is budget and Economic Projections predicate on the assumption that the laws of the currently governing federal taxes and spending generally remain in place of entire projection period. Even if that occurred there are no changes in those laws, before the end of it. It would still not be possible to predict the budget or economic outcomes precisely because many of the factors are uncertain. Our goal is to construct budget and Economic Projections that fall in the middle of the distribution of possible outcomes given both fiscal policy embodied in current law and availability of economic and other data. I would now be happy to answer your questions. Thank you, mr. Hall. Now we will begin the question and answer session. If i could ask the staff to bring up figure one for my first question. Mr. Hall, cbo forecast has been trending sharply downward in the recent years and roughly five years ago cbo was expecting real gdp growth to average around see over the tenyear budget horizon. Close to that longterm average growth rate that weve seen her in the u. S. , that figure has been dropping consistently and in this latest forecast it down to just 1. 9 . So it seems cbo was expecting u. S. Economy will experience a protracted economic malaise for at least the next decade under current policy. So to questions i have for you. First of all, what are the reasons for cbo to keep ratcheting down its projections for the gdp growth . Secondly, how will this much lower expected growth path affect our federal budget . The look forward over the next 10 years, we do expect the slack in the economy to virtually be a limit of the next two years so we will be on what we think is a potential growth of gdp are quite constrained the growth of gdp as we forecast to Something Like 1. 8, 1. 9 , is accommodation of a more slowly growing labor force, a lot of that is aging population as baby boomers retire, not all of it, however. And slower productivity growth. Since the end of the recession productivity growth has only been oneeighth of. 8 , less than 1 productivity growth. We expect that will go up by the end of the period to Something Like 1. 3 but that is still lower than has been in the past. So, in fact, if you take the labor force of growing. 5 , productivity drawing 1. 3 , at those together, that 1. 8 to 1. 9 1. 8 1. 9 is about our Economic Forecast. So the challenges are slower growing labor force and slower growing productivity Going Forward. And again we have this issue with baby boomers in particular we have seen coming for a long time. Its just hard to get closer and closer now. How do you expect what youre projecting to affect the federal budget . This is going to have an impact. This is going to make, its going to contribute probably to the growth of the deficit Going Forward. Something like productivity, for example, which is part of whats at the heart here, thats pretty Significant Impact on our budget forecast. So if we get some increase, for example, in productivity we will have a smaller growing deficit but the problem is so big that even thats not really going to solve the problem. So do the other end of that coupled with the sluggish economy as the relentless rise in our Government Spending and deficits, and your figures show that the tax revenues were already above the 50 year averages as a of gdp at a projected to keep going, and yet our spending keeps going faster. If we tried to balance the budget just by raising taxes how would a big tax increase, public with the tax increase the required to be in order to be able to catch up . Well, just to give you some idea, weve actually got a great little figure, one, seven. Its some idea of the size of the deficit relative the size of things like revenues and Discretionary Spending, et cetera. We see the deficit in 10 years, going to be about 1. 4 trillion. Its about 5 of gdp, and total revenues are about 18 of gdp in 10 years. So its a major chunk of revenues right now. It would be a significant increase in revenues to get there. Any idea of what percent we would have to increase taxes in order to be able to get there . We havent done a scenario like that spirit but significant . It would be significant and it would probably also significantly change our Economic Forecast as well, so it makes it particularly complicated. So even for those who would favor some combination of spending restraint and tax increases, is it fair to say that getting control of spending usually indispensable in this equation to overcome those chronic deficits and debt . That seems to be the picture. The growing deficit and the growing debt is so large, its hard to imagine just picking on either revenues or outlays and not looking at both things. And the broader you look, a spot of the change you need. So if you restrict yourself to just smaller, just discussion spending can you really got to reduce Discretionary Spending. Thats one of the features you we see that this is a really big hole to fill spirits on the other side of that, if we could achieve a more robust degree of Economic Growth, said something closer to that historic averaget over 3 , how much would that help us in shrinking those deficits . Ill give you a little bit of an idea. We dont have gdp in your butt we have a little scenario with productivity growth. For every onetenth of a percentage point productivity growth, we see the deficit in 10 years shrinking by about 50 billion. So Something Like an increase in productivity of half a percentage point would be pretty significant, and thats going reduce the deficit by about a quarter of a billion instead of 1. 4 trillion deficit. So deficit. So that makes the difference but even half a percentage point isnt enough to balance the budget essentially in 10 years. Let me go to another topic. Lets go to figure number two, please pick one of the most troubling aspects of our cbos outlook is the low rate of labor workforce participation. That rate stands at 62. 7 come close to a 40 year low and cbo expects this to continue to decline over the next decade which is just really disappointing. The ongoing retirement of baby boomers generation plays a key role that cbo also says Government Policies are exacerbating the trend. Is it correct the labor force is a key component of Economic Growth, and how large does that roleplay quick second to that is what are some of the policies that do affect of this and how do they create incentives for work . I think if you look at the longrulong run growth of the e, longrun health of the economy, you can look at two different things. You can look at Labor Force Growth and productivity growth. If you compare our growth that we see over the next 10 years to what we have in the 1990s when we had 3. 3 gdp, the slow death of Labor Force Growth is about half that difference. So its pretty significant, and youre right, although baby boomers retiring as a source of that decline in Labor Force Participation, we also have lower Labor Force Participation by every cohort in the united states. And that is certainly one of the targets i think for raising, having a supplyside impact, it raises potential gdp is doing things increase the Labor Force Participation by working age people speak what kind of policies can we initiate to change this trajectory . Certainly weve identified, we often do, we point out what amounts to implicit taxes on work. There are a number of things that are implicit taxes on work will reduce benefits with income goes up. The aca itself probably reduces Labor Force Participation. Thats a drag as well. You are a number of things like that. I dont want to get too specific about it, but just the sort of things that will get people back into the workforce are things that will help the Labor Force Participation and help this potential gdp growth problem that we have. I do thank you for all of your comments on this and i will go back opening remarks, as i conclude my time, that it really bothers me so much that we have people who are out of the workforce. Because i know my career and my children and so on that work is good for the soul. And i often tell people that after you ask someone you say hello, this is my name, what is the second question you ask them . What do you do. And if you are productive and youre feeling good about your work and what youre contributing to society, that overall helps the entire society. And of this is for me even more about how we have our society grow as a society that is whole and healthy. As much as it is and what it will do to help keep the economy going, all of this together, is what makes our country great. Thank you, and i now yield to the Ranking Member, mr. Yarmuth. Thank you, chairman black. Im going to do for my questions until later in the hearing. [inaudible] okay. Would you like to yield to one of your members . Sure. Mr. Jeffries from new york with your first. I will yield to him spirit mr. Jeffries, you are recognized for five minutes spent thank you, chair and thank you distinguish Ranking Member for yielding the estate was made earlier that we can choose to get the economy working again. I want to pursue that for a moment because i think that the economy has been working ever since the turnaround that was engineered by the previous president eight years ago. Isnt it a fact in case that when barack obama came into office this country was in a mess, and a gauge of total collapse . Well, thats right. We were undergoing significant job loss and decline in gdp growth spent stock market was a mess . Yes. Spined Automobile Industry a mess and Banking Industry a mess, correct . Yes. 401 k~ s ms, correct . Yes. Housing market . Yes spirit since 2010 this country has gained more than 15 million private sector jobs, is that right . I think thats right spent eight years ago the stock market was around x thousand . That sounds right spirit that was over 19,000 . Yes spirit eight years ago the Unemployment Rate was at over 10 , right . Yes spirit now its under 5 , correct . The deficit has been reduced by more than 1 trillion over the dollars over the last eight years, correct . That sounds right spirit for stimulating the economy working again i think perhaps is inaccurate as a snapshot of what actually has occurred over the last eight years. And so it seems that what we need to do is build upon the tremendous progress that has been made under the leadership of barack obama, and keep this country moving forward. I would also note on this question of whether we should cooperate with the new president , that barack obama was able to lead an economic turnaround without an ounce of cooperation from the other side, we decided to pursue an agenda of obstruction today, obstruction tomorrow, obstruction for over over the last eight years. So hopefully we can find ourselves in a situation where we move forward in a cooperative fashion in a way that benefits all of america. In terms of our present situation, the cbo expects the Economic Growth will be sluggish over the next decade, is that right . Thats correct. In part thats because of a decline in Labor Force Participation, correct . Thats correct. Now, will with the retirement that will continue of baby boomers out of the labor workforce exacerbate this problem in a way that will continue to provide modest, if not sluggish, Economic Growth moving forward over the next 10 years . Thats right. Its almost surely going to happen and certainly be a difficult in achieving higher Economic Growth. And this is a problem that japan, for instance, which had a booming economy in the 1980s is experiencing today . Thats true. One reason why is because they got very harsh immigration policies and they dont have the natural growth from the own population that would lead to robust participation is a labor force, right . Yes spirit though theres a comprehensive Immigration Reform bill that i think was passed by the senate in 2013. Mr. Yarmuth mention it, worked hard to get it enacted into law here. And the house but due to the politics of the situation, it did not go anywhere. I believe the cbo study to that particular piece of legislation and concluded that over about a 20 year. It would reduce the deficit i think by 700 billion, is that right . That sounds right . I would have a positive impact, cover hints of Immigration Reform, on our economic situation, correct . Thats right. It is primarily to increase the growth in the labor force. Thats what are the primary constraints Going Forward is ate growth of our labor force. One of the ways we can deal with the labor force moving forward is to make sure that our immigration policies continue to welcome individuals who come to america, work hard, will contribute to the labor force since were not naturally able to produce the numbers that would result in increase economic productivity, is that a fair statement . It probably is although keep in mind the effects of any particular paper immigration policy cant be public or so we would have to sort of see exactly what is being proposed. But there is one constant and that does affect the labor supply of that labor supply does help gdp growth. Thank you. I yield back. The gentleman from oklahoma is recognize, mr. Cole. Thank you, madam chairman and thank you mr. Director for your testimony. Its always good to have you. I want to focus in on this trend line in terms of the deficit just a little bit, and if i may, as you know we think of the federal budget into different parts, discretionary and mandatory spending. Mandatory being primarily Social Security. Medicare, medicaid, the classic quoteunquote entitlement programs. Whats been the trend line on Discretionary Spending over the last few years . Discretionary spending is looking like its going to decline as the ship gdp. Its been declining. So, in fact, while we look forward to the next 10 years and see spending increasingly significant, Discretionary Spending is that increasing significantly and that impact is declining spirit as a share of gdp and since 09 its decline substantially in real terms just as an amount. We were spending considerably less on discretionary portions of the budget. Thats everything from defense to nasa to nationa national insf health comes up with more info nine and 2010, correct . Yes. To give us the trend line if you would on mandatory spending. Again, the classic atomic programs whats that trend been in the last five or six years . Where do you see going over the next decade . Mandatory Spending Continues to grow faster than gdp. Quite a bit faster, even the revenues are growing as a share of gdp but spending, medicare spending is growing at a faster. So its sort of a race that mandatory spending is winning in and adding to the deficit Going Forward. Are there any significant proposals out there on either side of the aisle to change the direction of that, slow it down, manage it a bit better . Nothing comes to mind. One of the things i like to point out, which is pretty something called options for reducing the deficit, sort of a nice thick volume with over 100 options. We do so options are things like mandatory spending and other things that you can look at for reducing the deficit Going Forward. Do you some idea of how much of an impact those different options would have. When is the last time we had significant reform in lets say Social Security . I think it has been a while. Im not an expert in Social Security. There have been some adjustments and benefits in eligible to, that, but they still havent affected the longrun problem that weve seen coming for decades. Its still coming. I think the last time we really made much progress in his day was very bipartisan. It was with president reagan and the house was democratic in that period, tip oneill, howard baker in the senate. They set up a commission and extended the life of Social Security fairly dramatically in the middle 80 spirit we havent really gone back and done too much since then. Is that correct . As you recall . Thats correct. I say this and a very selfserving way because my friend, mr. Delaney o on the otr side, and i have a bill that would set of the commission that would be by nature bipartisan ticket would be seven and six. Weve introduced at a couple congress, Seven Members chosen effectively by the president and the Majority Party six by the minority. But you would have to have nine votes to actually report something to congress. Congress would then have about 60 days to vote it up again. I would invite my colleagues on both sides of the aisle just to look at that legislation. I think you can read the numbers which you so accurately and persuasively put out here, sooner or later we have to address mandatory spending. Neither site in the last campaign did that in any meaningful way. Neither side, frankly, in the house and the senate has actually advance legislation. We always write a budget that addresses this and hope we do that again, madame jupiter but we dont ignore the elephant in the room so to speak. Im sure we wont under your leadership and my good friend the Ranking Member i know has the same concerns. I know im not using a crush on doing to finish and will yield back. I just would invite my colleagues and we can score against one another all day. We both are great arguments and great talking point. This is a problem we could solve its a math problem. Its not not as tough as medicare and medicaid. We literally could sit down and negotiate this just as president reagan and speaker oneill did and howard baker. I would invite us to begin that process because i dont like the way your numbers look at the end of the decade. With that i yield back. I thank you very much. I thank you for your indulgence, madam chairman. The gentleman from massachusetts mr. Moran is recognized for five minutes. Thank you, madam chair. I would just like to begin by echoing the comments mr. Moulton. Echoing the calmest mr. Cole. People ask me about what its like to serve on the Budget Committee and i say its often a great place for people who dont do math. If we started doing math we could solve a lot of problems, so thank you, mr. Cole. Director hall, as you know immigration has become a major topic of discussion of following President Trumps executive order last week. Now, theres a lot of evidence the order is unconstitutional. It is hurting our National Security overseas. Secretary mattis and others have made that clear, but its also having a detrimental impact on our economy here at home. The concern of course is that with this executive order the Trump Administration is scaring away some of the very people we need to continue growing the economy as our labor force shrinks. Many of americans age or corporations and were founded by immigrants. For example, steve jobs, his father came from syria. Apparently, more than half of the card of the u. S. 1. 0 a more so more than half of the car starts with evaluation of a billion dollars or more collectively these 44 copies are down at 168 billion. They were started by immigrants. So 168 billion valuation creating 33,440 jobs in the u. S. Market, and immigrants in these Companies Make up more than 70 of Key Management or Product Development positions. Weve heard in the past week cbos from facebook, starbucks and other leaders in the Business Community who have already stated that this ban will hurt their ability to attract and retain talent and that it may spur people or companies to discount the u. S. As a place to pursue business and investment opportunities. Causing universities have also raised alarm a logically those y district about the impact this will have on students and faculty who hail from the seven countries targeted by the order. In 2016 International Students in the u. S. Colleges surpassed 1 million for the first time, contributing more than 32 billion a year to our economy. 32 billion a year, madam chair, would certainly help with our budget deficit. Thats the kind of Consumer Spending whe we need because the crates jobs. I want to speak briefly about the impact on her Health Care System because more than a quarter of the workforce and ine u. S. Come from other countries with more than 8400 doctors working in the u. S. From two countries listed in the executive order, syria and iran alone. We want those talented doctors to be here, saving american lives and helping our Healthcare System at a time of physician shortage. America does not currently produce enough physicians to keep up with the demand for when where the current deficit of over 8200 primary care doctors, so that deficit would literally double the doctors from iran and syria were not here to so director hall, i know you cant speak directly to the effects of this executive order as its just released, but based on the 2013 cbo report on Immigration Reform and other work that cbo has done on this issue, can you talk in general terms about the impact that such restrictive immigration policies might have on the growth of our economy . Sure. You raise an interesting aspect of immigration. And one of the reasons why we really kind of need to see specific proposals, because it has different kinds of effects. The evidence is, for example, that increased emigration of unskilled workers probably has an effect of lowering wages for lower skilled workers in the united states. However, when you go to the skilled workers, they, in fact, increase productivity because as you say there are a lot of and troubadours, immigrants, skilled immigrants. That has sort of a different side effects spew if you look at the countries, the orders of country like iran and syria, are the most skilled or unskilled workers were coming to u. S. . I dont know offhand. Disproportion onto pruners and business businesspeople. Thank you. Please continue. Sure. If you look at immigration proposals and makes a difference. If youre just going to broad the increased emigration, thats focused or unskilled workers that has sort of a different effect than if it is unskilled workers. The font of middle and increases the labor supply is there. Its sort of the other fax that depend upon exactly who is immigrating. Of course the size needs to be pretty significant. Its not clear that executive order at least from what i see that thats large enough to make us change our forecast. Thank you, sir. The time of the gentleman has expired. The judgments in california mr. Mcclintock is recognized for five minutes gentleman. Thank you, madam chair. There seems to be too dominant themes coming for my friends across the aisle. One is that the obama economy has been wonderful, and second can we need more fo foreign immigration to compete for american jobs. As to the first i would give the same advice i tried to offer them at our last meeting on obamacare every american has an upclosup close and personal exe with the economy. They know whats going on and on lies, and any politician who try to convince them otherwise looks downright foolish. Some people are doing very well in the obama economy. Most people are not. If most people are doing well in this economy the democrats would not have lost 67 u. S. House seats, 13 u. S. Senate seats, 11 u. S. Governors and more than 900 state legislative seats, not to mention the presidency over the past four election cycles, just a word of unsolicited advice. Second, with respect to foreign immigration, our foreign immigration over the last decade has been unprecedented. If my friends were correct, this should be the golden age of the American Economy. The impact has been very clear, badly depress wages for working families and the lowest labor Participation Rate since jimmy carter. But thats not what i want to talk about. What i want to talk about is what admiral mike mullen warned us was in his professional military judgment the greatest single threat to our National Security, and that was our mission to debt. And that warning was issued about five years and about 4 trillion of debt ago. You report that the debt held by the public this year is 77 . Actually our total debt is well over 100 of our Gross Domestic Product, is it not . We look at debt held by the public because thats i know you do but i think thats highly deceptive. The difference is mainly because Social Security as it runs chronic deficits, we pay back what we borrowed by going to the public. What weve got in that overall debt number is in effect converting intergovernmental debt into debt held by the public, isnt that whats going on . Thats right spirit so were understating the problem here unless we change the law that gross debt which of the over 100 of gdp is destined to become debt held by the public over the next few years, isnt that correct . Well, let me put it this way. The debt held by the public is going to grow significantly spirit is already baked into our total debt which simply converting the debt we owe to Social Security by borrowing from the public. Thats already in those numbers as long as Social Security continues its chronic deficit, as going to continue and that could require a change in law, is it not . That would, yes. So were already approaching uncharted territory for this nation. And the question i have is thatt our current trajectory, are we courting a sovereign debt crisis . We are. One of the difficulties is what does that look like . Well, as of the debt continues to grow, Interest Rates when they go back to normal ranges will have a major share of our budget just paying off interest pics of thats going to be a real drain. With that affect our ability to provide basic services . It will pick is going to reduce flexibility spirit would it imperil our ability to respond to a military challenge on the magnitude that we faced after pearl harbor . Absolutely. Our ability to spend money will how will it affect our overall economy . Part of what will happen if this is a drag, an increase of Interest Rates on federal borrowing crowds out private borrowing. In other words, when the federal government borrows a dollar, a borrows it from that same Capital Market that would otherwise be available to loan to consumers to make consumer purchases, to businesses to expand jobs, is that correct . Correct. Home buyers to buy new homes . Thats correct. Tataxes often suggested as an antidote to debt, but arent debt and taxes the same thing . After we spent a dont have already decided toxic was the only question is whether we tax it now to current taxes or are right now and taxes later through future taxes . We certainly constantly remind you that of that. However when you raise taxes or spending et cetera, a lot of the stuff depends on how you pay for it. Want to let the deficit grow or not makes a big the deficit is just a future taxpayer we borrowed now and pay it back to future taxes. In other words, isnt jabbar from the clinton maximum isnt it the spending stupid . Certainly spending is the biggest single problem Going Forward, the rate of spending. The time of the gentleman has expired. The gentlelady from washington, ms. Domain is now recognized for five minutes. Thank you, madam chair eric director hall, thank you for being with us. My district in Washington State has a northern border and is also home to im pretty sure nearly every point of view on every issue. Most of the time. One key difference has been Immigration Reform. Weve heard from Business Community, farmers, faithbased committecommunity can folks in l and tourism, law enforcement, all asking for that need for comprehensive Immigration Reform. Reform. And i was one of the folks who led the developer introduced in the 113th Congress Similar to the one the past the senate that the cbo has said would have a Significant Impact in reducing the deficit, about 700 billion in the second decade. I think you confirm that was the correct number. That sounds right. But when we look at individual sectors and when i was elected and talking to our farmers they said we need two things, a farm bill and comprehensive Immigration Reform. We got a farm bill and folks have said where not sure we can stay in business it would dont have Immigration Reform. If you look at a sector like agriculture d. C. Lack of Immigration Reform is actually having a negative impact on Economic Growth . We havent looked at that sort of analysis. We would have to do a little work. I can tell you that farmers definitely feel that way. Its incredibly important issue. The reckless executive order has not helped and is impacted many peoples lives and is only continued to have a negative impact. Before coming to congress i was a businesswoman, an entrepreneur and also ran the department of revenue for the state of washington. Since coming to congress i been very frustrated with our budget and appropriations process without they dont work. In particular we seem to live off of continuing resolutions and you would never run a business 30 or 60 days at a time and you definitely, its no way to budget is probably the most expensive and least efficient way to budget. With sequestration on top of that we end up looking at folks have been focused on cuts but not on return on investment. I know that sometimes spending money on important projects actually saves you money in the long run, and we get a great return. I was wondering when you look at your models and look at things like infrastructure, research, education, how does our lack of investment in those areas impact our future growth . I think the research is fairly clear that generally federal investment does increase productivity and it does have an impact on growth. The research is pretty incomplete and that it identified the different kind of investment is difficult, what the rates of return on different kinds of investment. One of the big things about increasing investment is really depends upon how you pay for it. If you increase investment and reduce spending in other spots so you dont have an impact on spending, thats a much more positive impact on the economy and if you let a deficit grow spirit but if we for example, have a puddle in the road and we dont fix it, it might cost a certain amount to fix that pothole. The next and because we didnt fix it we end up having to replace the roadbed. We end up spending a lot more because we did make that investment early on, isnt that a fair point of view when we look at a lot of these issues, that we are not funding or providing those investments because we dont have a normal budget appropriations process . Isnt that hurting our ability to see progress from those areas . Thats right. Federal investment in things that helps companies be more productive, move products around, encourage innovation, that does help productivity and thats obviously one of our big problems Going Forward. One of the issues, its a little bit like in my mind although bit like cutting taxes they both can stimulate the economy and depends on how they are worked. They both affect longterm growth. The question a little bit is how much . Investment, particular is often a delight and that is impact on Interest Rates. That impact on Interest Rates does raise the cost of debt in the economy. So its not quite so clear, for example, if you just increased federal investment, dont pay for it, let the deficit grow, that probably does not have a net positive on the economy. But also just cutting and not investing in programs that give us a great return as a negative impact, too, and i think thats our role is to decide what is getting a secret return and making sure were making those investments, seeing whats not working and not making those investments, and continuing resolutions and sequestration are us not taking that responsibility seriously here and not making those decisions and making investments in the right way that need to be made. Thank you. My time is expired. I yield back. The gentleman from ohio, mr. Renacci, is recognized for five minutes. Thank you, madam chair. Its interesting, first i want to go back to my colleague mr. Cole and say the exact same thing. We consider all day and fire bullets back and forth on political issues, but thats not going to solve the issues of the day. Because the issues of the day is where to get a budget and we have to live with the budget before we can even get a budget went to figure out where we are at which is another problem around here. I have mentioned since day one that we dont have a complete record of Financial Information because we dont, we dont allow for all of our debts to be added up and we dont use the information we have been to make decisions and we dont look at the past decision we made it as a business guy for 30 years, and actually visits canada took over 60 failed businesses and successfully turned them around, you have to see where you are at first before you can go forward. My frustration always a bill to a get into these talking, political talking point because everybodys district will have issues that concern them. My district i can tell you the businesses, the people, the individuals are all concerned about tax reform, regulation for an reform. Again, its not what the district, its what we can do as far as putting a budget together and getting things moving. Dr. Hall, dont we have the record of revenues in the treasure over the last few years . Thats right. Im not sure they are record. They are sold above average and it will go up as a share of gdp. We dont have declining revenues. We have record revenues and in my Business World what i would find, you are really doing really well except when you had record expenditures over exceeding those record revenues. I heard you say earlier one of her issues is that we are spending, our biggest problem is our spending problem. Would you agree . Yes, thats the major contributor to our deficit. Until we come together as republicans and democrats and realize we had spending issues and tax income we will not tax our way out of this and we can put up budget together i think thats the starting point that help at some point this committee can get you, having a good solid budget that then we live with. My concerns again, its extremely alarming our interests and our National Debt is projected to nearly quadrupled to 760 billion in 2027. It appears that as numbers continue to grow, we are going to bless, the time is now just looking at our spending side. Because if we just sit back and start sync the last president was great, the president before that was great and we dont do anything, we are going to be in a deeper, deeper hole in the next few years. Would you agree with that . Absolutely. I think the sooner we get to solving the deficit problem, whether its spending or whether its taxes or anything, but the sooner we start to address that, the less of a change its going to become the easiest going to be to try to do with it. The sooner we recognize its one of the reasons why i introduced the physical state of the nation which would require the comptroller general to come before the house and senate, a joint session of congress, i had almost 170 cosponsors, republicans and democrats pick i hoped new hope new members here would join me as we refiled that bill. But do you agree it would be a good starting point to have someone, the comptroller general county for the house and senate and explain our growing deficits and where the numbers are occurring and whats going on to have a starting point . Absolutely. Hopefully were providing some of the information to you, but yes. Thats what youre doing here today but i think the boards is as we continue to look at these numbers we have to start to realize that the growth of our federal debt is another issue, concerned me and i heard one of my colleagues earlier talk about this. If we do nothing, i think the federal deficit is projected to grow if we just stay on the same track, 9. 6 trillion in the next 10 years, correct . Yes spirit user issues i hope our colleagues, my colleagues on both sides of the arc and Start Talking about as a way we can Work Together to come up with a solution and a budget. I have another to which i think is on board, when we pass a budget we should follow a budget. We had a budget act since 1974. Most people dont realize that even though we passed budgets we never follow them. Members of this committee can other committees come to the floor, pass bills that break the budget. If were ever going to make things work we had to come up with a solid budget and live with that budget and not break the budget. Im hoping that we can continue to work forward with these numbers. I appreciate the information. Theres plenty information in your report definitely takes the time to read them. We are not going in a great direction. We do not have a healthy economy. We have what i would call a, we have an anemic economy. Would you agree with that . Yes. Thank you. The time of the gentleman has expired. The gentlelady from florida, ms. Wasserman schultz, is now recognize. Thank you, madam chair. Our colleagues on the other side of doubt would do well for stop patting themselves on the back and take credit for voters putting them in the majority, rather than the cartographers and map drawers or did a really good job of partisan gerrymandering to ensure that the scales are tipped in favor in virtually every state, particularly the states were republicans hold a majority, and voters are not able to choose their legislators are by the legislators choose their voters. Thats reflected in the sea of diversity that we see in this committee on the other side of the aisle as opposed to our side of the aisle. And that also is reflective of the difference dramatically in the policies that result in how we govern. So please spare us the political advice. That having been said, i think its important to note that, mre slack in our economy is mainly attributed to the available labor force, largely attributed as you said it, mr. Hall, retirement of baby boomers and the stability of women in the workforce, is that right . Thats right. By stability i mean in the 1990s we had this great period of where womens Labor Force Participation was growing very quickly and we had significantly more Economic Growth as a result, as a sort of closed that gap and it is now sort of holding. We are now no longer getting the faster growth. You did indicate in your Opening Statement by merely the slack in the economy is attributed to those two things. Right. And really i think i was more to refer to the potential growth, longterm growth of the economy but yes, i did talk about those things. Thank you to our former cbo director Douglas Elmendorf and a recent talk noted under the current caps on annual appropriations federal Investment Infrastructure r d, education and drink will soon be small relative to gdp than anytime in the last 50 years. He said that that is not forwad looking growth oriented budget policy can just to make in the tradition love of investment as a percentage of the economy requires a substantial increase in the caps on appropriations. The caps on appropriations wouldnt you agree are a large part of what limits our ability to see growth in the economy . It certainly has been the limit on the Discretionary Spending growth. Thats been part of why it looks to be declining over the next 10 years. But the cbo act of 2011 and sequestration with contingency dramatic cuts and nondefense Discretionary Spending dramatic cuts. Cap in investment in Research Infrastructure and education at the out about what the budget policy that promotes growth and the American Economy and should be nature to include a certain percentage of spending on discretionary programs to promote Economic Growth and especially the muslim bid which will among other things, leaders, research and development out of our country and hurt our economy . Iowa make a recommendation, but increasing its one of the tools for increasing potential of gdp growth democrats i promoted over the last eight years to responsible spending cut and generating revenue is the most responsible way to address deficit over a period of time. Wouldnt you say when it comes to dealing with our debt that there is a dramatically negative impact on our overall economy when we threaten that the congress to potentially pay our bill. However congress decides to address the deficit and a broader fashion and anyone he said that it does seem like that is a strategy certain that congress can take. Thank you very much. Youll got the balance of my time. Gentleman from minnesota, mr. Lewis for five minutes. Thank you, madam chair and dr. Hall for being here today. Talk about federal investment of federal spending did in 2002, the federal budget was 2 trillion. Today is 3. 4 trillion. To your numbers come and pick your average is about 18. 4 of revenues were well above that now and headed above that. The top 1 of income earners if we look at revenues to balance this budget, the top 1 of earners pay 543 billion in income taxes. That is less than this years deficit, correct . I think thats right. I dont know the numbers exact way, but that sounds about right. My question is this. I dont think we have a revenue problem. If you look at these numbers again, we are at the fifth year average of 18point or percent and moving higher than that. How would we do that if youre just going to raise revenue . There isnt enough money at the top, is there . We havent had any civic analysis of that, but you are right, putting it all in revenues makes it a pretty significant revenue increase. Just like outlays and most pretty dramatic outlay drops. Spreading it out is a difference or to strategy. You are servicing the debt, not interest on the deck from a 670 billion largest in the Defense Budget in the next 10 years it will be based not on with regard to Interest Rates . The postworld war ii tenyear treasury averages 5. 7 are way down to 2. 0 . How did you come up with that calculation . Interest rates have been really low. Climbing up into their historical range still at the lower end of the range limits that were over 3 eventually on the Interest Rates. That is a really important point to be honest because we are at a pretty low Interest Rate relative to history and in fact, if Interest Rates go up by more, we are back to their average. That may give you an example. If Interest Rates are one percentage point higher than our projection, were talking about adding 1. 6 trillion to the debt over that time. And that is one percentage point. Thats one of the more important things in our forecast. 768 billion in the next 10 years is based on historically low Interest Rates. Lets talk a little bit about japan. Im not expert, but i, but it dont bother that this change remarkably. The economy has hit this deflationary spiral. Im not certain if you got the same policy that all of a sudden you go into a tailspin and you can blame that policy. What you might look at its credit expansion. Weve had a similar ex. Tear where weve monetized a lot of that, where weve let the credit expansion go, create asset elbow someone say on the monetary side. Is it your experience or i dont want to ask your opinion, that your analysis that japan is suffering at that way, that was created so much that they cant grow their way out and is that a danger for america as far as i have for missionary scenarios that can make that viral and stuck with deflation and low growth. Im afraid i dont know enough about japan. That makes two of us. We can followup with some description if you like on japan in what has been happening there. Theres a reason for low growth rates. We created money. Weve certainly engaged in federal spending. Look at the figures cited well above historical means. So why the low growth rates . I dont know enough about japan. I would suggest that the reason we havent had 3 growth for 11 straight quarters, the reason during the reagan robust recovery, even with a robust recovery where we had growth, five, six, 7 is the level of debt today. Our Balance Sheet stomachs of vitamin e service that debt its hard to grow out of it. One of the most remarkable things thats going on now and hasnt the end of the recession has been very low product to be growth of 0. 8 . We dont understand that very well. That has been a major headwind. One final point quickly. When we find federal investment, where does that money come from . The private sector, which should be private investment. Thank you on the server. The gentlemans time is expired. Mr. Higgins is recognized for five minutes. Thank you, madam chair. Listening to the discussion here, which is awful and i believe that people truly are sincere in their beliefs about performance to the American Economy and the pilot be that we in congress are responsible for enacting to help influence hopefully Economic Growth and i think there are two very different views of it. The good thing about the economy is, you know, its not ideological, if every grammatical. If you look at performance under various administrations, relative to the policies they had been, the measure of their effect to miss our lack of affect demands of their economy. It has been referenced here in the waning days of the last bush administration, a decision was made to enact tax cuts that disproportionately benefited higher wage earners. People who make a lot of money. The theory is trickledown, supply side, call it what you will. Is it because they save money because that tax policy, that money will find its way back into the economy and new business and thats been in job growth. That is the theory. That is indisputable. Thats what they say. Job growth during the george w. Bush administration was the lowest level in the past 75 years. In the waning days, the economy went into a very severe contraction. In march of 2009, the stock market was at 5600. We are losing 600,000 jobs a month. The Auto Industry was a disaster. The u. S. And world Financial Markets were falling apart. Something had to be done. So new policies were put in place to allow those tax cuts for the very, very wealthy to expire and continued tax cuts for the middle class. Higher wages, higher takehome pay increases aggregate demand in the economy. Aggregate demand creates Economic Growth. As a result, since 2010, in the past six years, we created in this economy almost 16 million private sector jobs. In outcome of the American Economy, we used to make things and sell them to the rest of the world. Nows recently consulted the rest of the world, they make and sell to us. As a consequence, 70 of the American Economy is consumption. So, how do you create aggregate demand in the economy . You put more money in the pockets of more americans as humanly possible because you know they are going to spend it. When they spend it, there is growth. You are always looking for Silver Lining in these different views of economic policy. I think the one real clear Silver Lining is infrastructure spending. There is talk about a trillion dollars bill and it does two things. In the immediate sense, it creates jobs that i think 43 jobs for every Million Dollars of investment in the construction trades and supplying materials industry. The second economic benefit you get from not is when you invest in infrastructure, it unleashes creativity and resources of the private sector. So, your view on a trillion dollars investment in infrastructure publicly financed. And dont tell me about deficit financing because this nation spent 110 billion rebuilding the roads and bridges of afghan dam. This government spent over 6 billion rebuilding roads and bridges of iraq, both of which great deficits financed and didnt one american jobs. Your view is in Infrastructure Investment and finance in a traditional way. Mr. Hall, you have 10 seconds to answer this. Im afraid mr. Higgins he did not leave him adequate time. I will let him give a very brief comment. If members would remember if they are asking that question, they need to leave a little time with their witness to answer the question. Otherwise, if you could do a brief answer and there answer and theres more youd like to do, if you could do that in writing, thank you. I just had a basic principle i think all of our work. For the change spending or change taxes, increase spending or lower taxes, how do you pay for that makes a difference because the deficit has an impact on things. If you increase spending but dont pay for it, increase deficit, that makes the difference how you pay for things. That is something to consider always the pope are talking about. Thank you, mr. Hall. The gentleman from texas is recognized for five minutes. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I appreciate your time in service and im happy to be on this bipartisan house Budget Committee. I say that a little tongueincheek based on some of the comments made. The American People are tired of partisan bickering and titfortat. They want us to do like they do in their businesses and their homes and daily lives and they leave and go to work and solve this problem. The other thing they are tired of his congress plane by different set of rules. One of the rules they have to play by and live by if they have to live within our means. And so, weve got to Work Together to solve this. Im excited to be on this committee because i think its the greatest threat to the future of our country. My commitment is sent to the Republican Party or to the leadership. Minus two minus three children they will have a free america to live in, that they will in fact have a future to grow up in the shining city on a hill and this is the greatest threat to that future. I am grateful to be a part of the problemsolving venture that we are about to undertake. I am concerned. I think theyre spending issues then cut to be made across the board. But im very concerned about the elephant in the room that was mentioned, the mandatory spending and entitlement programs are squeezing important assessment that we need to make in the country if we are going to have a prosperous nation Going Forward. I think about agriculture. Ag is the livelihood of the economy in west texas. And if we dont make the investment and Risk Management tools for our farmers are the safety net, we wont have the capacity to feed and clothe the American People. Dr. Hall, how much do we spend on the ad Risk Management for the programs within the farm bill as a percentage of our federal budget . I dont know, but its not a large percentage. A quarter of 1 that we have a safe and affordable and abundant life good for the American People. Weve cut billions of dollars and that discretionary program. Whether its transportation and making sure we meet Transportation Needs r d where the laboratory of innovation for the world on the cuttingedge of Technology Oriented Fund National defense. I am concerned about the lack of investment in this important area at all because we had squeezed i think just about all the blood out of the turn up on the discretionary side. At what point, and dr. Hall, two we reach diminishing returns on the cuts on the discretionary side, and maybe some of the programs ive mentioned. Its hard to say on any of this. The growing deficit, any of these numbers. They look back and weve been on record to say that that is unsustainable if you look out a lot of years. Its hard to say what is too much. Focus on Discretionary Spending. One of the things that is interesting, sobering factoid here is we expecting 10 years that just the payment on debt, the net interest on debt will exceed all nondefense Discretionary Spending in the country. That will become a bigger item in all the nondefense Discretionary Spending. Thats part of the problem. You have this net interest becoming a major part of the budget Going Forward. Of the risks to balancing our budget, getting arms run deficit spending and National Debt, which is the greatest risk . Interest rates, domestic spending or the entitlement programs in the runaway cost there . Its hard to rank them because obviously you can it any of those are all of those to address the deficit problem. Here is my last point and again, thank you for your time. We cant keep kicking the can down the road. We dont have any more runway. We dont aim or analysis, more accountants or budgetary experts. We need leaders with purchase of the problem. The problem is mandatory spending. I look forward to getting after it has became a is. I yield back. The gentleman from california is recognized for five minutes. Thank you, madam chair. I appreciate following congressmen arrington. We may not agree with much on economics, but he has shown a lot of graciousness reaching out to the freshman class trying to build stability and put the country first. I appreciate following him. Dr. Hall, thank you for your surveys, not just in this role, but at the Commerce Department Treasury Department and i look forward to hearing some of your expertise. I represented district at at the heart of Silicon Valley with google, apple, yahoo , intel, cisco. In rico were ready, economist at berkeley has been an attack multiplier of 4. 5 jobs for every one job created intact, 4. 5 other jobs are created. Pastor treiber pimpernel and for the National Prayer breakfast will tell you in our district not everyone goes to their church, but there are folks, lawyers and others who have those jobs partly because of the tech industry. In eastern kentucky, thanks in part to Ranking Member yarmuths work with the administration, there is this model were 40 jobs were created, coal miners kids being trained on ios software on the apple phone in and write software on a google phone, fourmonth class, all of them have jobs. It was funded by the Tech Initiative that the administration worked on with congress and the regional appellation economic center. My question for you and i dont its a partisan issue is how do we get these tech jobs across the country and what are your thoughts on what this Congress Needs to do to make that possible . The little hard for me to speak to specifically. I dont want to make specific recommendations. That is not what cbo does. In general terms, the longrun problems we talk about the labor force and participation in the labor force, growth increase. Working age people started back in the labor force. But also the productivity side of things. There is lots of things government can better that will help increase privatesector productivity. Whether it is looking at tax policy, trying to find a more efficient way of collecting taxes that is hopefully tax neutral, looking at the Regulatory Environment, whether its looking that increased federal investment. All of those things could impact private sector productivity. That is really an important part of the recipe. One of the real difficulties we have come anybody has right now im being too specific. We dont understand productivity growth very well and we dont understand policies, how they impact productivity growth very well. It is hard for most anybody to have to been a solid recommendations on how to achieve higher productivity because we dont know that much about it. Would you say preparing folks are jobs that be a component of it . Yes. Absolutely. The other line of questioning i have a slightly different and that is on Social Security. Without taking a particular view, if we were to scrap the cap, how much revenue at that race and how much would that go towards solving some of the structural deficits . It would certainly have an impact. I dont have the number in my head, but we just did the calculation and the option for reducing the deficit volume reproduce one of the options we put in there. We can followup to two give you some idea of how much of an impact that would have. I appreciate that. I yield back the balance of my time. We appreciate that balance of time. The gentleman from South Carolina is recognized for five minutes. Thank you. I appreciate the thoughtful comments from my colleague from new york and from california. We do think things differently. On my other colleague from california, mr. Mcclintock was getting at. In the sovereign debt crisis, it is much more real than people realize. I think it is much closer than people realize. You yourself have identified the dead is unsustainable. That we are on a path we cannot possibly continue and i think the numbers are compelling on that case. But i think to flesh out is how this may be a nearterm event would have cataclysmic consequences with regard to the value of our currency and future inflation, with regard to the American Standard of living. I think it is interesting, i thought a mckinsey report the other day and what it showed his leer at 250 debt to gdp globally. In the wake of 2008, what we saw was roughly 57 trillion increase in debt, which was highly unusual. What the report showed was going back over the last 50 plus years, more than that, went back to 1930, died in the wake of financial crisis or economic slowdown, historically there was a deleveraging that followed. But in the sense that, post2008, what was seen as a reverse. Significant leverage in the wake of financial crisis and therefore we lived in a time like no other and you could see the same numbers at the federal level. Our debt to gdp numbers are a gas a postworld war ii postworld war ii high emirate peacetime high. I was looking at numbers the other day and i think this was an interesting chart that again suggests hopeful durable we are and how a crisis could come much sooner than people realize. This is from the fed and its not worth as a percentage of disposable income, you could also do network as a percentage of gdp. A sickly but it shows over the last 75 years weve been constant at an average of 500 network for low income. But in early i guess late 90s, we had a peak under represented the tech bubble. We went about 600 and we did it again in the housing crisis or just free housing crisis when about 600 and weve done it again now. What is interesting is what followed the tech bubble, what followed the housing bubble we know. But we are at the same percentage and an overall insulated environment with regard to chat both domestically and internationally. Is there much greater level of vulnerability than we realize . Let me add one other thought. I pulled the numbers on economic expansions. We are now living in the fourth longest economic engine in american his career. So we have the tech bubble. Brad drake next engine, but you know, the average is 60 months. We are about a third pass back, which would suggest to me another vulnerability. Finally, we live in a zero Interest Rate policy, which is the policy that we have acted never lived in. I guess it was roosevelts treasury secretary that the time they talked about pushing on a string, how there is just no marches in terms of making things happen. Would you flesh out in a minute and a half that you have a little bit of color with regard to coming in now, while it may be unsustainable in the long run, maybe this could creep up much sooner than people realize. Part of the trouble is that it just isnt research. Theres no way to know how much debt is too much. Theres regression to the mean for everything. I think its even dangerous when we talk about Interest Rate you say we will go back to the average. Thats not what historically have been. The reason you have regression is typically go far on the other side. Interest rates go up to give you the average. The numbers of marriages where unassertive compares that we wind up making in comparison. 70 of the highest debt ratio since the end of world war ii. The end of world war ii was a pretty special time. Its way above historical numbers. That was the case when we were fighting force of as the republic. Right now it is going towards consumption manage argued to be unsustainable. The gentlemans time has expired. Im very sorry. The Ranking Member, mr. Yarmuth is recognized. Thank you, none of chairman. Thank you, director hall. Back forward to reading your publication. That would be something mandatory reading for all of us. One thing we havent talked about yet during this hearing is tax expenditures. I think your report shows that tax expenditures actually are on a path larger than Discretionary Spending in total, including defense spending. Some are to 1. 5 trillion. Is there any difference between inter and said impact on the budget between a dollar of tax than Discretionary Spending . The effect on the deficit does the same. And have you done an analysis of what types of Discretionary Spending may be have a more positive or negative impact on the budget, on the deficit as he would have, for an instrument of charitable deduction versus r d tax credits versus mortgage. None of that comes to my mind so much. Our colleagues at the joint committee on taxation are the ones who got a lot more about where. They might have some numbers for you. Last year, the house renewed about 800 billion of tax expenditures as i recall with no offset. Is that correct . I dont remember the numbers. That could be correct. It is substantial. I hope you dealt with this in the new publication because clearly, when you look at over a trillion dollars worth of tax expenditures, you look at another Significant Impact on the deficit in something that we dont spend nearly enough time looking at in terms of which ones really pay off for the taxpayers. Most of the mortgaged action benefit goes to wealthier taxpayers. Is not correct . Probably correct. Can i Say Something in general, one of the ways to try to improve efficiency and product dignity is to look at the efficiency of taxes of our tax system because our tax system that ought to think that encourages behavior that causes distortions. There are things one could look at. Reducing taxes on Capital Investment, for example. A really direct way of effect imported dignity because Capital Investment raises productivity. Worrying about attacks based here offshore behavior reduces tax base. Some of those things, especially if they are sort of tax neutral, would have an impact potentially unmonitored Growth Without adding to the deficit. Reasonably the house takes on tax reform. Itll be an interesting one. This is totally out of character for me, but im going to ask questions that have no point. Just curious about them. In your report, you project medicare spending per beneficiary to go up 4. 3 which is 3 higher than the last five years. Why such a dramatic increase of the cost per beneficiary. That was actually difficult for us to forecast. A lot of thoughts for us is continuing the trend. That is part of inheritors generally. Will grow faster than gdp and that is part of the growing deficit. That hasnt been the case over the last five years for whatever reason. Part of it is aca. Part of it the economy. A lot of factors involved there. My point being, that could be totally that could be a dramatic difference for medicare is the growth rates per beneficiary stayed up one third of which are protecting. You are right that the growth has slowed down. I dont know if we have in this report, but a little Sensitivity Analysis or repair the cost of health care and the effect it has on the budget deficit. We can get back to you on that. Another point you make is the subsidies in the exchanges, assuming they are not revealed what double basically from the steering felt 10 years and im curious as to whether thats predicated on a doubling of the number of insured, a rise in the premiums so the subsidies have to keep pace with the premium under current law. Is that the reason they would double in 10 years or is it a combination of both . I think most of it is the increase use of the exchanges and increased use of the expansion, decade expansion. They are both in there. Now turn to medicaid. You project this is on regulatory medicaid, not the expanded medicaid. Expenditures for 389 billion in 2017 to 650 billion in 27, which is significant increase, 70 growth over that period of time. But its 5. 5 a year growth. Is that because youre projecting rising cost per beneficiarys or because you expect that many more people to be involved and be eligible for medicaid, which would reflect a really bad economy, or would it be because so many such a huge percentage of medicaid is for Skilled Nursing and you expect the senior population to eat up a larger chunk of the Medicaid Budget . To get that level of detail, have to get back to you. A big chunk of that is the increased number of people. But we can break that out for you. Would it be in a Skilled Nursing side . To say that the population portable for medicaid indicates an economy thats going in the tank. We have pretty modest growth. And a continuing trend for income for high income folks. We have continuing to change. That is a trend Going Forward that is in there for a while. Go into Medicaid Expansion, your projection is between now and 27, the number of people in expanded medicaid would go from 12 million to 17 Million People. And the expanded medicaid go from 70 billion to 142 billion. 7 a year as which are project. Im curious as to why that is such a huge increase. When i know. Rate now, there are 31 states that have expanded and thats about 50 of the eligible people. We expect that to increase the number of states that adopt Medicaid Expansion and increased 70 of the total people of all the states. It is from growing state acceptance of that. Good answer. Wish we could see that. Policy doesnt look like its going that direction however. In my state, we have arguably the most successful expansion of medicaid in the country. We are reduced and are insured by 60 . We are now at 3 and on expanded medicaid. The projections neither projections, but other projections if you actually were to resend the affordable carriage, the Medicaid Expansion are just Medicaid Expansion, who would listen off a lot of jobs, tens of thousands of jobs here 44,000 jobs and 30 billion worth of Economic Activity over the next five years. Does your data, your analysis of the Affordable Care act reflects that potential loss in Economic Activity and employment other areas across the country . Im not sure if we have that level of detail. The main impact we saw a for example, aca repeal of the change in the labor supply. We think that would be an increase in labor supply that would increase Economic Growth and that would counter some of the effects. I dont know offhand what we thought about that. Thank you very much for your testimony. I yield back. Gentlemans time has expired. The gentleman in pennsylvania, mr. Smucker is recognized for five minutes. Thank you, madam chair. Good morning. As for being here. As any other freshman year and probably other members as well just come through a campaign where i know ive had many, many conversations with people throughout my district and her concerns that they have expressed in one of the top things that weve heard is people believe that the economy is not working for them as they should. They believe they are concerned that their kid, their grandkids will not have the same opportunities to live the American Dream that we all have had. People are very concerned about that. And they are concerned that we are asking future generations to pay the bill. Isnt it true, dr. Hall, that is over doing . If we cannot solve this problem here, we are transferring that problem to future generations. Is a fair statement. We do have a little literature, research on the intergenerational effects we can give to you, but thats a concern. People are also very concerned, their perception is that their elected leaders are not willing to make the tough decisions to solve the problems that we are faced with. And i am hoping that we are about to change that. I am pleased to be on the Budget Committee to work to try to solve these difficult issues. I agree with many other comments that have been said here today. This is not a partisan issue. These are issues we should be looking to find solutions that will take us working across the aisle to move our country in the right direction. Hoping that this is the beginning of finding some of the solutions. The other thing ive heard and i want to get another question to you. Pennsylvania lancaster pennsylvania, a lot of entrepreneurs, Small Companies who have developed in technology, whatever it may be and created jobs and grown into Large Companies that have created more and more companies. The Business Owners i talked to today believes that it is more difficult and as a Business Owner myself and nastiness as well, it is more difficult. There is less incentive to invest Additional Capital into new technologies to hire people because of the environment weve created in this economy. They believe the Regulatory Environment holds them back, both individuals and businesses back, prevent that Economic Growth weve seen before. They believe that tax policy is no longer working for them. Do you think we are seeing that kind of impact . I certainly tank that that is a potential area for improving the longterm growth. One of the two big challenges is perfect to be the period in things like some regulation, you need some regulation. Some regulation could actually hurt her but to be. Having regulation that is unnecessary or goes too far can impact perfect today. Tax policies can impact perfect dvd. Weve talked about whether we need to tax our way out of this and cut spending. We also need to look at establishing the right environment to encourage Capital Investment, to encourage more hiring, to encourage a use by individuals and business is that will create that Economic Growth. I think it has been done before. My question to you in this regard is how much impact will that have . Say for instance we are able to get to 3 or 4 annual growth. The numbers im looking looked every bit as bad and worse. They dont look any better from this side of the table then they do before. How much impact could we have if we create an environment for much stronger Economic Growth . The problem is so big you cant do it just for Economic Growth. One of the ways they have a sense of how much different that would make. Right now product to be will go up to about 1. 3 by the end of her tenure. Good in the 1990s, it was as high as 2 , which is very unusual. But then we got another half of a percentage point at a private entity. We are talking about, in 10 years we are talking about having a deficit thats about 50 billion lower. Going from 1. 42. 9. Thats an impact, but its not balanced and we still have a continuing worsening of the deficit on the demographics Going Forward. Gentlemans time is expired. I now recognize mr. Faso from new york for five minutes. Thank you, none of chair. Dr. Hall, thank you. You restart it to be. How much would make them permanent the 179 tax incentive for this disinvestment or 100 expensing of capital expenditures, how much have you factored that into her den analysis as to how much that could improve product to the d. . I dont know if weve done an analysis. We assume that they expire when they expire. Id have to see if weve done an exercise like this. Did you get back to us on that . Im also a member of the Agriculture Committee and i was appointed to the nutrition committee. I have noted that despite the general improvement in the economy in terms of employment, that we still have not seen a decline in recipients under snap. I am wondering if you factored in and look at that factor as well. It is sort of part of our forecast. We do think there is slack in the economy. The underlying forecast does incorporate our Economic Forecast. We think we are still about a 1. 5 million jobs short of full employment right now, even though the Unemployment Rate is very low. That is still a significant slack left. I would add some of the comment that my colleagues gave one of the things ive heard frequently on the campaign trail and speaking to business sense was that they had jobs, they just cant end quote by people to fill the jobs and often, these rely these are jobs that might have kept a close skills. They might need some basic mechanical skills and training and robotics, it better. If you know one particular school nearby district, Hudson Valley Community College for the guy who runs it is a robotic training facility. He has about 150 students every year. Every single student has the job. He told me you could have literally the d. Around the country and you still wouldnt meet the need for employment to those kinds of jobs. Any comment on that . Two things come to mind. Our issue with a slowly growing labor force is not going as quickly. Part of that is working age people are entering the labor force like they have in the past. Our dissipation rate of working age people now are lower than they have been in the past. That is a puzzle. We think a lot of that just doesnt look like its coming back. That is something that is may be important in here. A second thing is one of the things we have done a little work on a federal investment in things like education and training. In fact, we are coming up very shortly on a block about what we see as evidence on the effects of education and training Going Forward that might address that issue. Okay, id be interested in the night. Id also be interested in seeing the publication you referenced about the 100 best ways we could use to reduce the deficit. Speaking of that that, what do you say our tenure of growth and National Debt is going to be . We are going to hit about 89 of gdp. In terms of actual amount of debt, it will go from right now 19 trillion i think it is 30 trillion over 10 years. About a 10, 11 trillion increase over 10 years, does that get a little frustrating coming up here to congress and to tell us and the American People that their National Debt is going to be 30 trillion in 10 years and no one seems to pay attention. One of the things i notice every year when we put out this report, we do a little press conference where we talk to press and let them ask questions. One of the questions is what is new about this report. The most notable thing is that he still got the same punchline it did last year and a year ago. Dad is large and growing at some point unsustainable. That is a continuing message from cbo and its been a message for quite a while. Dr. Hall, thank you for your service. I wouldnt recommend it, but maybe you need to fetch her hair on fire when giving a presentation. I yield, madam speaker. The gentleman yield spec time. Gentleman from ohio, mr. Johnson is recognized for five minutes. Thank you, madam chairman. Dr. Hall, thank you are joining us today. Let me turn to direct spending or mandatory spending. You know, when i was first elected in 2010, the first phone call i got was from my nearly 80yearold mother and her pleasant to say congratulations. It was to say, what are you going to do to make sure that washington protects my Social Security benefit because if they dont, i am coming to live with you. The next phone call i got this from my wife who said you better do what your mother said. For many years, after the 1983 Social Security reforms, the Social Security trust fund ran fairly large surpluses. This was done deliberately to ensure the trust fund would have resources to pay benefits for a long time. So what is the current cash flow situation with Social Security . Right now their outlays exceed the revenues. Even excluding interest by a fair amount. This year, the outlays will exceed revenues by 55 billion. How long do you think Social Security will last at that rate . Right now, we have our exhaustion dated at 2030. Okay. If Social Security continues to pay out more in benefits than it collects in taxes, what in your opinion will that mean for current and a fishier is if we dont take any action here . I can guess at what that is. I can put the two into it what you said together, but i would like to hear it from you on the record. Or assumption in this is that beneficiaries will still continue to get what they are promised. So even though unless congress, beneficiaries wont get their full outlays. We assume that that have been. If they didnt, in 2030, benefits would have to be reduced by 29 right away. Albright. So is it true the longer Congress Ways to reform Social Security, the harder it is to implement reforms without effect current retirees . It is. Okay. Let me go back and talk a little bit about Economic Growth. In a 2015 study on repealing the Affordable Care a, the Congressional Budget Office determined repeal would increase gdp by about. 7 on average over the medium term thats 2021 through 2025. Mostly by repealing the provisions that are expected to reduce the supply of labor in the economy. So how would repealing the Affordable Care act affects the expected supply of labor in the economy . Would it lead to an overall benefit in the economy . Repealing would likely increase the supply of labor in the economy. Not quite one percentage point, actually would give up is to gdp growth is that the increase in labor supply. Our latest estimate was 0. 7 of gdp. Okay, so if we were to repeal, it would increase the gdp by. 7 and tell me again what you think that would go to. Sure, we think that the number of people who would increase their hours or reenter the labor force, it would increase by 0. 80. 9 of the labor force. The boosted the labor force. Im asking you to do some mental math here. I know that at the current labor rate that we are experiencing, youve got any idea how many millions of people that would be back in the labor force. I dont offhand. I dont want to guess. Can you take that as a question, please . You can do that pretty quickly. Added a calculator, too. Im sorry. I appreciate you answering my questions. I yield back. The gentleman yield back. I want to reference the report that did come from cbo on budgetary and economic effects on repealing the Affordable Care act. I will read online from this in addition to the questioning by the gentleman from ohio. Paragraph begins with the macroeconomic feedback effects of repealing the aca would lower the federal deficit by 216 billion in the period from 20162025. It would have significant economic effect in lowering. The gentleman from georgia is recognized for five minutes. Thank you, madam chairman. Dr. Hall, thank you for coming today. One of the joys of being a freshman and going late in a statement that guidance year a lot of comments and have learned an awful lot. A couple questions. First of all, do you believe the rules set by congress that you have to follow for scoring the budget and the policy changes, do they allow us to accurately look in to the future . Yes or no. I dont have an opinion on that. We will do whatever you like. I suggest we are 20 trillion in debt. All of the answers stand worth of air. Can you accurately talk about how the proposed reforms, tax reform policy, rolling back of regulatory cost possible trade all of the changes come as spending on defense, infrastructure and poverty initiatives simultaneously affect the budget . We have to see a lot more specific than do a lot more work. It is awfully tough for us to have an honest conversation of we dont accurately know where we are going with their numbers and how they will affect us. Do you think that we should be using more dynamic scoring models descent predictive analytics, give your office and those around you more tools to accurately reflect what the policy changes are going to suggest . The policy right now is working well. The dynamic scoring we believe makes for a more accurate were cast. It really makes a difference on large pieces of legislation. That is when we are required to use it. That seems appropriate. We will continue to get better at it, quicker at it. But it does probably help improve accuracy. You know, as we sit around and talk about this, the big challenge that weve got obviously is the mandatory spending. I think that we are going to have to be honest with ourselves and the American People about the promises that have been made in our ability to continue to keep those promises. We are going to have tough decisions to make. I kind of look at it when we talk about where we are in the budget process. We are going to have a budget to balance this in 10 years and one of five years. Is it one that balances in 12 years and were not going to vote for a balanced budget because it was political. He of a particular representative. I just get the sense until we are willing to fundamentally address and honestly address the mandatory funding crisis, that we are not doing anything more than rearranging deck chairs on the titanic. Is that a fair statement . I want to be fair and say theres a lot of ways you can invest in you dont have to focus on mandatory. You said earlier i think the question now i may be paraphrasing that all of the mandatory spending will recall the Discretionary Spending. So a man, it is coming at some point i would eat up every single resource weve got, so we have to address that. You know, another thing and i will close with this. You know, it is interesting that kind of feel like we are political verse that toma in the least right now. Weve been justin is here talking about whos the better driver for the last 50 miles. And now we are fussing about who is striving and the car is about to go over the cliff and it doesnt matter whos right or whos wrong if we dont stop that from going over the cliff. The American People at that does to stop this car from going over the cliff and i think its going to be a real challenge that we have as a congress and American People to have those very honest conversation weve got to have. Weve got to get better score in the budget. I believe weve got to get better at scoring proposed changes. But thats available to strip the emotion and politics out of our decision and use better analytics to make these tough decisions. But that, madam chairman, i yield back your the gentleman or in wisconsin is recognized for five minutes. Thank you airport to pick up again by the economy is doing so poorly paid 1. 6 growth this kind of pathetic. Labor Participation Rate is 62. 7 . I want to talk more about these entitlements because in the last decade, means tested spending has gone up from 670 billion to 700 billion. Tough competition out there to find workers and the toughest competition im getting is from the froth thats paying people not to work for me. Could you comment on what will happen if we scale back some of the programs . Well, sure. Of course, repealing some of these programs would have some other effects that you might want to consider but we do a number of things that and we make a point of pointing it out occasionally which are implicit tacks on working, that if people work more and eastern more, they lose benefits or if they begin to work they lose benefits. That is part of our calculation. We look to see what we have in the supply labor. Thats consideration. Could you easily come up with a hypothetical in which people say if they work and make another 10,000 lose 10,000 in benefits between their pell grants and earned income tax credits and food stamps and lowincome housing . Well, those are reasonable versions of that. For example, we have been talking a little bit about the aca. Thats been part of the issue of the aca. Implicit tax on working where you lose health benefit. Its not just a decline in labor supply, some of the programs will encourage you to work but not very hard. The income tax credit was designed to discourage someone from making 20,000 a year. Thats what it appears that it was designed to do. There are various different cliffs in the Affordable Care act, that was in a different hearing yesterday in which they talked about People Holding their their income to get subsidy, the Affordable Care act was designed by something who wanted somebody that wanted to discourage americans from working hard, right . Looking at the possible side effects of programs, what effects they may have incentives as an important part of any Public Policy analysis, i think. Do you think that we can do both a great steph to step to reducing and allowing people to work. You talk to their parents and siblings. They will tell you, my brother, my sister, they are not working because of benefits. A big step towards policy if we change any of this back . It would undoubtedly would have an impact. I dont know if it would get us towards balancing the budget. This is such a big problem. That could have Significant Impact if one looked at the programs and word about the incentives. According to what i have here went up 370 billion over the last ten years. That by itself would be halfway towards balancing our budget and if you turn around and you get that income tax coming in. I suppose you would be afraid to take a ballpark estimate on what will happen. Thats right. Thanks for coming over here, its enjoyable to you. The gentleman, time expired. As we conclude today, i want to cliff off a few things to help us recognize what a situation we are in this country right now and how desperate we are to change of the current trajectory that we are on. Real gdp grew up 1. 6 , fiveyear low. Since recession ended the economy grew by 2. 1 making this the wakest economic recovery of the modern area. The headline on Unemployment Rate, that declined sharply in the recent years and currently stands at 4. 7 . That all sound good but the other aspects of the labor market remain weak. Ub employment rate and discouraged workers who stopped looking for work is 9. 2 . Nearly doubled the headline rate. That really is a rate that matters. Of ablebody workers 62 and cbo expect it is rate to continue to decline in the future. Cbo maintains that the Affordable Care act is contributing to the decline by reducing the labor supply in the economy. The average Hourly Earnings have increased by about 2. 5 over the latest year, but that is well below the prerecession level. Real Median Household Income is finally on upswing but at 56,501, still 900 or 1. 6 below prerecession peak in 2007. As we can see by all of the statistics and numbers, this is affecting our economy and more importantly this is affecting the people of this country. Thank you, mr. Hall, for appearing before today. Members may submit written questions to be aned later in writing. Those questions and answers will be made part of the formal hearing. Any members who wish to submit questions or materials can do so madame chairman, can i respond to your comments . Absolutely. So i think if it would be possible, maybe to have another session sometime in the next few months to discuss the actual recommendations that are in the new publication from director hall and then maybe get some other people in here who can talk about how we can actually grow the economy because im not exactly sure we know how to do that, either side of us. Point well taken. With that, the committee stands adjourn. [inaudible conversations] the Heritage Foundation will be taking a look at the Iran Nuclear Agreement and whether stated as the worst deal ever as stated by President Trump. We will have live coverage of their discussion at noon eastern time. With congress on break, prime time, programs normally seen on the weekend here on cspan2. Tonight authors on National Security starting with mitchell on enhanced interrogations, jami and elliot cohen, author of the big stick, all tonight starting at 8 00 eastern. So which president s were americas greatest leaders in cspan recently asked 91 president ial historians to rate our 43 president s in ten areas of leadership. Top went to the president who preserved the union, abraham lincoln, he has held the top spot for all three historian surveys, three other top vote getters continue to hold positions, george washington, Franklin Roosevelt and theodore roosevelt. Dwight eisenhower makes his first appearance in the cspan top five this year. Now rounding out the historians top 10 choices harry truman, thomas jefferson, john f kennedy, ronald reagan. James beuchannan last and bad news for Andrew Jackson as well. Seventh president found overall rating drop this year from 13 to 18. But the survey had good news for outgoing president barack obama. On his first time on the list historians placed him at number 12 overall and george w. Bush moved three spots up to 33 overall with big gains in public persuasion and relations with congress. How did our historians rate your favorite president. Who are the leaders and losers in each of the ten categories. You can find all this and more on the website at cspan. Org. The European Union Foreign Policy chief talked about future relations between the u. S. And europe, she met with several officials on her first trip to washington, d. C. Since Donald Trump Took Office and stressed the relationship between the eu and the u. S. This is about an hour