[House Hearing, 118 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
FINANCIAL SERVICES AND GENERAL
GOVERNMENT APPROPRIATIONS FOR 2025
_______________________________________________________________________
HEARINGS
BEFORE A
SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE
COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
______________
SUBCOMMITTEE ON FINANCIAL SERVICES AND GENERAL GOVERNMENT
STEVE WOMACK, Arkansas, Chairman
MARK E. AMODEI, Nevada
DAVID P. JOYCE, Ohio
JOHN R. MOOLENAAR, Michigan
ASHLEY HINSON, Iowa
MICHAEL CLOUD, Texas
JERRY L. CARL, Alabama
CHUCK EDWARDS, North Carolina
STENY H. HOYER, Maryland,
Ranking Member
MATT CARTWRIGHT, Pennsylvania
MARK POCAN, Wisconsin
SANFORD D. BISHOP, Jr., Georgia
NORMA J. TORRES, California
NOTE: Under committee rules, Ms. Granger, as chairwoman of the full
committee, and Ms. DeLauro, as ranking minority member of the full
committee, are authorized to sit as members of all subcommittees.
Marybeth Nassif, Kathryn Maxwell,
Susan Occhipinti, and Nick Goranites
Subcommittee Staff
______________
PART 1
Page
President Biden's Fiscal Year 2025
Budget Request and Economic Outlook........................ 1
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Printed for the use of the Committee on Appropriations
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
61-856 WASHINGTON : 2026
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HOUSE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
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KAY GRANGER, Texas, Chair
HAROLD ROGERS, Kentucky,
Chairman Emeritus
ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, Alabama
MICHAEL K. SIMPSON, Idaho
JOHN R. CARTER, Texas
KEN CALVERT, California
TOM COLE, Oklahoma
MARIO DIAZ-BALART, Florida
STEVE WOMACK, Arkansas
CHARLES J. ``CHUCK'' FLEISCHMANN,
Tennessee
DAVID P. JOYCE, Ohio
ANDY HARRIS, Maryland
MARK E. AMODEI, Nevada
DAVID G. VALADAO, California
DAN NEWHOUSE, Washington
JOHN R. MOOLENAAR, Michigan
JOHN H. RUTHERFORD, Florida
BEN CLINE, Virginia
GUY RESCHENTHALER, Pennsylvania
MIKE GARCIA, California
ASHLEY HINSON, Iowa
TONY GONZALES, Texas
JULIA LETLOW, Louisiana
MICHAEL CLOUD, Texas
MICHAEL GUEST, Mississippi
RYAN K. ZINKE, Montana
ANDREW S. CLYDE, Georgia
JAKE LaTURNER, Kansas
JERRY L. CARL, Alabama
STEPHANIE I. BICE, Oklahoma
SCOTT FRANKLIN, Florida
JAKE ELLZEY, Texas
JUAN CISCOMANI, Arizona
CHUCK EDWARDS, North Carolina
ROSA L. DeLAURO, Connecticut,
Ranking Member
STENY H. HOYER, Maryland
MARCY KAPTUR, Ohio
SANFORD D. BISHOP, Jr., Georgia
BARBARA LEE, California
BETTY McCOLLUM, Minnesota
C.A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland
DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Florida
HENRY CUELLAR, Texas
CHELLIE PINGREE, Maine
MIKE QUIGLEY, Illinois
DEREK KILMER, Washington
MATT CARTWRIGHT, Pennsylvania
GRACE MENG, New York
MARK POCAN, Wisconsin
PETE AGUILAR, California
LOIS FRANKEL, Florida
BONNIE WATSON COLEMAN, New Jersey
NORMA J. TORRES, California
ED CASE, Hawaii
ADRIANO ESPAILLAT, New York
JOSH HARDER, California
JENNIFER WEXTON, Virginia
DAVID J. TRONE, Maryland
LAUREN UNDERWOOD, Illinois
SUSIE LEE, Nevada
JOSEPH D. MORELLE, New York
Anne Marie Chotvacs, Clerk and Staff Director
(II)
FINANCIAL SERVICES AND GENERAL GOVERNMENT APPROPRIATIONS FOR 2025
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Thursday, March 21, 2024.
PRESIDENT BIDEN'S FISCAL YEAR 2025 BUDGET REQUEST AND ECONOMIC OUTLOOK
WITNESSES
HON. JANET YELLEN, SECRETARY, DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY
HON. SHALANDA YOUNG, DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET
HON. JARED BERNSTEIN, CHAIRMAN, COUNCIL OF ECONOMIC ADVISERS
Mr. Womack. Before we get started here this afternoon,
first of all, I want to apologize for the delay. We had this
thing called voting on the floor, which is something we do here
in the House. So we're getting underway just a little bit late
this afternoon.
I want to remind everyone that we will follow the five-
minute rule for opening remarks, questions, and comments.
Members will be recognized in order of seniority based on who
is seated at the beginning of the hearing, going back and forth
between the parties. Latecomers will be recognized in the order
of their arrival, again, going back and forth between the
parties.
As a point of personal privilege, I would like to welcome
our newest member to the subcommittee, the gentleman from North
Carolina, Mr. Chuck Edwards. Chuck, welcome to the Subcommittee
on Financial Services and General Government.
So with that out of the way, let's get started. The
Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government will
come to order. Welcome to our first subcommittee hearing on the
fiscal 2025 president's budget request.
Appearing before the subcommittee today are Treasury
Secretary Janet Yellen, Office of Management and Budget
Director Shalanda Young, and Chairman of the Council of
Economic Advisors Jared Bernstein. I want to thank each of you
for taking the time out of your busy schedules to be with us
today. This will be an important discussion that should not be
taken lightly.
We are here today to discuss the Biden administration's
fiscal year 2025 budget request and our nation's economic
outlook. I am happy to share that this is the first time in
over a decade that this committee has had a panel with the
Treasury Secretary, OMB Director, and a council chair. Thank
you for being here. Going forward, we hope to have you back
more frequently. It is important for the American people to
have more transparency into the financial direction of the
country.
It is my opinion that the reckless spending and out-of-
control regulatory expansion driven by this administration and
democrats in Congress have pushed us into an economic downturn.
Over the course of the Biden administration, we have seen
families struggle to put food on the table, gas in their cars,
and roofs over their heads. This is not the American way.
President Biden has continued to ignore the hardships that
these policies and irresponsible spending have unleashed on the
American people, further evidenced by his fiscal 2025 budget
request. This unsustainable trajectory is one of the greatest
threats to American prosperity, also to America's security and
future generations. Our nation's debt grows every day. However,
President Biden refuses to claw back wasteful spending, as seen
by the $7.3 trillion price tag on his requested budget.
This budget is absent of improvements to mandatory
spending. I want to say that again: it is absent of
improvements to mandatory spending. That's 73 percent of our
federal spending, and it remains on autopilot. Without
implementing common sense structural changes, that percentage
will continue to rise and the discretionary spending that funds
our nation's defense, biomedical research, infrastructure, and
much more will continue to shrink under the pressure.
I would also be remiss if I didn't mention President
Biden's regulatory regime, which has continued to harm small
businesses, banks, and the taxpayers in Arkansas and across the
nation. These burdensome and unnecessary regulations range from
the SEC's consolidated audit trail whereby the SEC exceeds its
statutory authority in collecting every American investors'
personally identifiable information without their consent or
knowledge to the Treasury's mature unredeemed debt, which
remains unclaimed by millions of Americans because of the
Treasury's unwillingness to turn information over to the
states. This includes $214 million in my home state alone.
In conclusion, it is obvious that I won't be able to
support the level of spending included in the president's
budget. Our members are taking a hard look at the spending
request line by line and will determine the level of funding
that prioritizes putting our fiscal house in order, consistent
with the Fiscal Responsibility Act.
I look forward to your testimony today and working with you
on these important issues. And with that said, I will now
recognize my colleague and my dear friend, our ranking member
from Maryland, Mr. Steny Hoyer.
Mr. Hoyer. There it is. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I appreciate your comments. I may not agree with them, but I
appreciate them. And I appreciate the way in which we are able
to work together, notwithstanding differences, to come to a
conclusion on behalf of the country.
That this hearing occurs the same week that we finish our
fiscal year 2024, we hope, appropriations, some six months
after the fiscal year started, is a testament to how broken our
appropriations process is. I know many of my colleagues on both
sides of the aisle, including Chairman Womack, share that view.
I am pleased that we are close to seeing final legislative text
on a sensible, bipartisan funding deal. It shouldn't have taken
this long, however. If my Republican colleagues honored the
deal that 314 members of the House came to last summer, we
would have finished these appropriations months ago. We must
avoid these same mistakes as we start our work on
appropriations for fiscal year 2025. I believe my friend, the
chairman, shares my hope that we can pursue that mission in a
more collaborative fashion. That includes working with the
Biden-Harris administration to ensure that our federal agencies
receive the resources they need to enforce the law, build a
more resilient economy, and help the American people get ahead.
President Biden's budget proposal is a great template for how
we can continue investing in America.
I must say, Mr. Chairman, as an aside, I am looking forward
with great anticipation to the actions your party proposes with
respect to the mandatory spending of which you speak. We will
have some discussions about that, I am sure. By supporting the
policies, including in the Inflation Reduction Act and other
historic laws we passed last Congress, the president's budget
would help lower Americans' costs. That includes essentials
like health care premiums, prescription drugs, energy, insulin,
and high-speed internet.
As chair of the Regional Leadership Council, I am eager to
hear from Secretary Yellen about the progress we have made to
implement those laws in every corner of the country. I also
look forward to hearing Director Young's insights on the other
ways this budget invests in America and in Americans, whether
it is expanding access to childcare or ensuring the integrity
of our elections. Crucially, the budget accomplishes all of
this while also reducing our deficit by $3.2 trillion over the
next decade.
Now, we can argue back and forth, but there is no doubt
that the chairman is correct: we need to address the fiscal
crisis confronting our country in terms of our debt, and we
need to do that across the aisle. And it will be tough, but we
need to do it. I am a big believer in fiscal responsibility, as
are many of my friends across the aisle. Fiscal responsibility,
however, means looking not only at spending but also at
revenue. That ought to include providing much-needed funding to
the IRS to enforce existing tax laws. I was not pleased this
year at the figure that we have come because IRS, under both
parties by the way, has been underfunded. While the Inflation
Reduction Act's funding for the IRS has greatly improved the
agency's taxpayer services, we must do more through the
appropriations process to support its enforcement efforts.
Every dollar we give to the IRS to collect legally-owed taxes,
not increase in taxes, legally-owed taxes from high earners
yields $12 in return, so that every one dollar we cut from
enforcement, one could extrapolate costs us $12 in collections.
If we are serious about reducing the deficit, we cannot afford
to ignore revenue owed under laws already on the books.
This is another strong budget, but I am disappointed that,
for the first time, it doesn't maintain pay parity for military
and civilian federal employees. I have expressed that
disappointment to my dear friend, the budget OMB Director.
Instead, it includes a 2-percent cost-of-living adjustment for
federal civilian workers and a 4.5-percent COLA for members of
the military. Now, let me explain what that means. You have a
military guy, maybe he is a sergeant, a three-striper, a four-
striper, he is sitting, he is running a machine. You have a
civilian sitting right next to him running the same machine,
doing the same thing with the same responsibility, and getting
a disparate pay, both living in the Washington, D.C. area. I
hope our guests can shed some light on that discrepancy and
what we can do to resolve it.
I know Secretary Yellen, Director Young, and Chair
Bernstein are here to discuss fiscal year 2025 appropriations.
Many of us, however, would also like to hear their perspective
on one of the most pressing issues facing our Congress today,
and that is securing supplemental aid for our Ukrainian and
Israeli friends. I have spoken three days in a row on money for
Ukraine. We are going to go for a two-week vacation. We call it
a district work period, and we all work, so it is not a
vacation at all. The young men and women on the front lines in
Ukraine are going to have no two weeks off. The young people
flying their planes, which are not many, are going to have no
time off. The people backing them up are going to have no time
off. We need to pass the Ukraine supplemental now, and it is a
damn shame that we haven't done that already. So I thank our
guests for doing their part to support that effort, and I hope
Congress will follow suit.
Again, I want to count myself very, very fortunate to be
the ranking member of a committee chaired by Steve Womack, who,
in my view, is one of the most straightforward, honest, and
effective leaders in this Congress. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Womack. Thank you. Thank you for your kind words,
Steny, and the feeling is mutual. At this time, the chair would
like to recognize the ranking member of the full committee, the
gentlelady from Connecticut, Ms. DeLauro.
Ms. DeLauro. Thank you so much, Chairman Womack, and thank
you, Ranking Member Hoyer, for really holding this very
important hearing. And I want to say a big thank you to our
witnesses, our guests today, Director Young, Secretary Yellen,
Chairman Bernstein. Thank you for being here. Thank you for
your public service to our country.
Like the Appropriations Committee, the Office of Management
and Budget and the Department of Treasury touch every corner of
our nation and impact people at every stage of their lives:
OMB, by preparing the president's budget request and then
distributing funding after enactment; and Treasury, by paying
our nation's bills and collecting our revenue that enables us
to invest in families and in communities.
Like appropriations bills, the president's budget presents
a vision, a vision for our nation. It tells the story of what
the administration cares most about in this country. The stakes
for the American people are incredibly high, and I am thankful
to all of you and we all agree that we take this responsibility
that we have very, very--sorry. So thank you for taking your
very important jobs so seriously.
You directly influence government programs and services
that hardworking Americans need in these challenging times for
families, programs and services that help with the cost of
living, lower their taxes, reduce drug and childcare costs, and
support small businesses. Most importantly, you share our
vision to strengthen workers' hands in winning higher wages,
weaken the hand of the biggest corporations and Wall Street.
Most families today are living paycheck to paycheck. It is
not a sound bite or a campaign slogan; it is the fact. They
struggle with the high cost for food, for childcare, for health
care, and education for their children. And while fiscal year
2024 is not yet closed out, I am pleased that Democrats and
Republicans in the House and Senate united to reach a
compromised spending agreement that supports working and middle
class families, keeps our communities safe and our economy more
equal. We are helping with the impossibly high cost of living.
We are siding with the hardworking majority of Americans. We
are protecting women's rights. We are reinforcing America's
global leadership, and we are helping our communities be safe
and secure.
To continue this critical work, President Biden's 2025
budget calls for vital increases in investments in the programs
and the services that hardworking people, small businesses, and
communities in need rely on. The president said during the
State of the Union, and I quote, ``The way to make the tax code
fair is to make big corporations and the very wealthy begin to
pay their share.'' The president's budget request shows how we
can invest in American families while lowering the deficit by
increasing taxes on the wealthiest Americans and big
corporations.
My colleague, Mr. Hoyer, mentioned this, but I hear the
argument from my colleagues on the other side of the aisle all
of the time that we have a spending problem. I would disagree.
We have a revenue problem in this country, and the President of
the United States is prepared to fix that revenue problem. Too
many corporations pay little or no tax at all: 55 pay no tax,
another 39 don't pay their share of taxes. And the chronic
underfunding of the IRS has allowed tax cheats and evaders to
get by with limited scrutiny. I will continue to fight to
ensure the IRS has the resources it needs to protect honest
American taxpayers from those who skirt the law.
I know that this budget blueprint would not be possible
without the tireless and dedicated work of the staff in your
agencies that adapt and respond to the economic challenges of
our day. Secretary Yellen, I am glad to see a request for
increased funding at the Department of Treasury. I look forward
to discussing how the department will ensure the wealthiest
Americans and large corporations pay their taxes, improve the
taxpayer experience, increase community development and job
creation, combat money laundering, help implement the outbound
investment review program, and support the sanctions activity
to weaken Vladimir Putin, Iran, and others of our adversaries,
and, particularly, Putin's assault on Ukraine.
But I have to say this, and the three of you will
understand my saying this. While I have the three of you, and,
Secretary Yellen, I want to say thank you to you for all of
your work on the Child Tax Credit. People told me that the IRS
would never get it out on a monthly basis. And to Director
Young and to Chairman Bernstein, you know there were people who
said we will never be able to get $3,600 and $3,000. There has
never been a federal program that has had such a profound
impact in such a short amount of time. The Child Tax Credit is
the most effective tool we have in the fight against rising
costs. It is the antidote to inflation. It is about financial
stability for families. I am proud of our hard work in securing
what was the largest tax cut for working families in
generations, and we must continue fighting to make the full
expanded credit permanent.
As the appropriations process turns the page to 2025, I
certainly hope that is the case after 11:00 tomorrow morning. I
will continue to work with my colleagues in both chambers on
both sides of the aisle to pass the final funding bills that
continue to help hardworking people.
Thank you so much to our witnesses for being here today,
for the work that you do day-in and day-out, and for your
testimony. With that, I want to say thank you to Chairman
Womack and Ranking Member Hoyer, and I yield.
Mr. Womack. I thank the gentlelady. The written testimony
of each of the three witnesses, though you are in three
separate ZIP codes today, have been entered into the record,
and we will proceed now with testimony.
Madam Secretary, it is an honor to have you in front of
this subcommittee today. We welcome you, and we will turn the
floor over to you at this time. Thank you.
STATEMENT OF HON. JANET YELLEN
Secretary Yellen. Thank you, Chairman Womack, Ranking
Member Hoyer, Committee Ranking Member DeLauro, and members of
the subcommittee. Thank you for the invitation to testify.
Over the past three years, the Treasury Department has
helped drive an historic economic recovery, including through
our implementation of the American Rescue Plan. We are now
playing a leading role in advancing President Biden's medium-
and long-term economic agenda, including through our
implementation of the Inflation Reduction Act. Today, our
economy is growing. The labor market is historically strong,
and inflation has declined substantially. Companies have
announced $650 billion in clean energy and manufacturing
investments since the start of the administration.
We have also been focused on taking necessary action beyond
our borders to advance our economic priorities and national
security, including continuing to respond to Russia's invasion
of Ukraine as part of this strong global coalition. Our
coalition recently imposed additional Russia-related sanctions.
Here at home, the Senate passed a bipartisan national security
supplemental package that provides critical support for our
allies, including Ukraine, and is vital to our national
security. I urge the House of Representatives to send it to the
president's desk.
Treasury also continues to closely monitor the conflict in
the Middle East and use all the tools at our disposal to
counter the financing of Hamas, other Iranian proxies and their
facilitators, stabilize the West Bank, and help humanitarian
aid reach Palestinians in Gaza. Securing funding for fiscal
year 2024 is crucial to achieving these and other priorities,
including to support a fair tax system, promote access to
capital in disadvantaged communities, and combat terrorism and
financial crimes.
Let me now briefly highlight several key requests included
in the president's fiscal year 2025 budget request. First, the
budget requests $12.3 billion in discretionary resources to the
IRS. Decades of underfunding the IRS had done a disservice to
American taxpayers and undermined our country's economic
strength. Now, funding from the IRA and discretionary
appropriations have driven unprecedented improvements in
customer service, technology, and enforcement to ensure that
wealthy taxpayers pay their fair share and help reduce the
deficit. We need to continue IRA investments and maintain base
funding to sustain this momentum.
The budget also requests $325 million for the Community
Development Financial Institutions Fund, which is key to our
efforts to increase fairness and grow our economy through
support for historically underserved and low-income
communities.
Second, the budget requests funds to allow Treasury to
address emerging threats, such as $312 million for Treasury's
departmental offices, including to support promoting investment
security in sensitive technologies and the stability of the
financial system. Treasury is also requesting $150 million to
enhance cybersecurity to protect and defend sensitive agency
systems and information.
Third, advancing our work abroad requires $231 million to
the Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, which
provides critical financial intelligence and sanctions-related
economic analysis, including to support sanctions related to
Hamas, Iran, and Russia. We have also requested $216 million
for the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network. This will allow
us to build on this significant milestone of launching the
Beneficial Ownership Reporting System while taking other
actions to protect the financial system and combat illicit
finance.
All of Treasury's work is enabled by my dedicated and
skilled colleagues who should be equipped with the tools and
resources they need to advance key priorities on behalf of the
American people. I am happy to take your questions.
[The information follows:]
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Mr. Womack. Director Young.
STATEMENT OF HON. SHALANDA YOUNG
Ms. Young. Mr. Chairman, thank you for having me here.
Ranking Member Hoyer and the full committee Ranking Member
DeLauro, you all tried to get me emotional here today. I get to
sit in front of my old boss, Nita Lowey's very large picture,
and Chairman Frelinghuysen has a very small picture by return.
But this is a homecoming for me. I have not gotten to testify
in this room, so thank you of having me here.
And I know a lot of disagreements happen. We clearly have
different ways of tackling a lot of tough challenges we have
heard here today. But the work this committee does, the
American people would be proud if they saw what I get to see in
working with this committee, one of which I have a lot of faith
and one that taught me you may not get everything you want but
you can hold your values and still find compromise for the
American people. So congratulations to Chairwoman Granger,
Ranking Member DeLauro, the subcommittee chairs and rankings,
for pulling together and finishing fiscal year 2024. As we are
here talking about 2025, I know 2024 remains in the background
of what Congress has to finish over the next few days. And I,
frankly, just want to say thank you and some acknowledgment it
might be ugly to get there, but you got there under extreme
circumstances, so thank you for that.
Turning to fiscal year 2025, while we are here, over the
past year, three years, President Biden has overseen a strong
economic recovery, historic job gains, amassed one of the most
successful legislative records in generations, grown the
economy from the middle out and bottom up, and delivered
important progress for the American people. This administration
has taken action to lower costs for working families from
everything from prescription drugs and health insurance
premiums to everyday goods and services. At the same time, the
president has also restored U.S. leadership here domestically
and abroad.
The president has delivered this progress for the American
people all while fulfilling his commitment to fiscal
responsibility. It is a fact that the deficit is more than $1
trillion lower today than when the president took office. It is
also a fact that the president negotiated the Fiscal
Responsibility Act and signed into law that act which saves,
roughly, a trillion dollars over the next decade. That is on
top of a budget that shows a path to achieving more deficit
reduction of, roughly, $3 trillion.
This budget will lower costs for working families, invest
in America and the American people. These investments will help
working families keep more of their hard-earned paychecks,
bolster manufacturing and industry across the nation, make our
communities healthier and safer, improve our military readiness
to protect Americans at home and abroad, strengthen our
economy, and more. The budget protects Medicare and Social
Security, rejecting efforts to cut both programs and extending
Medicare solvency indefinitely by requiring wealthy people to
pay their fair share toward Medicare and reducing prescription
drug costs.
The budget achieves all of this while building on the
president's proven record of fiscal responsibility and honoring
the president's promise that no one earning less than $400,000
per year will pay a penny more in new taxes. His budget reduces
the deficit by, roughly, $3 trillion over the next ten years on
top of also paying for new investments by cracking down on
fraud, cutting wasteful spending, and making the wealthy and
corporations pay their fair share. The discretionary budgets
comply with the Fiscal Responsibility Act, just like the bills
before you in fiscal year 2024 I know you will take up.
A few words on the Office of Management and Budget's 2025
budget, and I want to thank the team at OMB for putting
together this budget and also helping Congress with a lot of
behind-the-scenes work finish fiscal year 2024. Just like the
Appropriations Committee I got to work on for a long time, the
OMB staff just really punch above their weight, as they say,
and I appreciate the staff very much, our budget team, our
management team. This committee has helped rebuild that agency,
frankly, the career staff to levels needed to ensure that we
oversee the budget and management challenges of the federal
government. Your support has enabled OMB to continue to take on
significant areas of responsibility, leading the implementation
of historic legislation and policy that includes the Bipartisan
Infrastructure Law, the PACT Act, the Infrastructure Investment
and Jobs Act, CHIPS and Science, Inflation Reduction Act. OMB
plays a role in the implementation of all those laws, so thank
you.
Our 2025 request asks for $138 million, an increase of 8
percent. The largest part of that is our ITOR, or our
Information and Technology Oversight and Reform Fund. The
request includes $14.5 million for the Office of the Federal
Chief Information Officer and $30 million for our United States
Digital Service. Together, OFCIO and USDS ensure efficient,
effective, and secure investment of the government-wide $75
billion IT portfolio. We spend $75 billion on IT, and I do it
with a smaller and smaller staff to oversee that IT spend.
We are losing the fight on managing contractors, frankly.
You see the cybersecurity breaches becoming more and more
frequent, so, just as important as the budget portfolio, the
management challenges of the federal government, if we want to
stay ahead in how we manage and prevent cybersecurity and,
frankly, IT projects that this committee has seen go over, not
be served well, we need more assistance in our Office of Chief
Information Officers. They work closely with every agency who
has a CIO. This is the umbrella organization, and they don't
get a lot of attention. The budget side does, but they really
bring a small staff and leverage their knowledge to make sure
the federal government gets what it is buying. And, frankly, we
need more in order to catch up on contractors. The government
doesn't always get what they pay for.
So with that, Mr. Chairman, I will yield back my time, or I
have no time to yield back.
[The information follows:]
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Mr. Womack. Thank you, Director Young. Chair Bernstein.
STATEMENT OF HON. JARED BERNSTEIN
Mr. Bernstein. Chairman Womack, Ranking Member Hoyer,
members of the subcommittee, thank you for this opportunity to
testify on President Biden's 2025 budget and, in my case, the
economic context within which we propose this budget plan.
I would like to start by noting that the president's
budget, which includes the Biden-Harris administration's ten-
year economic forecast, is the culmination of the work of
hundreds of smart, dedicated people both in the Executive
Office of the President and across the agencies, all of whom
have put in long hours to produce this document. I offer them
all my deep thanks.
As noted, the budget must implement the Biden-Harris vision
within the existing and expected future economic context. It is
that context I will briefly discuss this morning--or this
afternoon. In his State of the Union speech, the president took
us some remarkable aspects of the current economic expansion,
reminding us how far we have come since he took office. The
quick passage of the American Rescue Plan got shots in arms and
checks in pockets, along the way standing up a highly-effective
vaccine distribution program where none have previously
existed. This accomplishment proved to be essential to
reopening our economy and helping families and businesses get
to the other side of the crisis. The ARP prevented mass
evictions and business losses, supported state budgets, reduced
child poverty, and ensured that the job market got quickly back
to full employment.
Importantly, the U.S. job market did not just quickly get
back to full employment, it has stayed there. The unemployment
rate has stayed below 4 percent for 25 months, over two years.
You would have to go back more than 50 years to see a
comparable stretch of such low joblessness. The average black
unemployment rate last year was the lowest annual rate on
record. Labor force participation for prime age women, 25 to 54
year olds, is also near its historic high with data back to
late 1940s.
As CEA shows in our newly-released Economic Report of the
President, this persistently tight labor market has delivered
strong inflation-adjusted wage gains that have grown faster for
low and middle than for higher-wage workers. A key reason for
these real wage gains is that consumer inflation has come down
by almost two-thirds off of its peak from 9.1 percent to 3.2
percent. That is we have maintained historically-tight labor
markets while achieving significant disinflation. Many
economists told us this couldn't be done, that, to get this
much disinflation, we need to give up many points of
unemployment and growth. President Biden never believed that we
could only achieve lower inflation on the backs of working
Americans, and he was right to hold that line. Virtually, every
forecast we have seen, including our own, has inflation
continuing to ease throughout the rest of this year and next
year.
The economic forecast in the budget results from joint work
by the three agencies represented before you here today. Our
forecasting team faces a unique challenge in that we must
finalize our forecast well before we release it. In this case,
in early November 2023. This can sometimes render our near-term
predictions stale relative to more up-to-date market forecasts.
However, the new forecast looks good in this regard, as our
near-term optimism about transitioning to steady, stable growth
was broadly warranted. On a Q4-Q4 basis, we expected real GDP
to grow 2.6 percent last year when the actual growth rate was
3.1 percent, meaning the expansion was even stronger than we
expected. This is above trend growth, which means it is helping
to generate the ongoing strength of job creation along with
real wage and income gains.
On inflation, things also turned out a bit better than we
expected. We thought that the CPI would be up 3.4 percent last
year, but it actually came in at 3.2 percent, down sharply from
north of 7 percent in 2022. On 2023 unemployment and interest
rates, we came in very close to the actual results.
Over the longer-term, our forecast is largely unchanged
from earlier budgets, with terminal growth and unemployment
rates of 2.2 and 3.8 percent respectively. As we show and
discuss in our budget release, our terminal growth rate is
higher than some other forecasters because we include pro-
growth effects of our policies, including investments in human
and fiscal capital, physical capital, along with affordable
childcare, which research shows has the potential to
significantly increase caregivers labor supply.
With that, I look forward to your questions and yield back
my 12 seconds.
[The information follows:]
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Mr. Womack. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We are going straight
to Q&A. Let me remind our panel that we are going to be called
for votes probably within an hour or so, sometime between 4 and
4:30. It is likely that we will only get a single round in if
we are all kind of brief. I don't think it is practical to
break for votes and then force our witnesses to stay here and
complicate the dinner hour, so we will just go through one
round, so be as brief as you can.
And while the subject is the fiscal year 2025 budget, my
question is going to be to you, Director Young. You referenced
our good friend, Nita Lowey, up here above my right shoulder.
Six years ago, she and I co-chaired, as you well know, the
Joint Select Committee on Budget Process Reform. And given what
my friend, Steny Hoyer, said in his opening remarks about the
condition we are in right now, the fact is that we are in the
sixth month of the fiscal year and we still have not completed,
hopefully will tomorrow, the fiscal 2024 budget appropriations
measures.
That said, it is my strong belief that some of the
recommendations brought about by the Joint Select Committee
should be acted on by Congress. They have not. Among those,
biennial budgeting with annual reconciliation and continued
oversight. Is that a way out of this mess that we are in right
now that continues to send a message to the American people
that we can't even do our basic responsibility, and that is
pass budgets on time, deliver appropriations on time, and give
the agencies certainty?
Ms. Young. To be quick, which this is not a quick issue, we
clearly have an inherent process problem. Process, in my view,
makes good results. This budget is 30 days late, the last
budget six months late. We need to figure out a way to get out
of that doom loop, and I am all for finding solutions.
What I do worry about, I think there is inherent value to
Congress looking at a part of the budget every year. We have
all heard a lot of complaints about not looking at programs
that are entitlement or mandatory. Well, we still get a shot.
It is ugly. We have got to find a way to make it easier. But I
would hate to lose the one process where everybody is forced, I
mean forced. And it is so ugly, if you are not forced to do it,
you wouldn't do it, in my view. And you are talking to an old
staff director here. I would hate to see anything get in the
way of that angle process, but I do think, Mr. Chairman, as you
pointed out, there are ways to get that process on time.
Sitting in this seat now, I will tell you managing a
federal government in three-month and two-month and two-week
intervals is no way to do business, and none of you would
choose to do it that way, and it is clearly inefficient. We
have a complex world, Department of Defense, and we can't tell
them what is going to happen Saturday or Sunday. There is
something wrong with that.
So I am with you. I am happy to sit down and look for
solutions. We lovingly call that committee the JSCBAPR. I do
think there is some pieces in there we should look for. I know
fiscal year changes ideas. You are right, we have got to do
something, but I also have an intense belief that there is
something about this angle process and having both parties do
the hard work where you literally still sit down across from
each other and fight about each of these line items. There is
something really special about that, and it doesn't happen many
other places in government anymore.
Mr. Womack. Thank you. Mr. Hoyer.
Mr. Hoyer. I agree with both of you. As majority leader, I
tried to get the appropriations bills done, frankly, marked up
in May, to the floor in June, to the Senate in July, and
reconciled in September. That is the way it ought to work.
Fairly simple. We are all adults. We are bright, we are able
people. We ought to be able to do that. But, frankly, everybody
thinks if they keep waiting they will get their way, and the
Senate doesn't like to consider appropriations bills because it
takes them too long. And that is a very simplistic way to look
at it, but, as somebody who has tried for 20 years as a leader
in this House to get the appropriations process to run on time
in a rational way.
And the question I would ask Director Young and Secretary
Yellen, we ought to determine how much it costs us in lost time
and productivity to do the process that we have done this last
16-17 months. You don't have that now, but I would suggest that
we get that number because that is the cost. The real cost is
more than that because of the lack of confidence that people
have that this government can run in an efficient, effective
manner. Both parties are to blame. This is not a party problem,
it is a human problem of delay and dissemble, which is pretty
harsh but I think that is what it is.
Now, let me ask a question: $650 billion of investment,
when was the last time we had $650 billion of additional
investment, which I think was motivated by the Infrastructure
bill, by the Science and CHIPS bill, and the IRA. When was the
last time we had $650 billion in one year of additional
private-sector investment?
Secretary Yellen. I honestly can't think of a time when we
have had such a response. It has been absolutely dramatic, and
I think it has been driven by the trifecta of legislation, the
Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the CHIPS and Science Act, and
especially the Inflation Reduction Act, which is the most
dramatic, important piece of environmental legislation in
history. And we are seeing an unprecedented response.
Mr. Hoyer. Thank you, Madam Secretary. I would tell all the
members of this committee, in 2010, I came up with an agenda
that I called Make It in America. We are a lot of talk about
made in America. I said made in America is what we did
yesterday. Make It in America is what we do today and what we
are going to do tomorrow. I think the most Make It in America
Congress in which I have served since 1981 was the 117th
Congress, and I think the results, not only in terms of
investment but the results in terms of jobs and economic growth
that we have seen. I heard the chairman's comments, but I,
frankly, think that an honest analysis of what has happened
over the last 36 months, from the pandemic on. We made
extraordinary investments. We spent a lot of money, and we have
to deal with that because we spent a lot of money and we
incurred a lot of debt, but it has made an extraordinary
difference in the lives of America and, indeed, the rest of the
world. So that is not a question, it is an observation, but I
think important to make. I yield back.
Mr. Womack. Mr. Moolenaar.
Mr. Moolenaar. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Madam Secretary,
thanks for being with us today. In your testimony, you
mentioned emerging threats, but you didn't, to my
understanding, mention China, nor did you mention ensuring that
tax credits provided by the Inflation Reduction Act wouldn't
flow to subsidiaries beholden to CCP-affiliated companies.
I am particularly concerned that some tax credits, like the
45X production credit, are essentially refundable, meaning the
Treasury will be sending a check to the subsidiaries of Chinese
companies for the value of those tax credits. Secretary Yellen,
do you believe that tax dollars of hardworking Americans should
be given to CCP-affiliated companies or their U.S.
subsidiaries? In the interest of time, just yes or no would be
helpful.
Secretary Yellen. Well, really, it is our job at Treasury
to implement the law that has been passed by Congress, and we
are doing our best to do that. The 45X production credit,
advanced production credit, is intended to onshore important
energy supply chains, and it can only go when there is
significant production of the components indicated in the
legislation. It has to occur in the United States.
But the legislation does not preclude Chinese companies. In
the case of the clean vehicle credit, 30D, there is a foreign
entity of concern restriction that comes into effect this year
and next. You can't qualify for that credit if there are
minerals extraction or processing or battery components that
are from a foreign country of concern, like China. But for the
advanced manufacturing credit, that isn't true.
Mr. Moolenar. Okay. Well, thank you because that is one of
my concerns of, you know, these investments by Chinese-based
companies and their subsidiaries. We are furthering our
dependence on China, and it doesn't sound like there are any
current restrictions under current law that would prevent a
subsidiary of a Chinese company that receives IRA tax credits
from sending those payments back to China. Is there any
prohibition on that?
Secretary Yellen. Well, they would help to defray the cost
of production in the United States. This can't be production in
China. It has to be production in the United States.
Mr. Moolenar. But the credits they could send back to--
there is no prohibition on that.
Secretary Yellen. There is no prohibition.
Mr. Moolenar. Okay. If there aren't any restrictions under
current law, was there a reason not to propose any restrictions
in the administration's budget proposal? You know, I have
introduced the NO GOTION Act to stop these IRA tax credits from
going to companies based in Iran, North Korea, Russia, and the
CCP and their subsidiaries. Do you support that legislation?
Secretary Yellen. Well, I don't want to--we haven't
discussed that, and I don't want to take a--I would need to
study that and get back to you with a--I do think the
legislation intended to shore up U.S. supply chains to reduce
our dependence on countries like China in areas like clean
energy. That is an important reason for it, and I would think
about it with that goal in mind.
Mr. Moolenar. Okay. Well, under Chinese law, a U.S. company
that wants to send income back to the U.S. must obtain
preapproval for that transfer from Chinese tax authorities. Do
you support incorporating similar preapproval requirements or
any other restrictions on Chinese firms sending IRA tax credit
dollars back to China?
Secretary Yellen. Well, I am not going to take a position
on that. Our general stance when it comes to foreign investment
in the United States is we want to make sure that there are no
national security concerns. We have a CFIUS process when it
involves not greenfield investment but buying out an American
company or merging with it, and we would look at national
security concerns. But, in general, we welcome foreign
investment in the United States. China does investment in the
United States, and this particular provision that you are
talking about in the IRA does not preclude China from receiving
these credits. China would be producing in the United States
and, in that sense, enhance mitigating our dependence on
foreign production.
Mr. Moolenar. Okay. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Womack. Ms. DeLauro.
Ms. DeLauro. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I will just
make one very quick comment about the earlier discussion about
how many months it has taken us to get to having a budget for
2024. I think, at the beginning of that, you can have all of
the financial gymnastics you want, at the base of this is
political will to get it done and understanding what needs to
get done and what our responsibility is here in view of the
American public, rather than adhering to ideologies that may
satisfy one soul but do nothing to help the American people.
With that, Director Young, I want to ask you a question
which has to do with the WIC contingency fund, which is in the
2025 budget. This would allow an increase in WIC funding if the
secretary finds in any quarter that the program has exceeded
statutorily, as specified, participation and/or food cost
levels. It costs about $34 million, as I understand it. First,
understand that I am for the $7.7 billion for the program. This
is not a substitute, it is an insurance policy. Just let me
know--I know you work closely with USDA--just quickly, through
the process of how we came to develop this solution. Is it a
good solution?
Ms. Young. Well, remember, the WIC estimates change
constantly. It depends on uptake, it depends on economic
conditions. So this contingency fund is an acknowledgment that
those estimates change on a regular basis and ensuring that we
have an insurance policy, a backup plan if you say. If the $7.7
billion turns out, my guess is, by the time you pass this, that
number is probably going to change. We want to ensure that we
have full funding of WIC. We believe our $7.7 billion does
that, but this contingency fund idea makes sure that the ebbs
and flows of participation, that we have every tool to make
sure we have enough money for full participation.
Ms. DeLauro. And just a note that there was a billion
dollar shortfall if that hadn't been met in the 2024 budget,
which we are hopefully passing tomorrow, that, in fact, we
would have seen millions of people waitlisted for that program,
about 2.2 million women, infants, and children jettisoned from
a program that is lifesaving. So thank you.
I just want to mention, this is the Council of Economic
Advisors' report on November 20th, the Anti-Poverty Income
Boosting Impacts of the Enhanced Child Tax Credit. A highlight,
it says between 2021 and 2022, the median post-tax real income
among households with at least one child 17 or younger fell by
$4,256, due, in part, to the reduction in the child tax credit.
The household median post-tax income would have been $2,600
higher in 2022 had they received the credit. Sixty-one percent
of the drop in meeting post-tax household income for families
with children can be explained by this policy change. I don't
have to tell you about what happened with the tax credit; you
all are very, very familiar with that. But I would just say
about Treasury, the IRS accurately sent 98 percent of monthly
child tax credit payments, and that is commendable. And,
additionally, the expanded child tax credit returns $8 for
every dollar spent.
Anybody who wants to answer very quickly, what would
restoring that expanded child tax credit mean to families? In
addition to lifting families out of poverty, what are the
broader economic benefits of the child tax credit?
Mr. Bernstein. Thank you, Congresswoman. As you well know,
and your fingerprints were very much on this development, the
expansion of the child tax credit that the president signed
into law helped to drive child poverty to a record low of 5.2
percent. Never in this country have we had such low child
poverty, and scholars of child poverty will tell us how
important that is not just for year one but for the rest of
that child's life.
When the CTC expired, that child poverty rate snapped back
up, and the conclusion is that the level of the child poverty
rate is very much a policy choice. This president in this
budget, and this committee has worked with us on this, you in
particular, proposes to restore the expanded child tax credit,
thereby taking child poverty back down to levels I mentioned
earlier and fully paid for, as well.
Ms. DeLauro. Thank you. With my six seconds, I will just
say that the proposal that is in the United States Senate the
moment I find to be lopsided in terms of what we provide to the
richest corporations in the country versus what we do for
children in our nation. Once again, it would be in keeping with
what the president wants to do in looking at corporations,
rather than giving them the benefit of billions or millions in
tax cuts, is that we work to invest in our families and our
children.
Thank you so much. I yield back.
Mr. Womack. Thank you, Ms. DeLauro. I apologize for the
distraction. It sounds to me, as an old broadcaster, it sounds
to me like we have got some RF interference in our sound
system. So do your best to disregard that. There may be some
kind of a transmitting device causing that. We will try to
isolate that.
Ms. Hinson.
Mrs. Hinson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. One of my top
priorities in Congress is, of course, to advocate for the
taxpayers in Iowa, the working families that we are all here to
serve, and ensure that their tax dollars are being used
responsibly to support Iowans' priorities. But, unfortunately,
we have seen a lot of improper payments continue to be a source
of waste for federal taxpayer dollars. Actually, according to
the report from Government Accountability Office, the federal
government issued more than $236 billion in improper payments
in fiscal year 2023. For context, that is more than the entire
budget of the U.S. Army annually. And since 2021, the federal
government has reported a staggering $764 billion in improper
payments.
So, Director Young, I know you're over there, but I just
had a quick question for you: Has the administration taken a
single step to ensure that these taxpayer dollars are being
spent responsibly to prevent these improper payments before
they occur? $236 billion is a lot of money.
Ms. Young. Well, one, the ARP provided funds to the
Department of Labor to begin the process of trying to improve
the unemployment insurance program, which I think most people
here will say that is one of the largest drivers of improper
payments. This budget also has further proposals that would
save $2 billion on UI. So we welcome and we are starting to see
some movement in some of the oversight agencies and moving on
the budget proposal. It was in last year's budget, as well, to
do something about some of the higher improper payment programs
of the federal government.
Mrs. Hinson. Are you looking at using technology like AI to
help track these things before they actually happen? I think
that would be ultimately the best outcome here is if we can
stop them before they go out, so we don't have to worry about
trying to claw them back.
Ms. Young. Well, that's one. You heard me earlier talking
about the need to make sure the federal government stays ahead
on technology. One thing we struggle with, frankly, and OMB is
at the center of trying to figure out how to help AI talent
across the federal government; and, frankly, we don't have that
right now. And we need to keep up with the technology to make
sure we know how it impacts the American people but also to
utilize it for things like this.
UI is difficult because you've seen one UI program, you've
seen one. We have a federal overlay, but each state runs it how
they want. So we are interested to see how we can utilize AI;
but, frankly, we at OMB are trying to deal with the AI talent
deficit.
Mrs. Hinson. As a separate issue, though, from----
Ms. Young. As a separate issue, but it is important. If we
want to utilize these tools, we have to have the people that
know how to do that. And part of our budget and part of what
we're trying to do is ask for more talent there. But on UI, we
are not leaning heavily into AI, but we do have proposals to
try to fix those programs.
Mrs. Hinson. I hope you will commit to work with us
continuing that, both on the talent side but also on just the
oversight side, to prevent improper payments and make that a
true top priority. That is a lot of money we are talking about.
And I want to go to one other topic really quick while I
have time. FinCEN's new beneficial ownership of reporting
requirements went into effect earlier this year, requiring more
than 32 million small business owners, including many in Iowa,
to, of course, report information about their company to a new
federal database, and the penalties for non-compliance on that
could include both civil and criminal action. So I know our
secretary of state has posted on his page in Iowa, you know,
hey, this isn't a state issue, this is a federal issue. But for
such a sweeping new rule, Secretary, it is very important that
FinCEN is taking steps to really educate our small businesses
on the impacts of this rule.
So how are you ensuring that these 32 million new affected
businesses are receiving the necessary resources to be able to
comply?
Secretary Yellen. So FinCEN has a well thought-out and
extensive education outreach program to make sure that
businesses learn what their responsibility is, and they are
trying to make it, and I have looked at the demonstrations of
how this works, this is easy to file for the vast majority of
businesses. It's not necessary to hire a lawyer or any help. It
is a simple form on a website.
There have been more than a million filings so far. It
started on January 1, and, you know, there is adequate time, I
think, for businesses to comply.
Mrs. Hinson. And I see I am rapidly approaching time, so I
will go ahead yield back in the interest of letting everyone
speak.
Mr. Womack. Mr. Cartwright.
Mr. Cartwright. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you,
Director Young, for being back in the room. It is nice to see
you here.
I want to invite your attention to Social Security as a
subject. Today, the Republican Study Committee called for an
increase in the Social Security retirement age, and so it is a
timely subject. Right now, Social Security is projected to run
out of excess reserves in about ten years. I was pleased to see
that the fiscal year 2025 budget protects Social Security
benefits and extends the solvency of Social Security, and so my
first question is how long will the provisions in the fiscal
year 2025 budget extend the solvency of the Social Security
program?
Ms. Young. Well, as you know, you have heard from the
president what our principles on Social Security are: no
benefit cuts, ensure that we have enough funding for those with
disabilities who receive payments out of Social Security, ask
high-income earners to pay more into the system, and you get
additional years in solvency.
We also point out something in direct control of this
committee, which is Social Security Administration who has been
underfunded and, as beneficiaries go up and there are more
people to serve, we are seeing a decline in resources at a time
when the Social Security Administration needs more. That is why
this president has asked for a 9-percent increase to fund the
Social Security Administration.
Mr. Cartwright. I just find it astonishing that today, of
all days, when you are here to talk about the fiscal year 2025
budget, that the Republican Study Committee, the largest
Republican caucus here in the House, comes out and calls for an
increase in the Social Security retirement age. You know, it is
one thing for people that have desk jobs, but for people that
are lifting and digging and climbing and carrying, to expect
them to work into their senior years doing these jobs, it is
not just wrong, it is a betrayal because these are people who
paid into the system, the FICA system, their whole work lives
with an expectation that they would be taken care of in their
senior years. And I am glad to hear that you are not endorsing
that.
Let me ask you this: what more needs to be done to protect
Social Security through the end of the century?
Ms. Young. You heard the president's plan. It is to ask
those in the top 1 to 2 percent to pay more. To deal with
insolvency, the first thing we often go to are benefit cuts.
Raising the age is a benefit cut. You worked all your life, and
the goalpost keeps moving, that is a benefit cut. And nothing
gets more spirited when I testify on Social Security, and I
have been asked many, many times, like, aren't you speaking in
hyperbole, you and the president, that people want to cut it.
And we see these proposals come out, and I get that every
member is not a member, but it is a proposal to cut, and that
is why this president finds it necessary to continue to remind
the American people he will not sign any piece of legislation,
nor support benefit cuts, to Social Security or Medicare.
Mr. Cartwright. Now, you alluded to the starving of the
Social Security Administration for resources, and I want to
talk about that. Unfortunately, they have been starved for
decades, making it difficult for many of my constituents. I
have 175,000 constituents receiving Social Security benefits in
northeastern Pennsylvania. It makes it harder for them and
people across the country to access their benefits when there
aren't enough people working at Social Security.
To make matters worse, budget constraints resulting from
the fiscal year 2024 CRs led to the Social Security
Administration imposing a hiring freeze, which is still in
effect today. Director Young, can you elaborate on what the
consequences of a hiring freeze are at the Social Security
Administration?
Ms. Young. Well, we don't have enough people today to serve
beneficiaries. So if we are not adding, certainly we will see
people retire from the Social Security Administration. This
means they won't be replaced. The problem is going to continue
to grow. And then we are going to see people who don't believe
their government is there to serve them. They know they are
eligible for benefits. It should not take people that long to
be able to get in contact, especially if they have a
complicated case.
But this is just going to get worse. We are happy we
finally have a Social Security administrator on the job. He is
talking to contractors, making sure we are getting what the
American people buy with their dollars from services. But there
is only so much we can do when we have a chart of beneficiaries
going this way and staffing and resources going the opposite
way.
Mr. Cartwright. Well, I was happy to see a 9-percent
funding increase on that line in your budget, and thank you for
your testimony and thank you for your work. I yield back, Mr.
Chairman.
Mr. Womack. Mr. Cloud.
Mr. Cloud. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you all for being
here. It is so true that Americans right now are living
paycheck to paycheck, working to make ends meet. And so much of
that is due to the inflation that Americans have seen, in large
part due to our massive spending. And I hope Americans are
listening to this hearing because when we hear from our friends
across the side of the aisle that we don't have a spending
problem, that is just a notion that is beyond any sort of
reality because the fact is that we have had record revenues
over the last several years, up until very recently, and
spending, no matter how much we are bringing in, continues to
be a problem. And so we have got to address our spending issues
and get things under control.
One of the things that I was concerned about is there is a
request for continued funding and expansion of the IRS to go
after American taxpayers. Meanwhile, the IRS, at the same time,
announced earlier this year that it is setting a goal for
employees to be in the office just 50 percent of the time in
May. So we are being asked to employ more federal workforce,
and this is true across all the agencies. Anyone who does case
work knows that anything from passports to VA benefits to farm
help to helping people with Social Security benefits, that the
time lines to get cases solved has massively expanded while the
federal workforce continues to go, quote to teleworking. And so
the productivity is going down, but we are being asked to solve
that by adding more people instead of finding ways to bring
higher productivity.
So I would encourage us to find ways to get people back to
work or expecting the people who are funding the salaries of
the IRS taxpayers to get people to work. And so I would
recommend that we do that. You had a thought?
Secretary Yellen. Well, you know, we are making sure that
IRS, as well as all bureaus in Treasury departmental offices
meet the standards that have been set for the federal
government, which is at least 50 percent time for everyone in
the office, and many employees have to be there absolutely
every day. And this applies absolutely to IRS employees in many
parts of the IRS.
Mr. Cloud. To the veterans that I am working to try to get
cases solved for them, 50 percent isn't enough to show up at
work. And, literally speaking, one of the facilities was a
literal work warehouse where the VA records are stored and have
not been digitized. We funded them, I think it was to the tune
of $60 million, to digitize those records. They didn't do it
because of COVID protocols. We tried to put in non-teleworking.
You cannot telework when you have to literally walk through the
aisles and look through file cabinets, and we couldn't even get
tele provisions passed by our friends on the left who oppose
that provision. We have got to get people back to work so that
we can solve these problems for the American people.
I wanted to talk to you about a little bigger of an issue,
and that is the strength of the U.S. dollar. You know, it is
essentially important to the safety, security, and freedom of
the world to have a America have a strong influence. We have
seen challenges against the U.S. dollar, a lot of it connected
to our spending. I mean, as you know, we used to have a gold
dollar, now we have a petro dollar that was based on, you know,
an agreement really with Saudi Arabia to trade oil and gas
using the American dollar. Very recently, we have seen, and
there is conflicting reports, but, at a minimum, Saudi Arabia
is considering joining BRICS, which has been built for the
fundamental purpose of challenging the U.S. dollar.
I am curious about your take on that. You know, this
administration has an attack on the oil and gas industry, in
spite of that, and how that plays into monetary policy I am
very concerned about. But then, also, this administration and
President Biden when he was vice president said, and this is a
quote, ``We are trying to create a multipolar world.'' In other
words, we are trying to create a world where the United States
is not the preeminent force. Now, most taxpayers would say that
we should share the goal, regardless of where we are on the
aisle, of the United States remaining a premier influence in
the world, so I would ask you, as you are addressing spending
policy and these kind of things, do you share that goal of
bringing the United States down a notch and us not being the
premier----
Secretary Yellen. I do not share the goal of bringing the
U.S. down a notch. I think it is essential that the U.S. shows
strong leadership throughout the global economy and leadership
on a full range of challenges the world faces. I strongly
believe the U.S. dollar needs to remain the world's primary
reserve currency, and I see few challenges, real challenges, to
the U.S. dollar. It may be that there are BRICS countries would
love not to be dependent on the dollar, but none of those
countries seem willing to accept any of those currencies as an
alternative for doing business, and there is a very good reason
for that. The U.S. is a well-managed country from a macro
perspective. Inflation has, for decades, been low and stable.
We have the deepest and most liquid capital markets in the
world and a rule of law and institutions that support the
dollar used as a reserve currency.
Now, it is helpful, when we want to impose sanctions on
other countries, the dollar's role enables us to do that
because, by using our sanctions tools to prevent malign actors
from running transactions through the financial system----
Mr. Cloud. I understand it, but I think we would be, if
we--we have a lot of strengths, but if we are not wary of the
fact that, historically speaking, when a currency collapses, it
happens overnight. We have got to sure fire our fiscal----
Mr. Womack. We need to move on. Mr. Pocan.
Mr. Pocan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thanks to our
witnesses. I am going to yield ten seconds to Mr. Hoyer, if it
is all right, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Hoyer. Ten seconds. I just want to say to the
gentleman's comment on competence in the international markets,
if we don't pass Ukraine funding forthwith, we are going to
lose a lot of confidence in international markets and with our
allies and our foes alike.
Mr. Pocan. Great. Thank you. Secretary Yellen, a question
for you. The bonus tax credits that were traded in the
Inflation Reduction Act for clean energy projects require
paying prevailing wages and utilizing registered apprentices,
which are the most important labor standards in the IRA. I
believe it is important that Treasury's final rule upholds
congressional intent.
As co-chair of the Congressional Labor Caucus, I sent a
letter yesterday with over a hundred of my colleagues outlining
several key revisions to the proposed rule that we are urging
Treasury to adopt, including treating project labor agreements
as evidence of compliance and establishing a front-end
monitoring system for employers that intend to claim the bonus
credit for their clean energy projects.
Our collective concern is that low-road contractors in the
construction industry already tried to evade federal prevailing
wage laws and provide fly-by-night training to their workforce.
Secretary Yellen, what steps is Treasury taking to set up
robust enforcement of these labor standards to ensure projects
pay prevailing wages and utilize registered apprentices, and
will those steps include our suggestions around PLAs and front-
end monitoring?
Secretary Yellen. Well, let me say that we are working with
the Department of Labor closely to respond on this issue and to
provide some clarity and certainty on the requirements. I will
say that, when a taxpayer goes to claim that credit, that there
will be rigorous procedures to make sure, given this is, in
most cases, 80 percent of the total credit, so satisfying this
is necessary to get most of the credit. There will be
requirements when a firm is audited to provide books and
records to show that every worker has received appropriate
prevailing wages and the apprenticeship requirements have been
met.
I would say there is now an active market for tax credits.
These credits are transferrable. And you will also get a great
deal of enforcement just through the market that is developing
around these credits because, if I am contemplating buying a
credit from a firm that, in the end, has not met, has not
actually met these requirements, I will have spent money for a
tax credit that may be denied. And there is an additional
enforcement mechanism: we see that potential purchasers are
asking for a good deal of assurance that these requirements are
being met.
Mr. Pocan. We just ask you to take a look at that letter,
and we hope that you can incorporate those suggestions in any
final rule.
Also, I think this is something my colleague, Ms. Hinson,
may also have some interest in. You know, we support biofuels,
the drive for economic growth, and creating good-paying jobs
and strengthening real economies. The Inflation Reduction Act
establishes a sustainable aviation fuel tax credit, and the
final guidance for this credit was supposed to be released on
March 1 but it is still not released. In December, the Treasury
Department announced that the updated GREET Model will be used
as a methodology, looking at integrating key greenhouse gas
emission reduction strategies and climate-smart agricultural
practices. As one of the co-chairs of the Biofuels Caucus, the
president has been very clear that he wants to see our country
lead the world's sustainable aviation fuel production. What is
the status of that fuel credit guidance, and can you ensure
that Treasury will include the greenhouse gas emission
reduction strategies that were promised in the department's
December announcement?
Secretary Yellen. So we are working very closely with the
Department of Energy, the Department of Agriculture, the FAA,
and the EPA. We want to get this GREET Model updated so that it
can handle some of the things that you have mentioned connected
to sustainable aviation fuel, and this has extended our time
line for getting the guidance out. But we want to make sure
that we do it right, and we are trying to get it out as quickly
as we can.
Mr. Pocan. And I think both Representative Hinson and my
office are more than glad to work with you if you have any
questions on that.
Secretary Yellen. Certainly. Thank you.
Mr. Pocan. Thank you.
Mr. Womack. Mr. Carl.
Mr. Carl. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Secretary Yellen, on
March the 6th, 2024, the House Judicial Committee released a
report detailing the Financial Crime Enforcement Network,
FinCEN, partnership with the FBI to gain access to consumers'
information from major banks posted January 6th, 2021 as a way
of tracking and targeting individuals it assumes could be
domestic terrorists based on certain financial transactions
they made, such as Dick's Sporting Goods or mobile payments
that use keywords like MAGA. Are you familiar with this report?
Secretary Yellen. I am familiar with the issue that you
are----
Mr. Carl. What actions are you taking to ensure that this
FinCEN is not targeting conservative Americans for their
constitutional rights or political beliefs?
Secretary Yellen. Okay. So I would like to put this in
perspective, if I could.
Mr. Carl. Very quickly, if you would, because I have a
second question.
Secretary Yellen. Yes. This is activity that took place
before I reached Treasury----
Mr. Carl. Well, what are you doing today?
Secretary Yellen [continuing]. With the previous
administration, and it ended in February of 2021. In the
aftermath of the attack on the Capitol, there was an attempt by
law enforcement to identify perpetrators of the attack. FinCEN
had been authorized by Congress to work with financial
institutions in a process called FinCEN exchanges to help them
identify. They are required to file suspicious activities
reports----
Mr. Carl. Yes, ma'am, I get that.
Secretary Yellen. --and they wanted to get reports that
would shed light on this.
Mr. Carl. I am asking you what are you doing today to
prevent that from happening again?
Secretary Yellen. This is a practice that has ended, and
the----
Mr. Carl. So you are doing nothing to follow up on it?
Secretary Yellen. There was no requirement for any bank to
do anything. Banks met with some people from FinCEN to discuss
how to----
Mr. Carl. But this report that came out on March the 6th,
you have not followed up on anything from it to see if there is
something there that you need to do?
Secretary Yellen. We are following up to make sure that
there are no abuses. But it is our obligation to work with
financial institutions to help them help the government
identify suspicious and illegal transactions.
Mr. Carl. Well, I can appreciate that, but innocent
Americans we don't need to be doing that on. I understand where
you are going with that.
Director Young, White House chief of staff requires
agencies to submit action plans on OMB in January regarding
their office spaces needed, but those haven't been made public
and the 2025 budget process doesn't appear to realize any
significant savings from building consolidation either in D.C.
or throughout the country. Why are we continuing spending over
$10 billion annually on maintaining these buildings and
securing leases for space that federal employees, when
employees are being allowed to work hybrid schedules?
Ms. Young. Well, thank you for acknowledging they work.
This is about returning to the office. Let me be very clear,
just like the Secretary pointed out, there are thousands of
federal employees who never got any opportunity to work hybrid
in the thick of the pandemic and put their own health at risk.
But you are right, OMB is central, and we have put out guidance
because we see the value, just like you all do. You see people
face to face. There is value in meaningful in-person work. But
there has been telework pre-pandemic and post-pandemic. It is
about mission. Different jobs have different requirements. I
have some people at OMB who work in a SCIF. They have never
gotten a chance to take advantage.
So this is about mission. We think meaningful in-person
presence, even for people who have office jobs that don't
necessarily have to come to the office, like for SCIFs. So we
are working and we are seeing improvements there.
Mr. Carl. But I am running out of time here. My question is
the $10 billion annual we are paying. We see no reductions with
this staff, this group not coming back. With that said, will
you commit that the OMB will lead this effort, so we can
consolidate underutilized office space?
Ms. Young. Mr. Carl, you, the chairman, Mr. Hoyer, I think
we all have an interest, and I have talked to the chairman a
lot about this, about doing something about space utilization,
which, frankly, was a problem when I worked on this
subcommittee more than ten years ago. And we need the tools to
make sure GSA can consolidate and manage, as the manager of the
federal portfolio.
There are lots of challenges here pre-pandemic that remain,
and I am committed to working with you and anyone else who is
interested because we need the tools to fix it.
Mr. Womack. Mr. Bishop.
Mr. Bishop. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I have two
questions, one for Director Young and one for Secretary Yellen.
The first is for Director Young. Medical debt and increasing
health care costs is a real problem in the country, especially
its disparate impact on minority communities. For Americans
with annual income in the $50,000 to $100,000 range, black and
Hispanic families have the highest rates of medical debt.
There are products on the market now that seek to help
consumers pay for unexpected medical expenses that are not
covered by their ACA-qualified health plan, and I am concerned
about a regulation that is currently under review at OMB that
you and I have spoken about before. In particular, I am
referring to the changes that would be imposed on the fixed
indemnity insurance market under a tri-agency-proposed rule
that was issued last summer. Overall, if the rule were
finalized as it is, it would do more harm than good for
millions of Americans.
There is universal agreement that consumers should be
protected from sham insurance products, and they should not be
misled into believing that they are purchasing ACA-compliant
plans. However, there are existing mechanisms that address
these concerns without eliminating valuable financial
protection that's available today through the supplemental or
the fixed indemnity coverage. In fact, the FTC just recently
announced a $100 million enforcement action against a company
that was selling sham health insurance products, and this is
sort of proof positive that the administration has existing
enforcement tools to protect consumers. In fact, the FTC is
just one of the many tools available.
And I know that you can't comment substantively on a rule
that is under review at OMB, but can you tell me whether the
administration did an impact analysis, specifically one for the
marginalized communities on what their alternatives are to pay
for expenses their underlying major medical coverage does not?
Ms. Young. Mr. Bishop, I believe people interested in this
are going through public comment now. You are right, I can't
comment once it is in review. And your comment and those
concerned, I know, have been recorded in the comment purposes.
In order to even get to OMB and to OIRA, which is the
regulatory office at OMB, a rule has to be seen or have
analysis that shows it has a large, a certain dollar amount
economic impact. So every rule has to have that sort of
analysis that you are speaking about. That is how we know
whether or not it has to come in for review. And we believe
that process upholds the integrity of the process. It allows
large rules to get the comments from the public and other
agencies to make sure that we are catching all the issues you
pointed out, I'm sure, have come through the comment process.
Mr. Bishop. Thank you. Secretary Yellen, according to the
IRS, in 2021, the government collected on the 86 percent of the
total taxes that it was legally owed, leaving about $625
billion uncollected. Between 2001 and 2021, the tax gap
consistently ranged between 13 and 16 percent total owed taxes.
Why is the tax gap so persistent, and how does your budget seek
to address the tax gap and to keep IRS funded at a sustainable
level which enforces the laws that are already on the books?
Where does the tax gap tend to come from? Are there certain
kinds of taxes or certain categories of taxpayers that
contribute more to the tax gap than others? And tell me if it
is true that 10 percent of the owners are responsible for two-
thirds of the unpaid taxes.
In the Inflation Reduction Act, we included $80 billion in
additional funding to IRS to narrow the tax gap but also to
improve customer service. Some of my colleagues want to repeal
that funding, but the CBO tells us that it saves more than it
costs. How much additional revenue can we gain for every dollar
that is invested in IRS?
Secretary Yellen. Well, prior to the Inflation Reduction
Act, the IRS was literally starved for resources, and the
auditing rates on complex partnerships, corporations, and high-
income tax filers dropped to exceptionally-low levels. And the
funding provided by the IRA is intended and is beginning to
really change that and help us address the tax gap.
There are various estimates of the rate of return on this
spending, but a simple one is that, for every dollar spent, $7
in tax revenue is generated. Some estimates are higher than
that.
Where does it come from? Well, individuals who have simple
tax returns who get almost all of their income through W-2s,
that income is reported to the IRS, and when the IRS has
reporting the fraction that is reported on tax returns comes
close to 100 percent. So there is no tax gap relating to W-2
income at all. But when income isn't reported, an example would
be rents and royalties, it is estimated that--so the IRS has no
independent information, it relies on the honesty of taxpayers
and audits, the reporting rate has dropped to something like 55
percent.
So really, at the end of the day, it is complex
partnerships, it is high income and net worth individuals who
and the lack of auditing and, you know, resources at the IRS.
They are beginning to use tools like artificial intelligence to
identify taxpayers who are more likely to be deficient in their
tax filings.
Mr. Womack. We have to move along, have to move along. Mr.
Edwards.
Mr. Edwards. Thank you, Mr. Chair. To the entire panel,
thanks so much for being with us this afternoon. Secretary
Yellen, the president's budget proposes increasing the
corporate tax rate to 28 percent, one of the highest in the
world. This tax hike would undoubtedly put America at an
economic disadvantage to global competitors, like China. And
even though it is touted as a tax increase on the rich, it is
widely believed that as much as 75 percent of the burden of
corporate tax increases fall on American workers and consumers
in the form of lower wages and higher prices. So I am just
curious exactly who would this tax increase be good for?
Secretary Yellen. Well, I believe the tax increase would
not really harm the competitiveness of business. Most studies
that have been done suggest that there is very little, if any,
economic benefit from having cut the corporate tax rate, that
almost all of the gains went to the wealthiest taxpayers. And
it has deprived us of the revenues we need to deal with our
budget deficit. It has probably lowered TCJA, probably lowered
revenues as a share of GDP, by something close to a percent, so
it partly explains the deficit.
The kind of program that I think is good for American
growth is the sort of legislation that President Biden has
championed and has been passed by Congress, much of it on a
bipartisan basis, making investments----
Mr. Edwards. And thank you because I am going to run out of
time here. I have got a couple more questions. I would like to
move on respectfully.
And so I think we have a philosophical difference on
exactly who is the rich. I am referring to a corporate tax rate
increase that is in the budget. A corporation is not a rich
individual. A corporation is a band or a group of individuals
and entities that have invested their money in order to produce
jobs, buy equipment, and that sort of thing. And so if we are
talking about Bill Gates, maybe we could say here is a rich
person and maybe he should pay more taxes. But when we are
talking about a corporate tax entity, I very much believe that
we are placing American workers at risk by not being as
competitive worldwide.
And so can you reconcile the difference between a rich
person and a corporation?
Secretary Yellen. Well, it depends what the corporate
ownership is, but stock holdings are concentrated among
relatively wealthy people and disproportionately among
foreigners rather than Americans. So when we use the proceeds--
--
Mr. Edwards. And, again, respectfully, because I am going
to run out of time. If we had more time, I would love to hear
the whole answer there.
And so, again, respectfully, I would disagree with that
statement because we are not all rich. A lot of people put a
few hundred dollars in the stock market and own a few
corporations, and it seems to me like a tax, an additional tax,
would be very counterproductive.
Secretary Yellen. Well, I think you have to remember that,
with the revenue that we get from those taxes, we are able to
do things like propose a larger child tax credit, which really
goes to families and disadvantaged and do other things that are
immensely helpful to working Americans.
Mr. Edwards. Again, it is a philosophical difference we are
not going to shake out here. Mr. Chair, I am not going to have
time for another question, so I will yield.
Mr. Womack. Thank you, Mr. Edwards. Ms. Meng.
Mrs. Torres. Ms. Meng is my twin from New York. It is okay.
Mr. Womack. I am so sorry.
Mrs. Torres. Director Young, I want to take this
opportunity to also acknowledge and join my colleague on the
other side of the aisle in saying that I really appreciate how
much federal workers work, how hard they work, especially the
people that work for you and your effort in helping me address
this longstanding issue with 911 dispatchers. I don't
necessarily have a question for you. I just want to acknowledge
how much work you have done in helping to educate yourself and
your staff on the plight of these primarily female workers that
have not been recognized for the work that they do. So, thank
you so much for that.
Secretary Yellen, I have two very different issues that I
want to work with you on, and one of them deals with fire
insurance specifically for California. The other issue is
related to the work that I do internationally. I want to also
take a moment to thank you and the Treasury Department
employees for your pivotal work on sanctions around the world.
As you are aware, I am deeply concerned about the future of
democracy and the rule of law in the Northern Triangle,
particularly how it impacts our southern border region.
During an attempted coup last year, corrupt actors sought
to stop the peaceful transfer of power of the president of
Guatemala. The Treasury Department sanctions on corrupt actors
played a vital role in our commitment to supporting the people
in that country and not propping up corrupt actors and wanna-be
dictators. Sanctions are key to fighting MS-13, the Mexican
Mafia, and other criminal networks that stretch into many of
our backyards. And that is not even going into, you know, other
countries, Venezuela, Iran, Russia, and many other places.
Can you share with us a little bit more about what your
fiscal year 2025 budget request and the emergency supplemental
funding would accomplish for our national security and what
more can we do to help you staff up the positions that you need
in order to further the work that our State Department is
doing?
Secretary Yellen. Thanks. Well, we take our sanctions
responsibility very seriously. We have a large number. I can't
remember the exact number but more than 40 sanctions programs,
and, over the last several years, the amount of time and effort
we have put into sanctions has really skyrocketed, partly
because we are now so focused on Hamas and trying to cut off
flows of resources to Hamas and also because of the Russian
situation with respect to Ukraine. So these are areas of
special emphasis that we have worked globally with partners,
and I won't go into the full range of----
Mrs. Torres. Yes. And I will have an additional question
that I would send your way regarding Hamas' work in Latin
America. So, if I can move over to the issue of insurance,
specifically for California. You know, there is no help to
alleviate the crisis. My constituents have seen their fire
insurance balloon from $1,800 to almost $6,000 per year. This
is not sustainable. Non-renewals of home and fire insurance
policies climbed from 11 percent in 2018 to 13 percent in 2021.
Most of the top insurers in the state have either stopped
writing or restricted new policies. How can the Federal
Insurance Office work with states like California, Florida, and
other states to help find solutions to the cost of insurance?
Secretary Yellen. We are very concerned about this for
exactly the reasons you have given. The Federal Insurance
Office has now agreed to collaborate with the National
Association of Insurance Commissioners to undertake a very
detailed collection effort to understand exactly what is
happening to the availability and cost of insurance against
environmental hazards across the country. Almost all of the
states are participating in this. And when we have that
information, we will try to come up with some recommendations.
But I would point out this is an area where states have
traditionally taken the lead, and we are going to have to
figure out what we can do working together with the states to
try to----
Mrs. Torres. We are going to have to push them to do more
for the consumers.
Secretary Yellen [continuing]. A real crisis.
Mrs. Torres. Thank you. And I yield back.
Mr. Womack. Thank you. I am so sorry. I should have been
paying better attention.
Mrs. Torres. It is okay.
Mr. Womack. It won't happen again, ma'am. It is on me. Mr.
Joyce, bring us home.
Mr. Joyce. Thank you. And thank you all for being here
today. Secretary Yellen, I want to discuss with you an issue
that I have been working on for a number of years. Five years
ago, I brought up the same issue with your predecessor,
Secretary Mnuchin, during the same budget hearing. He
previously referred to the status quo as untenable during the
hearing on talking about access for cannabis banking or
cannabis industry, the banking. The discrepancy between federal
and state cannabis laws have created a conflict in the
department's ability to administer that many areas under its
jurisdiction. As a former, prosecutor, I shared his concern
about the business having to deal with these huge amounts of
cash and not being able to put it in depository institutions
for public safety reasons.
Can you tell me what is presently this administration's
position on safe banking?
Secretary Yellen. I think we would potentially welcome
legislation in this area that would clarify for banks what
their responsibilities are. At present, my understanding is
that there is a conflict between federal law outlawing
marijuana sales and many state laws. And while I believe that
there is not active prosecutions, banking organizations do feel
compelled to be in accord with laws. And the fact that
marijuana is outlawed by the federal government creates an
impediment to their willingness to provide banking services to
cannabis firms, and it creates all the problems that you are
familiar with. And so I think legislation may be necessary to
raise the comfort level that banks have of doing this business.
Mr. Hoyer. Mr. Joyce, will you yield a second?
Mr. Joyce. I will always yield to you, sir.
Mr. Hoyer. You are very kind. I agree with Mr. Joyce 100
percent. It is a shame that the Senate has not passed
legislation that we passed in the House. We are putting people
in a very vulnerable position where they have large amounts of
cash. We are encouraging criminals to break into businesses
that deal in cannabis. I am neither a user, nor a suggester of
using, but the fact of the matter is every state that has voted
on it has made it legal. Every state. And I appreciate your
work, and, whatever I can do to help you, I am there.
Mr. Joyce. Thank you very much, sir. So is it fair to say
that you share Secretary Mnuchin's concerns and agree that the
situation is untenable as----
Secretary Yellen. I think it is a real problem that would
be desirable to have legislation that alleviated this problem.
Mr. Joyce. Thank you very much. I would be remiss if I did
not address Director Young and say I really liked you more when
you were on our team.
Ms. Young. I am still on your team.
Mr. Joyce. One of my other top priorities here is
addressing the opioid crisis and the problems that we have had
with fentanyl. And as chairman of the Homeland Security
Appropriations Committee, the southern border is obviously a
grave concern for all of us regarding fentanyl.
Director Young, how does the president's fiscal year 2025
budget request address the fentanyl crisis and seek to change
this reality? And is there some type of whole-of-government
approach that this administration is working to pursue?
Ms. Young. Mr. Joyce, I got this question from a Democrat
this morning in House Budget, from you here. It is one of the
places that gets lost in rhetoric of the year on border. When I
was here, this is one of the places where there's agreement,
and I hope we can find a way to enact the parts of the
president's supplemental, certainly, that do deal with
fentanyl. And this budget repeats those asks: $1.2 billion for
DHS to stop fentanyl from entering the country. You know the NI
equipment everyone says works, we bought a bunch years ago. We
don't have money to outfit the land ports of entry to put all
of those in. We also need more equipment to put in more land
ports of entry.
So we have a technology that works that has not been fully
implemented and utilized, and we would love to work with
anybody to help get that done.
Mr. Joyce. With all due respect, something that killed this
many kids in our country, and not just kids, adults, as well,
we should declare war on. I yield back.
Mr. Womack. Thank you. Great hearing. To our panelists,
thank you so much. Madam Secretary, always an honor to have you
here. Director Young, same to you. Chairman Bernstein, thanks
again for your work, as well, and for being here today.
I want to remind members, if you have questions to submit
for the record, please do so within seven days. In closing
again, let me thank everyone for being here and we look forward
to working with all of you as we continue the fiscal year 2025
FSGG appropriations process.
With that, this hearing stands adjourned.
[Whereupon, the subcommittee was adjourned at 4:35 p.m.]
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W I T N E S S E S
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Yellen, Hon. Janet, Secretary, Department of the Treasury........ 6
Prepared statement........................................... 8
Answers to submitted questions............................... 41
Young, Hon. Shalanda, Director, Office of Management and Budget.. 11
Prepared statement........................................... 13
Answers to submitted questions............................... 66
Bernstein, Hon. Jared, Chair, Council of Economic Advisers....... 16
Prepared statement........................................... 18
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