[Senate Hearing 118-257]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]





                                                       S. Hrg. 118-257

                    THE PRESIDENT'S FISCAL YEAR 2025 
                            BUDGET PROPOSAL 

=======================================================================

                                HEARING 

                               before the 

                        COMMITTEE ON THE BUDGET 
                          UNITED STATES SENATE 

                    ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS 

                             SECOND SESSION

                               ----------                              

                             March 12, 2024

                               ----------                              

           Printed for the use of the Committee on the Budget









    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]





















                                                        S. Hrg. 118-257

                    THE PRESIDENT'S FISCAL YEAR 2025
                            BUDGET PROPOSAL

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               before the

                        COMMITTEE ON THE BUDGET
                          UNITED STATES SENATE

                    ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION

                               __________

                             March 12, 2024

                               __________

           Printed for the use of the Committee on the Budget









    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]







  
                            www.govinfo.gov   
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                 U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE 
                 
55-278                     WASHINGTON : 2024 
                            
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
                            
                            
                            
                            
                            
                            
                            
                        COMMITTEE ON THE BUDGET

               SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island, Chairman
PATTY MURRAY, Washington             CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, Iowa
RON WYDEN, Oregon                    MIKE CRAPO, Idaho
DEBBIE STABENOW, Michigan            LINDSEY O. GRAHAM, South Carolina
BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont             RON JOHNSON, Wisconsin
MARK R. WARNER, Virginia             MITT ROMNEY, Utah
JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon                 ROGER MARSHALL, Kansas
TIM KAINE, Virginia                  MIKE BRAUN, Indiana
CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland           JOHN KENNEDY, Louisiana
BEN RAY LUJAN, New Mexico            RICK SCOTT, Florida
ALEX PADILLA, California             MIKE LEE, Utah

                   Dan Dudis, Majority Staff Director
        Kolan Davis, Republican Staff Director and Chief Counsel
                   Mallory B. Nersesian, Chief Clerk 
                  Alexander C. Scioscia, Hearing Clerk   
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                  
                                CONTENTS

                              ----------                              

                        TUESDAY, MARCH 12, 2024
                OPENING STATEMENTS BY COMMITTEE MEMBERS

                                                                   Page
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, Chairman.............................     1
    Prepared Statement...........................................    36
Senator Charles E. Grassley......................................     3
    Prepared Statement...........................................    39

                    STATEMENTS BY COMMITTEE MEMBERS

Senator Alex Padilla.............................................     7
Senator Patty Murray.............................................    10
Senator Mitt Romney..............................................    12
Senator Debbie Stabenow..........................................    14
Senator Rick Scott...............................................    16
Senator Chris Van Hollen.........................................    18
Senator Ron Johnson..............................................    20
Senator Tim Kaine................................................    22
Senator Roger Marshall...........................................    24
Senator Jeff Merkley.............................................    26
Senator Ben Ray Lujan............................................    29
Senator Mike Braun...............................................    32
Senator Lindsey O. Graham........................................    34

                                WITNESS

Hon. Shalanda D. Young, Director, Office of Management and Budget     6
    Prepared Statement...........................................    42

                                APPENDIX

Responses to post-hearing questions for the Record
    Hon. Young...................................................    44
Charts submitted by Chairman Sheldon Whitehouse..................   104
Charts submitted by Senator Charles E. Grassley..................   106
Chart submitted by Senator Lindsey O. Graham.....................   108
Chart submitted by Senator Ron Johnson...........................   109
Charts submitted by Senator Roger Marshall.......................   110
Chart submitted by Senator Rick Scott............................   113
Document submitted for the Record by Senator Jeff Merkley........   114

 
                    THE PRESIDENT'S FISCAL YEAR 2025 
                            BUDGET PROPOSAL

                              ----------             

                        TUESDAY, MARCH 12, 2024

                                           Committee on the Budget,
                                                       U.S. Senate,
                                                    Washington, DC.
    The hearing was convened, pursuant to notice, at 10:15 
a.m., in the Dirksen Senate Office Building, Room SD-608, Hon. 
Sheldon Whitehouse, Chairman of the Committee, presiding.
    Present: Senators Whitehouse, Murray, Stabenow, Warner, 
Merkley, Kaine, Van Hollen, Lujan, Padilla, Grassley, Graham, 
Johnson, Romney, Marshall, Braun, and R. Scott.
    Also present: Democratic Staff: Dan Dudis, Majority Staff 
Director; Josh Smith, Budget Policy Director.
    Republican Staff: Chris Conlin, Deputy Staff Director; 
Krisann Pearce, General Counsel; Erich Hartman, Director of 
Budget Policy and Review; Ryan Flynn, Staff Assistant.
    Witness:
    The Honorable Shalanda D. Young, Director, Office of 
Management and Budget.

          OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN WHITEHOUSE \1\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

    \1\ Prepared statement of Chairman Whitehouse appears in the 
appendix on page 36.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Chairman Whitehouse. All right. Let me call this hearing of 
the Budget Committee to order. Let me thank my colleagues for 
indulging the late start. We start at 10:15 instead of 10:00 
today because I had a presentation to make over at the Supreme 
Court, so thank you for indulging that. We will now----
    Senator Warner. Mr. Chairman, were you arguing at the 
Supreme Court?
    Chairman Whitehouse. No, I was presenting to the Judicial 
Conference for their biannual meeting at the Supreme Court. 
Semi-annual, biannual, which ones meet twice a year, semi-
annual.
    So, let me first say good morning to our Committee members 
present and offer a special welcome to our witness, Shalanda 
Young, Director of the Office of Management and Budget. 
Director Young, it is always a pleasure to have you here before 
the Committee. There is simply no better communicator of 
complicated budget procedure and arcana than you. And President 
Biden is very lucky to have you in this important position.
    As the President is fond of saying, a budget is a statement 
of values. That message is especially salient this year, as 
President Biden and MAGA Republicans offer starkly different 
visions of our country's future. On the one hand, President 
Biden released a fiscally responsible budget that puts the 
middle class first, cuts the deficit by three trillion dollars 
and paves the way for a stronger, safer, and more prosperous 
America.
    On the other hand, MAGA House Republicans voted to undo 
pro-growth investments that are creating jobs, driving a clean 
energy boom, and lowering costs for households across the 
country, all while calling to make the Trump tax cuts for the 
very wealthy permanent.
    Today we'll hear about the values represented by the Biden 
budget, like fighting for the middle class, lowering costs for 
families, and investing in communities. For example, President 
Biden's budget guarantees 12 weeks of family and medical leave. 
It would bring back the expanded child tax credit, which cut 
child poverty nearly in half, and it would increase funding for 
Pell Grants to make higher education more accessible and 
affordable to all students.
    The Biden budget lowers health care and prescription drug 
costs for tens of millions of Americans. For example, it would 
build on Medicare's authority to negotiate the prices of 
prescription drugs, a history-making initiative in the 
Inflation Reduction Act so Medicare could negotiate the prices 
of at least 50 drugs a year, reducing the costs of medicines 
and saving Medicare $200 billion over 10 years.
    The Biden budget reflects the President's continued 
commitment to fighting climate change, a danger too many 
Republicans pretend does not even exist, ending unfair fossil 
fuel tax breaks and requiring high-flying owners of private 
jets to pay fairly for the damages they cause. As we've heard 
in this Committee, the International Monetary Fund estimates 
fossil fuel subsidies at over $600 billion, with a ``B'', 
billion dollars per year.
    By contrast, what the House Republicans value? They value a 
tax code in which billionaires, big oil, and big Pharma keep 
getting massive handouts while the middle class foots the bill, 
in which corporations contribution to American's fiscal health 
continues to dwindle, and I'd refer you to this graphic, which 
shows how much of corporate tax revenues are in our overfall 
revenue picture. They are less than less in balance.
    MAGA Republicans value defunding the tax police, so that 
billionaire tax cheats can keep cheating with impunity. And as 
we've seen, they want secrecy. They will not come clean with 
the American people about which vital and popular services they 
would actually cut to help the billionaire elite. That should 
tell you something.
    One thing we've learned, when the Republicans say deficit 
reduction, it's not going to come out of the pockets of 
billionaires. It's going to come out of yours. They admit to 
wanting to extend the Trump tax cuts skewed toward the wealthy 
and corporations at a $3.5 trillion cost. They rely on economic 
fairy dust and fantastical growth numbers to claim that 
corporate giveaways will pay for themselves, a magical tale 
rebutted in this Committee by Republican and Democratic 
witnesses alike. Tax cuts simply do not pay for themselves.
    President Biden's budget would reduce the deficit by 
ensuring that big corporations can't get away with paying 
nothing and that billionaires don't pay lower tax rates than 
teachers and firefighters. It would end write-offs for 
corporations that offer exorbitant compensation to executive 
and close loopholes for big corporations that outsource jobs 
and shift profits offshore, and it would make sure the IRS can 
see to it that the wealthy and well-connected pay the taxes 
they owe.
    As we heard in testimony before this Committee, those 
investments save money and have a fiscal return as high as 12 
to 1. Unlike tax handouts, tax enforcement does pay for itself. 
Fixing our corrupted billionaire coddling tax code is good for 
its own sake, but the revenue also can support investment in 
the American people and reduce the deficit.
    When the wealth contributes a little bit more to Medicare, 
we can extend its solvency indefinitely, as achieved by my 
Medicare and Social Security Fair Share Act. Lifting the cap, 
so the wealthy pay their fair share will protect Social 
Security. My bill does just that, extending Social Security 
solvency indefinitely. And I look forward to working on these 
bills with the Administration.
    Republicans claim they no longer want to cut Medicare and 
Social Security benefits. If that's true, the only other way to 
ensure long-term solvency is making the wealthy chip in more. 
The Biden budget is a proposal for how to reduce deficits by 
investing in our families and communities, by demanding that 
the tax system be fair, and by actually enforcing our existing 
tax laws on the wealthy.
    Deficit reduction the Biden way leads to a declining debt 
to GDP ratio, a sound marker of a responsible fiscal path. 
Creating a safe, prosperous, and fair nation: Those are our 
values. House Republicans would rather gut essential programs 
and services to help their rich donors get even richer. Which 
path we take is the choice that's before us today. I look 
forward to today's conversation on the President's budget.
    Chairman Whitehouse. I will now recognize my distinguished 
Ranking Member Senator Grassley and then we will turn to our 
witness, the Director of the Office of Management and Budget. 
And just so that everybody knows, Senator Padilla is obliged to 
preside this morning, so I'm going to be swapping positions 
with him. He will have the opening round of questions and I 
will go to the end of the line and take his.

           OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR GRASSLEY \2\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

    \2\ Prepared statement of Senator Grassley appears in the appendix 
on page 39.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Senator Grassley. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this 
hearing and thank you, Director Young, for coming to give the 
position of the Administration on the budget. Today's hearing 
is doing what the Budget Committee is supposed to do, budget 
issues. We've spent a great deal of time over the last two 
years on climate, on abortion, and a lot of other issues, but 
this is what this Committee should be doing, so I compliment 
the Chairman for having a budget hearing.
    I was cautiously optimistic hearing President Biden's call 
for bipartisanship and unity during his inaugural address, but 
boy, have I been disappointed. For three years the President 
has embarked upon a far-left agenda. He's taken a ``my way or 
highway'' approach to governing, whether those who disagree 
with him are attacked as extremists. He topped that off last 
week with the most partisan State of the Union address that 
I've ever heard, and I've heard a lot of those presidential 
State of the Unions.
    A partisan president I find is so different from the 
bipartisan Senator Biden I worked with for 28 years in the 
United State Senate. Now, come his fourth budget offering more 
of the same radical agenda. At a time when we need real 
solutions to put our fiscal house in order, this budget offers 
nothing but false promises and a far-left wish list. You know, 
we all know that this would never pass, even this Congress.
    Just a few years ago, this Administration tried to claim 
that blowing up the deficit was a fiscally responsible thing to 
do. In fact, they said at that time higher interest rates would 
be a good thing. Now, our nation is barreling down the fiscal 
crisis that was started then. We're over $34 trillion in debt 
and still counting. Even the President's media allies can't 
stomach his dishonest deficit reduction claims.
    CNN, for instance, called the President out, noting that 
his policies, in fact, ``have had the overall effect of 
worsening the annual deficits, not reducing them.'' Thanks to 
irresponsible policies, reckless spending, and decade-high 
interest rates, debt service costs have more than doubled since 
2021.
    According to the Congressional Budget Office, interest on 
the debt will total $870 billion this year, exceeding what we 
expect to spend on national defense, the number one 
responsibility of the federal government. If that isn't 
daunting enough, within 10 years the Social Security Trust Fund 
is projected to go broke, putting benefits for over 50 million 
seniors at risk.
    Now, isn't this a sad political climate when a candidate 
Trump and a President Biden both say that they're not going to 
touch Social Security benefits. Well, what do they think is 
going to happen in 2033, just eight years down the road, when 
we all know that if we don't do something about Social Security 
everybody's benefits are going to go down to 77 percent of what 
they're getting now.
    If there was ever a time for a President to show leadership 
with his budget, this is it. Instead, he offers proposals so 
far out of the mainstream most have already even been rejected 
by congressional Democrats. Even if all the President's fantasy 
proposals were enacted, the budget still fails to reign in 
unprecedent debt and deficits. Under this budget, publicly held 
debt as a share of the economy would rival the record set at 
the wake of World War II.
    Over the 10 years, the President's budget racks up a 
disastrous $16 trillion in cumulative deficits, and I think 
when I go to my 99 counties to have Q&A with constituents, 
which I do every year, not at every one of them, but at most of 
them they yell at the back of the room what are going to do, 
Grassley, about the $33 trillion national debt? Soon, we're 
going to be asked what are we going to be doing with a $50 
trillion national debt.
    That's despite proposing five trillion dollars in new job 
killing tax hikes. That's in addition to a two trillion-dollar 
tax hike in store for families earning under $400,000 due to 
the President's shelving of the 2017 tax bill. Now. How do you 
get around the fact that the 2017 tax bill sunsets under budget 
law because you can't enact permanent law for more than 10 
years, without even a vote of Congress? We're going to have the 
highest tax increase in the history of the country.
    Now, unwittingly, the President's budget shows what anyone 
who understands our fiscal situation knows, there aren't enough 
rich people to solve our budget woes. So, I would remind even 
the Chairman that just talked about taxing the rich, that you 
could confiscate, not tax, but confiscate all the wealth from 
people in this country and you'd run the government for just a 
few weeks, or at most, a few months. Eventually, you're taxing 
people that aren't rich to do everything it wants to be done.
    I think Margaret Thatcher said it best, and I quote, ``The 
problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other 
people's money.'' The President's budget is a case in point. It 
includes no serious attempt to address ballooning autopilot 
spending that is the main driver of our record debt and 
deficits. Moreover, it piles another two and half trillion 
dollars in new mandatory spending, amounting to one of the 
largest expansions of the federal government in American 
history.
    Now, it's simple math. If you want to implement European-
sized government, you'll to impose European-sized taxes on 
everybody because that's what the--well, I can't think of the 
across-the-board tax cuts that they have for everybody that's 
similar to what we have called sales tax here. I'm sorry I 
can't think of that word, but it's simple math. If you want to 
implement European-sized government, you'll need to impose 
European-styled taxes. That means higher taxes and higher 
prices for Americans of all income levels and that's what this 
budget does.
    Ironically, President Biden likes to boast that our economy 
is doing better than Europe's. That's been true nearly my 
entire lifetime. Our economy does better than Europe's because 
this country has always rejected the kind of big government tax 
and spend policies envisioned by this President copying Europe. 
Unfortunately, when it comes to the President's budget, the 
President proposes, and the Congress disposes, I see Congress 
wasting no time before disposing of this budget.
    If the other side disagrees with me, then I challenge them 
to set a date to mark this budget up. It won't happen because 
even most Democrats wouldn't vote for this calamity. 
Unfortunately, this budget is another lost opportunity for the 
President to demonstrate leadership on pressing fiscal 
challenges, leadership that's desperately needed if we're ever 
going to climb out of a fiscal hole that we've dug ourselves 
into. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Thanks very much. I now turn to our 
distinguished witness today to speak about President Biden's 
Fiscal Year 2025 budget request, and she is Director Shalanda 
Young of the Office of Management and Budget. Director Young, 
we will now hear your opening statement. At the conclusion of 
your opening statement, I will recognize Senator Padilla to 
step in, in my place, and I will swap and take his place 
further down the line in order to accommodate his 
responsibilities to preside in the Senate. And the order will 
therefore be Senator Padilla, Ranking Member Grassley, Chairman 
Murray, Senator Romney, Senator Stabenow, Senator Scott, 
Senator Warner, Senator Johnson, and then Senators Van Hollen, 
Kaine, Lujan, Whitehouse, and Merkley, unless interspersing 
Republicans appear. And with that, over to you, Director Young.

STATEMENT OF SHALANDA D. YOUNG, DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF BUDGET AND 
                         MANAGEMENT \3\
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    \3\ Prepared statement of Hon. Young appears in the appendix on 
page 42.
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    Director Young. All right. Thank you, Chairman Whitehouse, 
Ranking Member Grassley, members of the Committee. I know when 
some people say they're happy to be here, they don't really 
mean it, but I spent the majority of my adult career in this 
institution in Congress, so even though it might be a rough 
morning for me, I'm happy to be here and thank you for the 
chance to get to talk about the President's fourth budget, as 
you heard Ranking Member Grassley say.
    And from Day One, this Administration, President Biden has 
tackled challenges head on while delivering long-lasting 
results for the American people. Over the past three years, he 
has overseen a strong economic recovery, amassed one of the 
most successful legislative records in generations, growing the 
economy from the middle out and the bottom up and delivered 
important progress for the American people.
    Under the President's leadership, we've added almost 15 
million jobs, the unemployment rate has remained below 4 
percent for over two years, a 50-year record, while inflation 
has fallen by two-thirds. This Administration has taken action 
to lower costs for working families from everything from 
prescription drug costs and health insurance premiums to 
everyday goods and services, and the President's top priority 
remains lowering costs for the American people.
    At the same time, the President has restored U.S. 
leadership on the world stage while Americans safe and 
promoting democracy at home and abroad. The President has 
delivered this progress for the American people, all while 
fulfilling his commitment to fiscal responsibility. The deficit 
is more than one trillion dollars lower than when the President 
took office, thanks in large part to a strong economic 
recovery.
    In addition, the President has also enacted another roughly 
one trillion in deficit savings over the next decade through 
the Fiscal Responsibility Act. The President's 2025 budget 
details the President's vision for a more equitable, 
prosperous, and powerful America with proposals for 
responsible, pro-growth investments in the American people. The 
budget protects and builds on the progress made over the last 
three years and proposes additional policies to lower costs for 
our working families, including for health insurance, 
prescription drugs, childcare, utilities, housing, college, 
energy, and more. These investments will help working families 
keep more of their hard-earned paychecks and strengthen our 
economy.
    It also invests in American working families. This 
President has shown us that we can be both fiscally responsible 
and invest in America. The budget will bolster manufacturing 
and industry across the nation, make our communities healthier 
and safer, provide paid leave, support researching cancer, 
deliver for our veterans, cut taxes for families with children, 
promote a flexible and dynamic workforce and more.
    The budget protects Medicare and Social Security bedrock 
programs that generations of American have counted on and 
seniors have paid into their entire working lives. It extends 
Medicare solvency indefinitely by requiring wealthy people to 
pay their fair share toward Medicare and reducing prescription 
drug costs and it reflects the President's commitment to reject 
any benefit cuts to Social Security, extend solvency by asking 
the highest income Americans to pay their fair share, improve 
financial security for seniors and people with disabilities, 
and ensure that Americans can access the benefits they have 
earned.
    And in what will be a decisive decade for America and the 
world, the budget reflects a national security strategy by 
including robust investments in military readiness, our 
diplomatic and development tools, and honors a sacred 
commitment to our veterans. 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 in this country a year will pay a 
penny more in new taxes.
    His budget reduces the deficit by roughly three trillion 
dollars over 10 years on top of paying for all new investments 
in the budget by cracking down on fraud, cutting wasteful 
spending, including by reducing prescription drug costs, and 
making the wealthy and corporations begin to pay their fair 
share.
    I also want to thank the federal workers who have worked on 
this budget, my team at OMB, my team with me. Thank the 
senators for being here, and also your staffs. I did what you 
do for a long time in my career. I know this wouldn't happen 
without your hard work, so I want to thank the teams who all 
helped to put this together today. So, thank you.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Thank you, Director Young. Standing in 
for me, Senator Padilla.

                  STATEMENT OF SENATOR PADILLA

    Senator Padilla. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the 
consideration. First question, Director Young, in five words or 
less, how is the baby?
    Director Young. The baby went quietly and peacefully to 
daycare this morning, so the baby could not be better.
    She knew I had some place to be.
    Senator Padilla. Not so baby anymore. In my time, there are 
two timely issues I'd like to cover with you, and appreciate 
the call last week to begin the conversation on some of these. 
Colleagues' household water and sewer bills have increased by 
more than 50 percent this last decade, leaving one in three 
Americans struggling to pay their bills. Now, during the 
pandemic, we actually had a very successful low-income 
household water assistance program that was approved which 
served than 1.4 million households in 49 states, 5 U.S. 
territories, the District of Columbia, and 97 Tribal 
Communities.
    So, I appreciate the Administration's continued recognition 
of the success program in the budget by allowing its 
continuation under Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program 
(LIHEAP), at least until we can pass my legislation that would 
make Low Income Household Water Assistance Program (LIHWAP) 
permanent. The goal there is to provide a separate, long-term 
authorization of the program. But unfortunately, in 
appropriating the funds,
    Congress has failed to allow for the set aside that the 
Administration has proposed in this and previous budget 
request.
    So, Director, the question is, is the expansion of eligible 
uses to allow LIHWAP services factored into the $4.1 billion 
funding level proposed for LIHEAP was this budget to ensure 
that the United States Department of Health and Human Services 
(HHS) can provide both LIHEAP and LIHWAP assistance without 
eating into the LIHEAP program. So, can you speak to that and 
the importance of enacting an appropriations bill that reflects 
this goal?
    Director Young. One, I helped get that program started in 
the Appropriations bill. It saved a lot of families from water 
cutoffs in the middle of pandemic. How terrible that would've 
been had we not done something, and we absolutely support the 
set aside 2.7 percent and believe that would allow the LIHWAP 
program to continue without eating into the LIHEAP program, 
which is also incredibly important.
    Senator Padilla. Okay. Because obviously, we don't want to 
eat into one program because they both have a significant merit 
and need, so look forward to working with you on establishing 
the permanent program when the time comes.
    The other issue I wanted to raise is the--well, let me just 
say, in that call last week very much appreciate your 
recognition of the importance of following the science when it 
comes to the Mars sample return mission. For the first time in 
history of callings, we will launch a spacecraft from the 
surface of Mars with samples for detailed study. This effort is 
being led by the incredible team at the Jet Propulsion 
Laboratory in Southern California. And as you now, Congress was 
unequivocally in the Appropriations Minibus we enacted last 
week in support of the Mars sample return mission and in the 
larger decadal survey process that determines National 
Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) funding 
priorities.
    Director Young, could you reiterate for the record the 
Biden Administration's commitment to supporting the Independent 
Review Board assessment and the funding profile resulting from 
its conclusions.
    Director Young. We are so committed to making decisions 
based on the internal assessment that we held off on providing 
a '25 number while that assessment is being done so we can put 
forward a '24 number because the Appropriation's bill asked us 
to take time and make sure we got that right in addition to a 
'25 number after that assessment is done to make sure we get it 
right.
    Senator Padilla. Can you assure me that both OMB and NASA 
are on the same page when it comes to this commitment?
    Director Young. We're both on the same page when it comes 
to this commitment. We are waiting for the internal review at 
NASA to conclude. Clearly, one of the things we'll look at is 
the long-term viability, the cost of the project, lots of 
missions NASA has to undertake, but we are committed to 
following the science.
    Senator Padilla. Thank you very much. And in closing,
    Mr. Chair, I just wanted to thank Director Young for the 
inclusion of $38.5 million for the Bhadra River Project to 
continue the important work safeguarding that historically 
underserved largely farmworker community in California and also 
for the increased funding for the International Boundary and 
Water Commission. We've been working closely with your office 
to address the needs of critical infrastructure around the 
Tijuana River. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Director Young. You know we supported that in the 
supplemental as well.
    Senator Padilla. Thank you.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Ranking Member Grassley, followed by 
Chairman Murray.
    Senator Grassley. President Biden has repeatedly claimed 
that he wouldn't raise taxes on anyone making under $400,000. 
The President's budget includes five trillion dollars in new 
tax hikes with much of that targeted at corporation and 
businesses. Of the five trillion, approximately 2.7 trillion is 
targeted primarily at corporations. Now, I quote or refer to an 
Executive Branch study. On its website, Treasury Office of Tax 
Analysis provides a distributional analysis for all taxes.
    That analysis shows that household with incomes below 
$310,000 bear approximately 37 percent of the corporate tax 
under current law. Using Treasury's own analysis, isn't it 
accurate that those earning under $400,000 would see their tax 
burden increase, at the very least, by hundreds of billions of 
dollars just under the corporate tax proposal alone?
    Director Young. Senator Grassley, I'm happy to look at that 
analysis, but we took a lot of time working with Treasury to 
make sure none of our proposals impacted those making under 
$400,000. If the assumption is corporations will pass on any 
tax increases the President's asked for, for hardworking 
Americans, that is all something we should all be concerned 
about. But all of his proposals are focused on those people 
that make over 400,000. And frankly, most of the tax proposals 
will hit those in the top 1 and 2 percent earnings in this 
country.
    Senator Grassley. Well, this estimate is by Treasury, and 
you said you worked with Treasury, but then they're giving 
conflicting views compared to what I quoted. We have also data 
from the Joint Committee on Taxation suggesting taxpayers under 
400,000 would shoulder more than half of President Biden's 
corporate tax hike. And I think you keep forgetting that 
corporations are nothing but a sheet of paper. They're 
management, they're employees, and they're customers and 
everything that corporations pay is passed onto somebody else. 
So, you've got to get over this that tax increases on 
corporations affect workers by--37 percent is what your own 
Treasury Department said.
    As part of his budget, President Biden fails to include an 
extension of the 2017 tax law. Based on information supplied by 
the Joint Committee on Taxation, approximately 70 percent of 
the benefits of the tax law flows to taxpayers earning under 
400,000. That equates to approximately two trillion-dollar tax 
hikes on those earning under 400,000. So, I want to make an 
important point that not extending these tax cuts would be a 
direct violation of the President's pledge and that.
    So, my next question is this. The nonpartisan Congressional 
Budget Office (CBO) has been providing Congress with an 
independent analysis of the President's budget since the 1970s. 
In recent years, CBO hasn't been able to re-estimate all the 
proposals in the Biden budget, citing a lack of details from 
the Administration on several multibillion-dollar proposals. 
So, would you commit to providing CBO with the necessary 
information it needs to provide Congress with an independent 
assessment of all the policies in the President's budget?
    Director Young. Congress absolutely needs CBO's analysis 
and I've never heard this concern from CBO and I'm happy to 
take that back, Senator Grassley, but we will provide CBO what 
they need to do this independent assessment.
    Senator Grassley. Okay. My last question is the President's 
budget estimates that making Obamacare subsidies permanent for 
higher income earners, some of whom make over $200,000 a year, 
will cost $273 billion over 10 years. This is a 67 percent 
higher than what you estimated three years ago. Enrollment only 
explains half of this increase. Obamacare subsidies are growing 
four times greater compared to total national health 
expenditure. Could you explain this re-estimated $110 billion 
increase in Obamacare subsidies to high income earners? And 
keeping in mind enrollment only explains about half of this 
increase. Why do Obamacare subsidies cost much more than 
overall health care costs.
    Director Young. Well, Congressman, I want to thank the 
senators that supported extending the premiums to American. We 
are very proud of the fact that enrollment has increased 
substantially under the Affordable Care Act, happy to go look 
at the analysis, but I think the good news story here is more 
Americans have access to health care through the Affordable 
Care Act. As some states pull back on Medicaid, it is 
incredibly important that we ensure that Americans have health 
insurance.
    It will cost us more in the health care system if we did 
not have this critical program at this juncture. So, I'm happy 
to look at the analysis you have, but frankly, the good news 
story if we have more Americans covered under this law and we 
will continue to push to make these premiums permanent.
    Senator Grassley. You can't explain the $110 billion, in 
other words, is what you're telling me.
    Director Young. So, I'm saying enrollment is why the costs 
have gone up and I'm happy to work with your team to see what 
the difference in numbers are. I'm not in the habit of 
answering analysis that I haven't seen, but I'm happy to take 
that back.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Chairman Murray, followed by Senator 
Romney.

                  STATEMENT OF SENATOR MURRAY

    Senator Murray. Thank you very much, Chair Whitehouse. As I 
always say, a budget is a statement of values and President 
Biden's budget tells working people and families very clearly 
and simply, we have your back and we're going to be building a 
stronger future together. You just don't get a sharper study of 
contrast than President Biden setting forward a budget that 
protects and strengthens Medicare, Medicaid, and Social 
Security while former President Trump goes on TV to say he 
thinks you can ``Do a lot in terms of cutting these programs.''
    But while the leader of the Republican Party wants to pull 
the rug out from under families and seniors, President Biden 
understands the source of our nation's strength is our people 
and investing in working families does pay off in a major way. 
This budget offers a roadmap for progress on tackling the 
housing crisis that is crunching Americans pocketbooks and we 
are really feeling this in my home state of Washington.
    Tackling the childcare crisis, like I have long championed, 
so working families nationwide can find the childcare they need 
for about $10 a day. Continuing our historic work tackling the 
climate crisis and rebuilding our nation's infrastructure, 
including funds for the Howard Hanson Dam Fish Passage Project 
in Washington State, which I thank you for. And there is a lot 
more, like critical investments to bolster our national 
security by strengthening our Military and our alliances, which 
are so crucial. And the President's budget recognizes it is 
absolutely possible to invest in the American people and put 
our country on a more sustainable fiscal footing.
    This budget also lowers the deficit by simply closing 
ridiculous loopholes that billionaires count on to avoid paying 
the taxes they already owe and ensuring the ultrarich and 
largest corporations finally start paying their fair share. 
That should not be too much to ask. There is never any good 
reason billionaires should be paying less than firefighters or 
teachers or nothing at all.
    So, Director Young, good to have you here today. Thank you 
for all this work. As you well know, we just passed the first 
slate of FY24 bills, which conform to the Fiscal Responsibility 
Act caps and the agreement that accompanied that. Those 
constraints made for pretty tough funding decisions, as I have 
said repeatedly, but we did manage to hammer out serious, 
bipartisan bills that protect key investments and we are now 
hard at work to pass the rest.
    In FY25, we're going to be facing an even tougher set of 
constraints within the second year of caps and fewer 
adjustments to make use of the outset. Can you talk with us 
about how the President's budget protects and strengthens our 
core investments, particularly on the non-defense side, while 
working within those caps? What are the tools that you all 
employed to make sure we are able to pass a strong set of 
funding bills within those tough caps.
    Director Young. Chair Murray, one, thank you for what you 
did last week with the six bills. I know that the final six are 
underway and your committee is hard at work.
    Non-defense discretionary, sometimes high, what we're 
talking about, we're talking about veterans' funding. We're 
talking about the Department of Homeland Security, childcare, 
Department of Education, Pell Grants, these are absolutely 
critical programs. It's the smallest amount we spend in the 
federal government, and we often find ourselves struggling 
because we had to enact budget caps to make sure these critical 
programs, frankly, both parties have historically supported.
    In this budget, because a lot of the debt deal had 
adjustments to make sure adequate funding could be had were 
used to make sure your '24 process could happen, this budget 
shows a path by using adjustments that have historically been 
used, like changes in mandatory programs and emergency spending 
where necessary. Congress has used both of those tools in the 
past in Appropriations bills and it's going to be needed more 
than ever at higher levels to ensure that programs, National 
Institutes of Health (NIH) and every other place that has 
bipartisan support isn't cut unnecessarily.
    Senator Murray. So, those are the same tools we used in our 
Appropriations Committee last summer.
    Director Young. We will need more of those because most of 
the offsets your committee typically uses to make sure non-
defense programs are continued and members priorities are taken 
care of are gone, frankly, and we will have to do more changes 
in mandatory programs, lovingly known as Changes in Mandatory 
Programs (CHIMPS), to those of us who work on this, and 
emergency spending will be necessary.
    Senator Murray. Okay. Thank you. And quickly, I just want 
to thank you for Hanford. You know how important that is to me 
and just always ask for your continued work with us as we make 
sure that that critical funding is there. And I always want to 
thank you again for the Howard Hanson Dam Fish Passage Facility 
Project. I'm glad the President heard me on how critical that 
is, and I really appreciate your working with us.
    Director Young. Thank you.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Senator Romney, followed by Senator 
Stabenow. Senator Romney.

                  STATEMENT OF SENATOR ROMNEY

    Senator Romney. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It's appropriate 
that this hearing is being held during Academy Award season. 
I'm afraid what we do here is more Barbie than it is 
Oppenheimer. The public thinks we work on the budget, but we 
don't. You realize from the time I've been on this Committee 
we've never met privately. We've never come together and 
negotiated and given some give and take and come up with 
proposals to somehow get us closer to a balanced budget or deal 
with the debt.
    Frankly, the only time we meet is in these hearings. And if 
you've been watching over the 118th Congress, you realize that 
we've had 28 hearings before today. Do you know how many of 
those hearings have been on the budget? Two. Now, I'm concerned 
about the climate, but 14 of our hearings have been on climate 
change. For instance, The Cost of Oil Dependence in a Low 
Carbon World, How Climate Change is Changing the Insurance 
Market, The Real Cost of Fossil Fuels, How The Climate Crisis 
Threatens Ocean Industries. These are important topics, they 
just don't belong in the Budget Committee.
    This is a committee that's about performing, getting on 
stage and acting like we care about these things, but there's 
actually no work being done by this Committee to deal with our 
budget and to deal with federal spending.
    Now, we pretend we're going to be bringing down the 
deficit, but the Administration is comparing our spending to 
the COVID years and any American knows that we spent a massive 
amount of money to deal with the COVID crisis and to help 
American families. And pretending like we're cutting the 
deficit when we're comparing to a COVID year is absurd.
    Now, people on both sides of the aisle, including 
economists, say that the increase in debt is unsustainable. 
That raising debt as a percentage of the GDP cannot go on 
forever, and we're apparently not in the position to do the job 
because we won't even meet to talk about it. So, my question is 
does the Administration support the idea brought forward by 
Senator Manchin and myself in our chamber, but also in the 
House by two leaders there, to put in place a bipartisan, 
bicameral, commission to look at ways to see if we can't hold 
the debt as a percentage of the GDP at a constant level? Does 
the Administration support that legislation?
    Director Young. Senator, there are lots of commissions. The 
House Budget Committee just passed a Fiscal Commission. I won't 
pick amongst commissions that are flowing----
    Senator Romney. But do you think that's a good idea?
    Director Young. But what I will say is, it will take 
bipartisan solutions to deal with our fiscal path. We're 
putting a path forward here. I know you may not agree. Our 
revenue proposals----
    Senator Romney. But you see, in order to have a proposal 
that actually becomes law, it takes both sides to come 
together. I can put a proposal out there that I know has no 
chance of passing and pretend like I'm doing something 
responsible. The Administration puts a proposal out it knows 
has no chance whatsoever of passing because we have Republicans 
and Democrats. We have to come together and work together, but 
we don't. So, look, it's this sleight of hand, which is look at 
all the things we're doing. We get a proposal that makes it 
work. You don't have a proposal that actually would get 
accomplished because you can't bring together both parties to 
do it.
    The sleight of hand, I mean, the President said the other 
night that these wealthy, I think, billionaires he was 
describing, pay only 8 percent in tax. Well, what he didn't say 
was--he wasn't talking about in income tax. I mean it was very 
disingenuous, a sleight of hand. Again, Academy Awards worthy. 
He's not talking about the income tax they pay. He knows the 
income tax that those people pay is a very high rate, as it 
should be. He's talking about putting in place a tax on the 
increase in value of their assets, so called unrealized capital 
gains. I don't know of any country in the world that does that, 
do you?
    Director Young. If I can talk about this in a way, if those 
unrealized----
    Senator Romney. Are there any countries in the world that 
tax unrealized capital gains?
    Director Young. Senator, if those unrealized gains are good 
enough to a bank to get hundreds of millions of dollars or 
billions in loans----
    Senator Romney. I asked a different question and I get to 
ask the questions----
    Director Young [continuing]. They should be taxed like 
income.
    Senator Romney [continuing]. That I want, and I hope to get 
a response from you. I don't believe there's any country in the 
world that taxes assets or unrealized capital gains. I believe 
France tried it for a while and found it was a disaster and 
gave it up, but the President's proposing doing it and telling 
the American people they're only paying 8 percent. They're not 
paying 8 percent in their income.
    That's disingenuous. And by the way, I think it's the 
stupidest idea I've ever heard, would devastate our economy. 
I'm not worried about how much money the billionaires are going 
to be paying taxes. That's not my concern. It's the idea that 
we'd be transferring everything from the public markets into 
private assets that couldn't be valued easily.
    Look, I would describe it, as well the other proposals 
made, sounding as if they have a chance at passing, they don't. 
We need to work as a committee and as a Congress to stop acting 
for the cameras and start working for the American people to 
finally deal with the massive deficits and debt that we have 
and that's not happening. That's why Senator Manchin and I have 
proposed a bipartisan, bicameral commission to finally tackle 
this before it becomes such a crisis it can't be resolved 
without calamity. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Thank you very much, Senator Romney.
    Let me take a Chairman's minute to defend the Committee on 
three points. First of all, we're operating under a budget 
agreement that holds through October of 2025, bicameral, 
bipartisan budget agreement. Second, about a third of our total 
federal debt is produced by crises that we were warned of and 
didn't respond to. My God, if there's ever a crisis looming 
that we're not responding to that's going to smash into the 
budget, it's climate change. So, I have no hesitancy about 
continuing to do that work.
    And finally, I've repeatedly offered members of this 
Committee to get together with health care bipartisan 
solutions. I do think that the ticket to entry should be 
actually a proposal rather than just senators talking at each 
other. Our last hearing was on that, and I renewed the 
commitment. So, I renew that commitment again right now. Let us 
look at bipartisan ways we can reduce the massive cost of our 
health care spending in ways that do not cut benefits.
    Senator Romney. I agree with you on climate change, Mr. 
Chairman, but 14 of 28 hearings are on climate change.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Wait until the budget gets blown out 
by it and the budget is under the rule of the bicameral, 
bipartisan agreement. Senator Stabenow, followed by Senator 
Scott.

                 STATEMENT OF SENATOR STABENOW

    Senator Stabenow. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I 
think all of what we're talking about is about the budget and 
it's about our values and where we want to invest as a country. 
I do think it's important to note that when we have a 
Republican president there's a very different discussion about 
deficits. I mean we all know that the two trillion dollars in 
unpaid for tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans done under 
President Trump put us in a situation where 25 percent of all 
of the national debt of the country ever, ever, ever, ever 
created was in those four years, and I didn't hear a lot of 
that. In fact, I'm sure we're going to hear when those tax cuts 
come up for renewal, that we should be extending all of them 
with the debt.
    So, what I appreciate, Director Young, and I appreciate 
President Biden for, is you're changing the paradigm. For years 
we've heard about trickle down economics, let it trickle down. 
Some way it's going to hit you. People in Michigan are still 
waiting for it to trickle down. But now, we have something 
different and hit's actually working by the numbers. You just 
have to look at the facts.
    This President has said grow the middle class, lower costs 
for people, grow the middle class and we'll see what happens 
here. Coming out of the worst crisis we have had ever in COVID 
and the mess that everybody was handed at that time, horrible 
situation for families, but also for a new President coming out 
of all of this.
    So, three and a half years later, as my mom would say, 
proof is in the pudding. We got 15 million new jobs, 351,000 of 
those in Michigan. We've got unemployment below 4 percent for 
the longest stretch in 50 years, more small businesses are 
being created, which I love. And I have to put a caveat in, 
really lead by Black women entrepreneurs, so I'm excited about 
all of what I see coming for small businesses as well. And I 
could go on and on in terms of what the numbers show us.
    We have not seen the crash that we keep hearing about from 
the other side and the doom that's been expected. We are seeing 
growth. We are seeing costs beginning to come down and there's 
more to do. So, I want to first thank you for this budget 
because you are building on the progress that's been made of 
smart investments to grow the middle class and to ensure, 
frankly, that large corporations and the wealthy pay more of 
their fair share, which I think people certainly in Michigan 
think is a good idea to see happening.
    I appreciate that this budget invests in affordable 
childcare, helping people buy their first home. And by the way, 
as a caveat, when I was in Northern Michigan last year talking 
to a coalition of 15 really terrific chambers of commerce of 
small communities all across Northern Michigan, their top two 
priorities, Mr. Chairman, were childcare, Senator Murray, and 
affordable housing. These are not radical socialists. Most of 
these folks are probably registered Republicans and I love 
working with them, but their priorities were affordable 
childcare and affordable housing is what they want us to work 
on as folks in small communities across Michigan.
    So, this budget cuts student debt, lowers prescription drug 
costs, again, thank goodness, as we move forward would love to 
have bipartisan support for that. We had the first round, $35 
insulin cap, negotiating with Medicare. We didn't get any of 
our Republican colleagues. It'd be wonderful to get some 
Republican support for this, this time. And of course, 
restoring the child tax credit, which when we did it two years, 
cut child poverty in half, which I think should be celebrated.
    So, thank you for that. And also, this proposal would 
reduce the deficit by another $3.2 trillion while achieving 
long-term Medicare solvency without harming Social Security or 
Medicare. So, I have a question for you. First, again, Director 
Young, thank you for supporting so many things that Michiganers 
care about, Soo Locks, Great Lakes Restoration Initiative, all 
the things that are important for us in Michigan, protecting 
our natural resources and growing our economy.
    We know that we work together, the Biden Administration 
and, in fact, this wonderful bipartisan effort around 
behavioral health, really funding and supporting health care 
above the neck the same as health care below the neck and we 
have made dramatic steps forward across the country right now 
to fund comprehensive, Certified Community Behavioral Health 
Clinics (CCBHCs) strongly supported by communities and law 
enforcement, and again, very bipartisan.
    So, in addition to increasing the investments in CCBHCs in 
the President's budget, you have several other proposals to 
strengthen and improve access to behavioral health. I wonder if 
you might speak for a moment about this because this too out in 
the real world, certainly across Michigan, and I know across 
the country, these are very, very important issues.
    Director Young. Thank you for all the points you've made. I 
could not have made them better. Look, the President's budgets 
are to show a vision. Most budgets are not picked up lock, 
stock, and passed. But the idea is Presidents should put 
forward how they believe the country should move forward. This 
President believes we have to keep investing in the American 
people, grow the economy for the middle class, give working 
families a shot in this country, and we can do that through a 
fairer tax code.
    But that also means we get to do stuff like behavioral 
health, not only not adding to the deficit, but having three 
trillion dollars in savings in the deficit. And we're proud of 
the behavioral health budget, $20.8 billion in discretionary 
and mandatory resources across Health and Human Services, $2.2 
billion over 2023 spending. We've enabled more Americans with 
private insurance, Medicare and Medicaid to access mental 
health and substance use disorder care.
    The 988 crisis line, thank you all for helping get that 
started. We need more resources to make that more robust. I 
don't think anyone here thinks we need to do less for suicide 
prevention in this country for civilians and our veterans. So, 
this budget makes those commitments to the American people, and 
we do so in a fiscally responsible manner.
    Senator Stabenow. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Thank you, Senator Stabenow. Senator 
Scott, followed by Senator Warner, if he is here, and if not, 
we'll go onto Senator Van Hollen. Senator Scott.

                   STATEMENT OF SENATOR SCOTT

    Senator Scott. Thank you, Chair. Thanks for being here. So, 
you work for a President that has a whole different vision of 
how you grow an economy. When I got elected back in 2010, the 
full economy was in the doldrums.
    We'd lost 800,000 jobs. We'd not balanced the budget in 20 
years. We were going into default in our debt. And so, we 
actually balanced the budget. The first year we balanced the 
budget, and we balanced the budget every year and what happened 
is even though I cut taxes and fees 100 times, my revenues 
skyrocketed which gave me the ability to have record funding 
for education, transportation, environment, the things people 
care about. Our job growth was faster, our wage growth was 
faster because we lived within our means.
    So, I want to do two things. Just talk about here's the way 
the American public looked at your budget and here's what's 
actually happening to the American public. So, first since 
2019, the population is up 2 percent. So, your budget increases 
spending by 66 percent. That's a lot. The American public says, 
okay, so what'd we get for that, 66 percent increase from 
populations up 2 percent.
    If you look at the numbers, you're spending per American--
it's not yours, it's President Biden's, but spending is 
$21,965. The average American income is only $59,430. You're 
expecting the American taxpayer to spend 36 percent of their 
income, 36 percent to pay for this budget. The increase per 
person in spending for every new person is $434,000. So, if you 
just look at what's happened as a result of the deficits, as a 
result of the spending, look what's happened to interest 
expense. When in 2022, interest was actually--you projected 
305, but projected was ultimately ended up being $476 billion, 
so your projection right now is 965 and so far, the projections 
out of the President's budget have been dramatically off every 
year. It's been dramatically low every year.
    Even with that, let's say it's right, this year interest 
expense will be in excess of Medicare and Defense. So, I mean 
when anybody says they care about Medicare or Social Security 
when you see a budget that just doesn't even come close to 
balancing it, it doesn't make any sense. There's no money--
there's not a dime in here to improve the Social Security Trust 
Fund. There's not one penny.
    So, then you go look and say, okay, this is Biden's fourth 
year, so let's see if it's working. So, the revenues are not up 
this last year. They're down. The federal revenues are down 9 
percent, so that's not working. So, I cut taxes 100 times; my 
revenues went up. Inflation, so if you think about both of us 
grew up in families that didn't have a lot of money. So, if you 
think about what's impacting families like ours, groceries are 
up 21 percent in three years. Gas is up 40 percent. Shelter is 
up 20 percent. Car payments are up 26 percent.
    If you wanted to try buy a house today, Biden took office, 
the cost has just skyrocketed with what's happened to interest 
expense. Immediate household income has gone from $77,800 to 
$74,755. It's down 5 percent. So, if you look at it, inflation 
is up. The wages are down. You're projecting a corporate tax 
rate--not you--President Biden's projecting a corporate taxes 
rate of 28 percent. I cut taxes when I was governor because I 
wanted every company to come to Florida.
    What we're telling people is don't come to America. Well, 
Communist China has lower corporate tax rates. If our tax rates 
are higher, we're in a global economy, what's a company going 
to do? They're going to go where their taxes are lower and they 
should, whether we like it or not.
    Now, let's look at jobs. In the last four months, we've 
lost 1.78 million full-time jobs. We've only added part-time 
jobs. We've added 9,900 part-time jobs. Just look at the 
employment numbers that just came out. Immigrants, legal and 
illegal, in the month of February added one million jobs. 
People born in America lost 500,000 jobs. When I go back to 
Florida, people don't think this economy is headed in the right 
direction.
    Then you look at debt. Debt to GDP since Joe Biden took 
office the debt has grown faster than GDP and if you look at 
these proposed budgets, the debt is going to continue to grow 
faster than GDP. How is this ever sustainable? You can't do 
that. You can't do it in business. You can't do it personally. 
You can't do it as a country. So, I know you're working for 
somebody that has a totally different vision of the country 
than I do, but if you look at the numbers the proposal that's 
been made by Joe Biden has not worked for three solid years and 
what I'd hope is that at some point that it would change. But 
thank you for your hard work.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Would you care to respond, Director?
    Director Young. I'd just make one point worth, native-born 
employment when the President took office was 6.5 percent 
unemployment, 4 percent unemployment January 2024. So, if we're 
looking at facts for native-born employment, which I hear is 
important and the Senator brought up, I thought that was an 
important data point to point that unemployment for those 
native-born in this country have come down by more than 2 
percentage points since the President took office.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Senator Van Hollen.

                STATEMENT OF SENATOR VAN HOLLEN

    Senator Van Hollen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And Madame 
Director, it's great to see you. I just heard Senator Marshall 
mention that that coming down on unemployment was all COVID. 
Isn't it a fact that around the time the President was sworn 
in, economists across the board were projecting much deeper 
levels of unemployment and for longer than we've experienced?
    Director Young. Senator, it took us nearly five years to 
get through the economic scarring of the Great Recession many 
of us lived through in 2009, so it was not a surety that we had 
come out of this pandemic with the strength that this economy 
has, and the President deserves strong credit. Thank you all 
for the American Rescue Plan. And people should not assume that 
that was a given, that the President could lead us so strongly 
out of a global pandemic.
    Senator Van Hollen. I appreciate that. In fact, the non-
partisan Congressional Budget Office projected that 
unemployment rates in the United States would last at a higher 
level for a lot longer. And as you say, because of the American 
Rescue Plan, we were able to, not only address the COVID health 
crisis, but also address the economic fallout from that crisis. 
And unfortunately, we didn't have any help from any of 
Republican colleagues in passing that.
    Let me just take a moment to thank you and the President 
for some of the important priorities in the budget. For 
Maryland, for example, continuing robust cleanup of the 
Chesapeake Bay, important support for NASA-Goddard, which is a 
national asset, and a number of other priorities, including the 
National Institutes of Health, which, of course, benefit all 
Americans who have experienced health issues, which just about 
every American family. So, I want to thank you for some of 
those priorities.
    I also commend you on dealing with tax expenditures, right? 
Tax expenditures are tax breaks where special interests don't 
have to sort of pay the same rate or under the same rules as 
everybody else because they've got a carve out. It's 
essentially a handout through the tax system by creating 
special exceptions. So, I appreciate the fact that the 
President's budget goes after some of these tax breaks like 
corporate jets, like a lot of the big tax breaks for the oil 
and gas industry. Could you just talk about why it's important 
that we have a fair tax system that doesn't include carve outs 
for special interests and how that also helps, not only provide 
important investments for working families, but also 
contributes to reducing the deficit.
    Director Young. Look at our Medicare proposal, Senator. By 
asking the wealthiest in this country to pay 1.2 percent more, 
by closing loopholes for people who have found ways not to pay 
Medicare taxes, we can save the Medicare program indefinitely. 
That is a small example if you extrapolate to lots of different 
policies here what we can do. We can do more for middle class 
and working families. 1.2 percent for Medicare, you heard the 
President say he's not trying to keep rich people from being 
rich and maybe having two boats instead of three by helping all 
Americans.
    And it goes on and on, in-kind contributions, all of those 
things ensure that we pay for every investment. We make sure 
NIH has the resources they need. We make sure we have a 
childcare system that is actually affordable. I pay childcare 
every month. I don't know how families do it. I really don't, 
other than leaving their children in places where they're 
nervous every day to leave their kids. The richest nation in 
the world we can do better, and we can pay for that. We can 
help families by having a fairer tax code.
    Senator Van Hollen. I appreciate that, Madame Director. And 
I would also point out when it comes to Medicare, in addition 
to providing long-term stability and solvency through the 
mechanism you talked about, the President also said he wants to 
announce and will announce or wants to announce additional 
drugs that would be subject to negotiating, so that we can both 
reduce costs for Medicare and extend its life and lower costs 
for seniors on Medicare.
    He also said, and I fully support the idea of trying to 
bring down those prescription drug costs for everybody. We did 
it for insulin on Medicare. We're trying to do it for 
everybody.
    In my remaining time, the Social Security Administration, I 
was pleased to see the increase for resources for the Social 
Security Administration, which, of course, is based in 
Maryland. But can you just talk for a minute about how stressed 
it is, how outdated the technology is? This is something we 
should all support. We're not talking about the benefit side. 
We're talking about the administration side.
    Director Young. Well, we are talking about benefits.
    Senator Van Hollen. The access to the benefits.
    Director Young. If we want Americans to access their 
benefits, we cannot continue to starve the Social Security 
Administration of resources and that is what has happened. 
We're asking for a 9 percent increase. We've asked for an 
increase every year and we are frankly begging for your support 
to help fund this agency. We cannot starve an agency of funding 
and then question why phone calls aren't getting answered.
    Now, on our side, we have finally a new administrator in 
place, and thank you all for making that happen. It's 
incredibly important to have confirmed leadership there to make 
sure management practices are up to date, but there's only so 
much more you can do with a lot less and they have been starved 
of resources for far too long and people should have their 
phone calls answered. And we're doing all we can with what we 
have at Social Security, but we need the resources.
    Senator Van Hollen. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, I would just 
observe that the Social Security Administration is serving 50 
percent more people than it was decades ago with less staff 
than were there.
    Director Young. Senator, you should see the graph the 
Administrator has. Benefits, people needing benefits and 
staffing, they cross each other in a very troubling manner and 
it's just going to get worse and worse.
    Senator Van Hollen. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Thank you, Senator Van Hollen. Senator 
Johnson, followed by Senator Kaine. Senator Johnson.

                  STATEMENT OF SENATOR JOHNSON

    Senator Johnson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Ms. Young, 
welcome. Ms. Young, do you know what a dollar that you held at 
the start of the Biden Administration is worth today?
    Director Young. I'm sure you'll let me know, Senator.
    Senator Johnson. It is a number you should know. It's worth 
85 cents. That is driving an awful lot of the numbers on your 
budget there. It's causing an awful lot of pain for the 
American public. I want to kind of pick up where Senator Scott 
left off without really asking questions. But if you take a 
look at what we were spending prior to the pandemic, about $4.4 
trillion. I personally think in 2020 we spent too much.
    We started talking about the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and 
Economic Security (CARES) Act, it was about $750 billion within 
a few weeks, so it was up to $2.2 trillion. It wasn't money 
spent very efficiently, but I think we had to do something 
fast. We had to do something massive so that markets wouldn't 
collapse. But after 2020, because we spent another two trillion 
dollars in 2020, we had so much money sloshing around the 
economy, at most I think we were down 25 million jobs for a few 
months. Within a few months, we were up to about eight million 
job losses, but come January of 2021, again, so much money 
sloshing around. There was so much pent-up demand those jobs 
are going to be coming back relatively soon, what do you think 
sparked the four-year high inflation?
    Director Young. Senator, we can also talk about inflation 
that has come down by two-thirds. And I think most people----
    Senator Johnson. What caused, what sparked----
    Director Young. Most economists will----
    Senator Johnson. What sparked 40-year high inflation?
    Director Young. Most economists agree that coming out of a 
global pandemic, which is why we saw inflation across every 
major economy in this country, it was the supply chain issues, 
economies turning back on coming out of a once-in-a-generation 
pandemic, which is why you saw inflation across the globe 
increase.
    Senator Johnson. I mean, you don't think that too many 
dollars chasing too few goods is the primary cause of inflation 
and when you spend two trillion dollars one year over the next 
and then you don't readjust the baseline, I mean, how can you 
justify spending $4.4 trillion, as Senator Scott was saying, 
the population grew less than 2 percent over this timeframe. 
So, we go from $4.4 trillion to $6.5. In 2021, when President 
Biden comes into office, we spent 6.8 and 6.3. We haven't reset 
to the 2019 baseline. How are we ever going to recover from 
this?
    Director Young. Senator, we set forth a proposal, a way to 
continue to invest in the American people. If we think we have 
adequate childcare and paid leave in this country, I welcome us 
to talk to hardworking Americans. We can do that by asking the 
top 1 and 2 percent to add more into the system. That way we 
can not only pay for our investments, but we can bring down the 
deficit of the three trillion dollars. We can't just talk about 
spending as if it only hits those programs that hit working 
families in this country.
    Senator Johnson. I mean it's a fantasy if you make the rich 
pay their fair share, and by the way, the top 1 percent garner 
about 20 percent of the income and pay about 40 percent of the 
income tax. I mean I some point in time you have say, well, 
that's probably a pretty fair share.
    Director Young. Well, if you add sales tax and local tax, 
they pay about 25 percent.
    Senator Johnson. But I remember when a couple hundred 
billion dollars was like real money. The political process 
would be all upset if you're running a couple hundred billion 
dollar a year deficit. Your plan to get us out of this you're 
running deficits of 1.8, 1.5, 1.5, 1.5, 1.5, 1.6. It never 
comes down. You're basically locking in at least $1.5 trillion 
deficits for the next 10 years. That's what you're budgeting. 
Clearly, this is unsustainable. You don't worry about, once 
again, sparking massive inflation that further devalues the 
dollar from a dollar to 85. What, is it going to go down to 70, 
to 60.
    Director Young. Senator, absolutely. That is why we put 
forth a plan that would actually bring deficits down by three 
trillion. We care about our fiscal path. This President has 
shown how you can still invest in the American people and 
achieve deficit reduction. And by the way, he worked with 
Republicans to sign a Fiscal Responsibility Act that would save 
a trillion dollars on our deficit.
    Senator Johnson. So, you're proud of a 10-year budget that 
never reduces the deficit, never brings it down below basically 
$1.5 trillion. You're proud of that work?
    Director Young. Senator, Of course, I'm proud of a budget 
that reduces deficits by over three trillion dollars that 
continues its investments in the American people. And by the 
way, most economists will tell you the way to look at our 
affordability of debt is to look at debt and deficit as a 
percentage of GDP. As a percentage of GDP, deficits are below 
4.5 percent.
    Senator Johnson. I don't think average Americans take a 
look at, at least $1.5 trillion deficits as far as the eye can 
see and think this Administration is bringing down the deficit. 
I mean that's just fantasy talk. Thank you Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Senator Kaine, followed by Senator 
Marshall.

                   STATEMENT OF SENATOR KAINE

    Senator Kaine. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Director Young, good 
to be with you. Budgets aren't about numbers. They're about 
people. The U.S. economy has come out of COVID stronger than 
any economy in the world, any large economy. Jobs are up, 
unemployment is down, manufacturing jobs are up, inflation is 
coming down. People's 401(k)s are up. The rate of people who 
have insurance in this country dramatically up. These are the 
measures that I look at when I look at a budget and economy and 
I don't see a competing economy in the world that has done what 
the U.S. has done and we've exceeded our own expectations from 
the CBO and others, as Senator Van Hollen stated.
    A couple of comments on some Virginia priorities then I 
want to dig into childcare with you. First, I really appreciate 
the President's budget has funding to save Tangier Island in 
the Chesapeake Bay. I asked you a question for the record in 
your confirmation hearing about the President's willingness to 
invest in fighting sea level rise and promoting coastal 
resilience and the President's budget includes funding that 
builds on Congressionally Directed Spending (CDS) funding I've 
received in the past to make sure we save this island in the 
Chesapeake Bay that has lost about 70 percent of its land mass 
and is extremely vulnerable to climate change.
    I was not happy that the President's budget zeroed out a 
program that I care a lot about, the Lorna Breen Act, which is 
funding for the mental health needs of our health care 
providers. The budget is strong with respect to behavioral 
health. I think that's great, but there's a particular program 
that I've worked on bipartisan that focuses upon the mental 
health needs of health care providers named after a Virginia 
emergency room physician who died by suicide in April of 2020, 
and I'll work with my colleagues to make sure we continue that 
funding.
    I know you're under some tight budget caps that affected 
some of the priorities that I care about. Let me ask you about 
one right now. The President sent us a supplemental that we had 
passed in the Senate by 70 to 29 vote for national security and 
one of the items in the supplemental was a significant 
investment in an initiative of President Biden's I strongly 
support, the Australia United Kingdom United States (AUKUS) 
framework. We'll work together with Australia and the United 
Kingdom (UK) to buildout more deterrents in the Indo Pacific, 
and pillar one of that framework is construction of Virginia 
class submarines and selling them to Australia in the 2030s, 
eventually equipping Australia with the capacity to build their 
own subs in the 2040s.
    So, the President strongly supports it, and he should. It's 
a great initiative, but the President's budget that was sent up 
to us actually reduces funding for Virginia class subs. We've 
been budgeting at two a year. The President has suggested in 
this budget that we would only build one a year to get to our 
commitment level where we can meet what we've committed to with 
Australia, we have to get to 2.3 a year. So, I view the two to 
one in this budget as an unfortunate backslide that is sort of 
in a cognitive dissidence with the President's request that we 
fund the AUKUS initiative.
    Can you tell us about some of the challenging tradeoffs 
that you've had to make in putting this budget together in 
order to meet budget caps?
    Director Young. Look, we felt it was important. When the 
President makes a deal, he keeps a deal to stick by the Fiscal 
Responsibility Act, but I want you to know the President, I, 
the Administration fully believe in the AUKUS partnership with 
Australia. We fund about the equivalent of 1.3 submarines a 
year. We need that number to go to something like 2.3. So, it 
is not just funding the submarines. We've got to invest in our 
submarine industrial base, so one thing I'd ask you to do is 
look at this in concert with the supplemental.
    We need that supplemental to move out of the House, not for 
just for our partners, Ukraine and Israel and humanitarian 
assistance, but we don't talk about the submarine Indo Pacific 
part enough and that money is critical to not just building 
submarines, but building the base so we can actually when we 
ask for two we can get two. Because right now the industrial 
base is not sufficient and does not have enough capacity to do 
that. So, we really need that supplemental to move in order to 
keep our agreement intact with AUKUS and we look forward to 
working with you and others to make sure that AUKUS remains in 
place, that we get the submarine money, and the industrial base 
fit to produce more submarines.
    Senator Kaine. Thank you. Other colleagues have praised the 
President's budget in the childcare area, and I join that. So 
good for parents, so good for kids, so good for childcare 
workers, great for the economy. It'll free up more people to 
come back in who are out of the economy now.
    Last question is how challenging it is for you to be six 
months into a fiscal year and not have Appropriations bills 
done?
    Director Young. The old staff director in me is on the 
backseat in trouble. I now regret the late bills I may have 
worked on and did not fully appreciate how difficult it is to 
implement programs, the efficiency. Just think about last 
Friday, big fire drill, four o'clock, we're like is the Senate 
going to pass this in time? Activating lots of people, seeing 
if we have to put stuff on hold. It is no way to run a 
government and so we share your frustration. We want to look 
for ways, speaking of bipartisanship and things we have to work 
together on. One is on the process questions, I'm one of those 
believers that process makes a good output, gives us a good 
product, and we have to do something and work on the process of 
the Appropriations process. And my guess is, it's something 
I'll think about and work on for the rest of my time working in 
this town because it's incredibly important and the agencies 
depend on this.
    And by the way, I'd like the annual process. I don't want 
to see the frustration with that process do away with that. I 
think it's a good thing that Congress looks at--now it's 30 
percent of programs every year. But unless we fix the process, 
that frustration is going to bubble up because you see the 
problems with it, the threats of shutdown.
    Senator Kaine. You have many supporters on that point in 
the Committee, including the Chairman. I appreciate your 
service. Thank you.
    Director Young. Thank you.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Senator Marshall is next and then, 
depending on who's here, our order is Senators Lujan, Graham, 
Warner, Whitehouse, and Merkley. Senator Marshall.

                 STATEMENT OF SENATOR MARSHALL

    Senator Marshall. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Today I'm here 
fighting for my grandchildren's future, for your 
grandchildren's future, for our grandchildren's future. They're 
going to have to live in a world where we're spending more 
money on interest than we do on Medicare, on the Military, 
because of our unquenched appetite for spending money. When 
their children are going through school, there'll be less money 
for good schools, for good hospitals, for highspeed Internet, 
for a strong Military because of the spending we're doing today 
they will suffer the consequence of this interest.
    I want to quote something that you said, and you've written 
as well, Director Young. ``The President's budget reduces the 
deficit by three trillion dollars over the next 10 years.'' I 
think that's deceitful. I think it's disingenuous. You've 
repeated here multiple times. You decrease it from what to 
what? You decrease it from 19 to $16 trillion. Only in 
Washington, D.C. do you make the claims that increasing the 
cumulative deficits by $16 trillion is a decrease. At the end 
of the day, you're adding $16 trillion that my grandchildren 
will be paying interest on. I think it's disingenuous and I 
think the American public gets that.
    My first question, Director Young, how much money is the 
federal government going to spend this year?
    Director Young. Senator, the budget, as many slides have 
shown is about seven trillion dollars.
    Senator Marshall. So, we're going to spend in the current 
fiscal year of 2024, we're going to spend about seven trillion 
and then seven trillion in the next fiscal year; is that 
correct?
    Director Young. Well, Senator, we haven't put a budget for 
the next fiscal year, but if you're talking about baselines, if 
nothing changes, calendar year '24 outlies will be about seven 
trillion dollars, this budget year about $7.3 trillion.
    Senator Marshall. Okay. Thank you. I would just point out 
that over the last five years that government spending has went 
up over 50 percent with no end in sight. Next, I want to talk 
about budget deficits for a second. $2.8 trillion we can blame 
that all on COVID, if you want to, make sure it's the same 
graph I'm looking at, but we continue with these budget 
deficits of approaching two trillion dollars and perhaps more. 
I don't think anyone can argue that that's the future.
    And then, we look at our national debt, of course, that 
we're going to add another two trillion dollars to our national 
debt. That's at the end of the day budgets be damned. I want to 
turn and ask a couple questions about Ukraine funding. 
Yesterday, Politico reported that the Department of Defense has 
sent $10 billion worth of weapons to Ukraine that it does not 
have the money to replace; is that reporting accurate?
    Director Young. Senator, I think no one was officially 
quoted from the Administration in the article. I've read the 
article, so I'm not going to comment on unauthorized or people 
who speak on background. What I will say is if our Ukraine 
supplemental passes the House----
    Senator Marshall. I understand that----
    Director Young [continuing]. Then we would have the----
    Senator Marshall. Is the $10 billion funding accurate?
    Director Young. Senator, if we had the Ukraine funding----
    Senator Marshall. I understand. That's not my question.
    Director Young [continuing]. We would have funding----
    Senator Marshall. I wish you would just answer my questions 
and not divert to different things.
    Director Young. Senator, you asked me a question based on 
unnamed sources within the article.
    Senator Marshall. So, is the $10 billion figure accurate--
--
    Director Young. We are very disappointed----
    Senator Marshall [continuing]. That really in reality we 
didn't just send $113 billion. There's a big difference between 
what these weapons we send costs versus the value of them 
today.
    Director Young. That's right.
    Senator Marshall. So, in reality--this is not a question. 
So, in reality, we've really sent them $121 billion, and you've 
said nothing to dispute that as being accurate. I want to go 
on. Here is a question for you. Does the Administration have 
the ability to provide any additional aid to Ukraine in the 
absence of Congressional action; yes or no?
    Director Young. So, Senator, we have to do the 
supplemental.
    Senator Marshall. I understand that's your opinion. We 
don't have to do anything. That's your opinion.
    Director Young. Well, I----
    Senator Marshall. Would you just try to answer my question? 
Does the Administration have the ability to provide any 
additional aid to Ukraine in the absence of Congressional 
action? That's a yes or no question.
    Director Young. Senator, if we have additional 
replenishment funds.
    Senator Marshall. I understand that. So, you're not going 
to answer my question.
    Director Young. Senator, I'm trying to. If we have 
additional replenishment funds, if materials come in cheaper 
than we thought, that will give us the room to maybe do another 
drawn down package. We're looking at that. The Department of 
Defense goes and buys the equipment. If some comes in cheaters 
and we have----
    Senator Marshall. Let me ask you the question in a 
different way.
    Director Young. We will do that.
    Senator Marshall. Will this Administration provide Ukraine 
any additional aid in any form until Congress passes the 
supplemental?
    Director Young. Senator, if we believe we can do that--to 
your first question, if we believe we can do that without 
affecting U.S. readiness in a detrimental way, we absolutely 
will. It is the President's commitment that we will not let 
Vladimir Putin march through Ukraine.
    Senator Marshall. We've been told over and over by this 
Administration----
    Director Young. We will look for everything we can do.
    Senator Marshall [continuing]. That we need to spend 
another 10 or $20 billion to replenish what we've given to 
Ukraine, so we didn't properly account for what we've already 
sent them. I still think we're 10 or $20 billion short of what 
we appropriated versus what we sent them.
    Director Young. Well, Senator, we're worried about defense 
readiness, pass the supplemental.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Thank you, Senator Marshall. Senator 
Merkley.

                  STATEMENT OF SENATOR MERKLEY

    Senator Merkley. Thank you. Director Young, are you 
familiar with the term ``greedflation.''
    Director Young. Did you say ``shrinkflation''?
    Senator Merkley. Greed, greedflation?
    Director Young. Greedflation? I think I know what it is.
    Senator Merkley. Well, what it is, is in Fortune Magazine. 
I want to submit for the record, if there's no objection, an 
article titled ``Greedflation caused more than half of last 
year's inflation surge as corporate profits remain at all-time 
highs.'' If I can submit that for the record.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Without objection.
    Senator Merkley. Thank you very much.
    [Insert of Fortune Magazine article appears in the 
appendix.]
    Senator Merkley. It points out that a big source of the 
inflation we've been dealing with is corporations doing huge 
price increases on products and have all-time high profits, 
which is a different explanation that we might've heard earlier 
in this hearing.
    And then, my colleague from Utah was talking about 
unrealized gains and we have in America a system of dynasty 
wealth protection and it works like this. If you have stocks 
and bonds and you hold them until death, then they receive 
what's called ``stepped up basis,'' which means they are never 
taxed for their increase in value as you pass it onto the next 
generation.
    And if you have property, it's even better. You sell one 
property, you buy another, you use a 1031 exchange. You're 
never taxed on the gain. And at death it also receives stepped 
up basis. So, essentially, the wealthy investing in property 
proceed to never be taxed ever on their income from growing 
value of assets; is that not correct?
    Director Young. That is correct and this budget does 
something about it.
    Senator Merkley. So, this dynasty wealth protection has 
resulted in the United States having the worst distribution of 
wealth, the most inequality of any of the developed countries. 
I just went though the chart, and to give you a sense of this, 
in American the top 1 percent own 40 percent of household 
wealth compared to Canada at 20 percent and Japan at 10 
percent. If you look at the top 10 percent in American, the top 
10 percent own 80 percent of our household wealth. In Canada, 
it's 50 percent. In Japan, it's 40 percent. So, we have put 
laws in place that essentially create the very dynasty wealth 
that the founders warned us against as creating a very inequal 
society; is that not right?
    Director Young. Senator, we share your concerns, which is 
why this President speaks a lot about closing the wealth gap in 
this country. That is why we do something about in-kind real 
estate transactions. That is why do a 25 percent billionaire 
tax. Most Americans have no idea of all these ways of getting 
around paying taxes.
    Senator Merkley. Absolutely.
    Director Young. Most people work, they get a paycheck, and 
they get taxed.
    Senator Merkley. My father was a mechanic and he said why 
is it that in America the laws mean that those who earn income 
by the sweat of their brow pay a much higher tax than those who 
earn money through investments? And in your budget, you have 
for those with incomes over $100 million a provision to help 
provide some tax on unrealized income; is that not correct?
    Director Young. That is correct.
    Senator Merkley. Well, hallelujah, because it's the first 
I've seen a real proposal coming from an Administration to try 
to help tackle this challenge. Our system is enormously 
beneficial to the already wealthy.
    They're making them more and more wealthy, while the burden 
is borne by ordinary Americans, blue collar Americans, like my 
parents, who strived to save in a system that designed to not 
help the ordinary Americans, but to help the very, very 
wealthy. So, I appreciate that effort.
    And I wanted to note that under the Trump Administration, 
you had in 2020, 55 of the biggest companies in America that 
had incomes over $40 billion, paid zero in federal income 
taxes. So, these companies use the vast amount of our 
educational system because of the people they hire, a vast 
amount of our highway system for transportation, a vast amount 
basically at every stage and paid zero in taxes. And your 
effort, the Biden Administration, to have minimum corporate 
taxes says those who use all these assets that grow from our 
investments need to pay some share towards it. That's the right 
thing to do; isn't it?
    Director Young. It is. And by the way, Senator, we're 
already on the path thanks to you and others who voted for the 
Inflation Reduction Act. We have for the first time a 15 
percent minimum. This budget would take that 15 to 21 percent.
    Senator Merkley. That's a terrific improvement. Thank you.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Thank you, Senator Merkley. Good to be 
with you, Director Young.
    Director Young. I'm not used to you going last.
    Chairman Whitehouse. I know. Well, I wanted to let Senator 
Padilla go and do his duty on the Senator floor. My Medicare 
and Social Security Fair Share Act would implement the Medicare 
tax proposals in the Biden budget and ensure that Medicare can 
pay out 100 percent of Medicare benefits indefinitely. How 
would the Medicare tax proposals in the Biden budget assure 
this program's solvency in a fair and equitable manner?
    Director Young. I talked about this a little earlier, and 
thank you for your work on this proposal, Senator. It not only 
helps the Medicare programs stay around indefinitely if we 
adopt. The prescription drug piece would ensure that seniors 
payless, and the government pays less, and it helps with our 
deficit reduction.
    The President's Medicare proposal would ask that those at 
the top 1 and 2 percent to pay 1.2 percent more into Medicare. 
It also closes loopholes that the wealthy have found not to pay 
Medicare tax in this country. It would expand our prescription 
drugs from the amount that are in law now due to the Inflation 
Reduction Act to bring in more drugs. That saves costs for the 
American people, and frankly, these are commonsense things.
    If we want to do something about Medicare solvency 
indefinitely, these are commonsense ways to go about, and the 
President believes in them, and this is our second time 
proposing these changes.
    Chairman Whitehouse. And relatedly, on Social Security, 
according to the Social Security actuary, the Medicare and 
Social Security Fair Share Act would extend Social Security 
solvency indefinitely also, and it would do so by making those 
earning above $400,000 contribute the same share that regular 
workers are obliged to for the first levels of income. It lifts 
the cap, essentially, and kicks in above $400,000. Is that 
proposal in line with the principles that your budget is 
seeking to achieve and will you work with us on that?
    Director Young. Absolutely. You heard the President speak 
about this very clearly Thursday, no benefit cuts on his watch, 
asking higher income earners to pay their fair share to make 
sure Social Security is solvent.
    Chairman Whitehouse. We had that wonderful moment in the 
previous State of the Union when the President talked about 
Republicans who wanted Medicare and Social Security cuts and 
they all rose in unanimous opprobrium to say, no, no, no, we 
don't do that. We had this unanimity moment about Social 
Security and Medicare cuts.
    Now, of course, that was based in fact. We've had actually 
members of this Committee say that they want to take Social 
Security and pull it up by the roots and get rid of it. That's 
hardly opposition to benefit cuts. And just this week, the 
former President said that, as part of his campaign, he was 
looking at cuts to Social Security and Medicare. So, it's 
really important that we get this done now while we have the 
ability to do this under President Biden because otherwise all 
the signs are that there will be cuts to Social Security and 
Medicare.
    Let's look a little bit about health care savings. There's 
an enormous health care issue in the budget and we've done a 
lot of good work, I think, post the Affordable Care Act to 
prove in real practice that you can save on health care costs 
without cutting health care benefits. Things like accountable 
care organizations and value-based care have shown that. Will 
you work with us to continue to develop proposals for savings 
in the federal health care spend that do not touch benefits?
    Director Young. Absolutely, Senator. One, we have to bring 
down health care costs and we have seen improvements since the 
Affordable Care Act was passed. But we also know what the costs 
to the American people the government spending is if we don't 
do all we can to bring down the cost of health care. We know 
also it costs a lot for uninsured populations to exists, so I'm 
proud of the increased enrollment in the Affordable Care Act, 
but we pledge to work with you to make sure we continue to 
bring every tool at our disposal to bringing down health care 
costs.
    Chairman Whitehouse. We have seen in Rhode Island through 
two of the best performing accountable care organizations in 
the country the cost of care per patient going down, the 
happiness and joy per patient, if you will, going up. They love 
the additional services that they get that help bring the costs 
down. And of course, health care outcomes improve and that's 
the path I intend to follow.
    Let me ask on one final point and then I'll turn to Senator 
Lujan. The Crime Victims Fund is largely sourced from criminal 
fines and penalties. As a former prosecutor, I'm very well 
aware of how it enables state and local communities to provide 
emergency services to crime victims like shelters and 
transportation, and very often, for victims of domestic 
violence and to support them seeking medical and mental health 
care that victims so often require in the aftermath of a crime.
    Director Young, the President has proposed a plan for 
appropriations to help support the fund over the next five 
years. Why are those appropriations so important for us to 
maintain our support for victims of crime?
    Director Young. You know this is incredibly personally 
important to the President. This budget would deposit about 
$1.35 billion. We also have a provision to restore the Crime 
Victims Fund so that funding for victims can be maintained in a 
sustainable, predictable manner over the next decade and we 
would love to work with you on that proposal to make sure the 
Crime Victims Fund (CVF) has the robust funding these victims 
rely on and need.
    Chairman Whitehouse. Thank you. Senator Lujan, followed by 
Senator Braun.

                   STATEMENT OF SENATOR LUJAN

    Senator Lujan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Director Young, 
thank you for being here today and for your leadership. 
Director Young, the President's budget mentions the pending 
supplemental request to continue the Affordable Connectivity 
Program through December of 2024. The budget also promises 
``The Administration will work with the Congress to secure 
additional funding for this important need in 2025 and 
beyond.''
    Director Young, yes or no, if Congress allows the 
Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) to lapse, would it 
abruptly cut connectivity or millions of low-income families, 
eliminating access to work, to education, and to health care?
    Director Young. Yes, millions.
    Senator Lujan. I've been proud to work with Senator Thune 
and other colleagues in the House and the Senate to move 
towards incorporating the ACP into a Universal Service Fund to 
ensure its long-term stability and improve program 
effectiveness. Director Young, will you commit to working with 
me to secure additional funding for the Affordable Connectivity 
Program, not just in 2024, but 2025 and beyond?
    Director Young. Absolutely, Senator. And we'll work very 
hard for--you heard us talk about the Ukraine supplemental. The 
President's also asked for six billion dollars for this very 
critical broadband connectivity program, and we hope Congress 
will act soon so millions of Americans don't lose access.
    Senator Lujan. I appreciate that very much. Now, the mental 
behavioral health system in the United States has been pushed 
to its breaking point. I was just visiting with a few mayors 
that are in our nation's capitol with the League of Cities. 
They heard from the President just yesterday. Now, over the 
past 25 years, New Mexico has had the highest alcohol-related 
and drug induced death rates in the nation and the consequences 
of drug use continue to burden New Mexico communities and this 
is something that we've heard day in and day out from our 
mayors. That's why I'm proud that this budget makes investment, 
not only in individuals and families impacted by substance 
abuse, but also across different communities at are especially 
highly at risk to overdose. This includes pregnant and 
postpartum women and their families, individuals with substance 
abuse disorders like those who experience housing instability 
or seeking services for addiction to opioids, alcohol, or even 
polysubstance use disorder.
    Director Young, why is it important to fund evidence-based 
and public health focused, harm reduction, prevention, and 
treatment for substance and polysubstance use disorder for all 
Americans?
    Director Young. Well, Senator, there's a reason this is 
prioritized in the President's budget. We have seen American 
family after American family, their story about substance use 
disorder and what it has done and the generational harm it can 
cause is absolutely critical, just like any other health care 
disorder that we have the resources needed. We have to make 
sure that insurance companies cover mental health and substance 
abuse disorder like any other ailment that might befall someone 
in a physical nature. So, we take this seriously. I've been 
heartened by the bipartisan interest in doing something about 
this. It's going to take both parties coming together.
    One more thing we haven't talked a lot about today is also 
stopping the flow of some of these dangerous drugs that have 
come across our border. And part of the President's supplement 
request that remain stuck is putting equipment to our land 
ports of entry to make sure we can stop fentanyl crossing our 
borders.
    Senator Lujan. I appreciate that.
    Chairman Whitehouse. If I could interject just for one 
second on some procedural business.
    Senator Lujan. Yes, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Whitehouse. We'll restart the clock at a minute, 
30 seconds for Senator Lujan, but he has kindly agreed or at 
least his staff have kindly agreed for him, to gavel out the 
rest of the hearing. I have to get to Judiciary. We have an 
important hearing on the Voting Rights Act. Let me just 
conclude by thanking Director Young very much for her testimony 
here today and for a budget that we can all, I think, support 
of and be proud of. And with that, back to Senator Lujan for 
his time, then Senator Braun and then Senator Lujan will close 
us out. Thank you.
    Director Young. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Senator Lujan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I very much 
appreciate that response and especially the latter. The one 
thing I'll compliment--well, there's many compliments I have 
for Chairman Whitehouse, but one of his responsibilities also 
is chairing the counter narcotics group of us as well. And the 
one area, Director Young, that I believe also needs more 
attention is looking at illicit financial markets. These 
cartels and bad folks see this as a business. There's a lot of 
money moving around the country, and I just don't hear a lot in 
that particular space. I look forward to working with our 
office and, of course, with Senator Whitehouse's team and 
others to make sure we're able to put a dent in there as well.
    Now, I appreciate the President's continued support for the 
Department of Energy and the Department of Energy National 
Labs, but I'm concerned that the modest additional investments 
requested by the President are not enough to solve our nation's 
scientific challenges. For example, we must increase our 
nation's energy security, while at the same time addressing the 
global climate crisis. Our international competitors are not 
waiting.
    Now, I meet regularly with the scientists and leadership 
across the Department of Energy's (DOE) premiere National 
Laboratory System, including two national labs in New Mexico, 
Las Alamos and Sandia. Now, I know our National Labs are 
capable and eager to help the nation and the world solve the 
climate crisis, but the President and Congress need to provide 
them the resources to get the job done.
    Director Young, as you know in his first day in office, 
President Biden committed to reaching net zero emission 
economy. As you know, this commitment requires a massive 
reinvestment in R&D in our National Labs. Director Young, can I 
get a commitment from you today to work with me and my 
colleagues to increase our R&D investment to the level needed 
to tackle the climate crisis?
    Director Young. Senator, you have my commitment to doing 
that. Our budget contains $10.7 billion for labs. I understand 
more is needed. You know this is our last year of budget caps, 
but I'm committed to working with you. The President 
understands how vital the National Labs are to our climate 
fight to reaching net zero carbon by 2050 and absolutely we 
want to continue our partnership to make sure the Labs are 
robustly funded to meet the moment.
    Senator Lujan. I appreciate that, Director. I have other 
questions I'll submit into the record. Director Young, I just 
want to close in saying thank you to you and to your team. Most 
recently, the Senate took a historic vote on the Radiation 
Exposure Compensation Act amendments, 69 senators voted in 
favor of addressing this important policy and the statement of 
policy that we received from the President to the United States 
I know had to be reviewed by your team extensively. I just want 
to say thank you and I know that the families across America 
that will benefit from this program would also like to say 
thank you as well. And with that, I'll yield my time.
    Director Young. Thank you. And recognize Senator Braun.
    Senator Lujan. Senator Braun, you're recognized for 
questions.
    Director Young. I can't get over being a staff director. 
I'm very sorry.

                   STATEMENT OF SENATOR BRAUN

    Senator Braun. Thanks for getting recognized from the 
witness and the sitting in senator. Looks like I'm the last 
senator standing. We've had a lot of interesting discussions 
about the health of our federal government and our financial 
trajectory. I've got a question for you because a lot of the 
facts and figures have already been covered by other senators. 
Do you think a balanced budget amendment or statute would be 
helpful to keep both sides of the aisle in a place where they'd 
have to do that simple thing so that we don't borrow from our 
kids and grandkids?
    I know everybody has great ideas and intentions, but looks 
like the major result probably since the Bush Administration 
when we put two wars on the credit card. It's been both sides 
of the aisle and that goes back to 2000. We're entering into 
three decades of it soon. Where are you at on a balanced budget 
amendment or statute?
    Director Young. Senator, one, you're always thoughtful 
about these things and I thank you for the way you approach 
them. I know we have a lot of disagreements, but I know you're 
honest about your ideas. My concern about that type of 
amendment is what it would do to programs like Social Security 
and Medicare. I do believe it is going to take bipartisan 
solutions. I know Senator Romney talked about a commission.
    Look, our concerns are always going to lie in what will 
dramatic cuts do to the benefits of programs. I think about my 
95-year-old grandmother. If we did that, what happens? What is 
her source of income, of stability if we pull back dramatically 
in that fashion on Social Security and Medicare? That is my 
concern.
    Senator Braun. What about the crowding out effect of more 
and more interest year after year even to do that, and do you 
think that we'll ever get to a point where--I know in the 
President's budget that's assuming that that stuff can get done 
that it doesn't tamper with economic growth that I think was 
set in place back with some of the stuff done in 2017, which 
you probably disagree with. But isn't there a point where I 
think it's called the Modern Monetary Theory where deficits and 
cumulative debt just don't make any difference anymore? Do you 
believe that?
    Director Young. Senator, I believe we need to make sure 
debt and deficits as a percentage of GDP don't make our debt 
unsustainable. So, no, I do think there are measures we have to 
be careful about. We need to make sure real net interest stays 
well below, as a share of GDP, 2 percent. Our deficits, in the 
long run, are about 4.5 percent of GDP. Most economists believe 
those levels make our debt manageable, so we agree on the need 
to manage our fiscal house, but we think nominal numbers tell 
one story. The more complex story is looking at a lot of these 
things as a share of GDP.
    Senator Braun. I think the only other country that's taken 
that more to the limit would be Japan, and they're a country 
that's got a lot of issues with their economy in terms of how 
it's growing. So, going 50 years back, we've never, other than 
two years, generated in revenues, regardless of the tax rate. 
You raise taxes, you flush a little more into the Treasury. You 
start to lose economic growth over time, as a rule. And if you 
lower taxes, you take a little bit away from the Treasury. You 
raise economic growth over time. Pre COVID, the CBO was about 
ready to say that we were revenue neutral on the Tax Cuts and 
Jobs Act. And then, of course, all the wheels fell off 
associated with COVID. So, at some point we've got to not defy 
statistics to where to keep Social Security healthy, Medicare, 
Medicaid, and defend our country maybe we have to do fewer 
things; but anymore, the mandatory spending is getting to the 
point where it's driving everything structurally.
    So, it sounds like you're willing to live with never 
reducing principal, keeping growing debt as long as the percent 
of interest doesn't swamp the deck.
    Director Young. Look, I think the way to measure these 
things from a sustainable standpoint is to look at real net 
interest as a percentage of GDP and look at deficits as a share 
of GDP. I don't think it is saying our principals should never 
be paid down, but I also am a believer that revenues is a story 
to tell in this. I do believe, especially with the IRS 
investments we have, that there is a different story we should 
be telling this country about bringing revenues in. And the 
last time we had surplus in 2001 we did have revenue higher as 
a percent of GDP.
    Senator Braun. And a couple years out of the last 50, so I 
just want to make sure you don't try to generalize that because 
that's been hard to attain. The other thing I'd like to point 
out is that with the economy as it's been constructed over the 
last three years, I'd make the contention that government has 
benefited most. The only part of our economic that actually 
brings prices down, enables you to raise wages would be for 
more business investment and government is another from of 
consumption and we're already a consumer driven economy based 
upon, I think, borrowing and spending as opposed to investing 
and saving.
    I'm about out of time here, even though I'm the last 
senator. We're not going to get to any agreement there. I would 
just want to put it on record. I think we're headed in a 
direction that we've never been there before in the history of 
our country. I would cite coming out of World War II where the 
last time we had government as a percentage of GDP where it's 
at now and we're not in a war. And we were savers and investors 
there. We paid it off to where we almost had no debt, built the 
interstate highway system.
    A lot of what you want to do through government I don't 
think is going to be sustainable when we don't put more 
discipline into the configuration. So, I think a lot of the 
things you talked about are in jeopardy because we just cannot, 
over time, when the facts and figures say we've never generated 
more than 17.5 to 18 percent of our GDP in federal revenues, 
having a federal government now, it's taking government to up 
to 25 percent higher than it was pre-COVID and we're not 
involved in a war.
    Think about that. I think we need to pay more attention to 
it or else I think the country, in the long run, is going to be 
going through some really tough times living beyond our means. 
Thank you for being here today.
    Director Young. Thank you, Senator Braun and you're no 
longer the last senator.
    Senator Lujan. Senator Graham, you're recognized.

                  STATEMENT OF SENATOR GRAHAM

    Senator Graham. Thank you. Welcome, Ms. Young.
    Director Young. Thank you.
    Senator Graham. I'm not going to ask you any questions. So, 
I'm just going to make a statement here about the budget. We've 
got problems with the budget over here and taxes and spending, 
but one thing about this budget that I think is not just unique 
to President Biden. The Defense side of this budget is not good 
for our country. It was a result of a deal negotiated, I think, 
with the former Speaker of the House and the Administration 
approved by the Senate.
    And I just want the American people to understand, from my 
point of view, for whatever it's worth, I've never seen this 
many threats at once. According to the FBI Director, wherever 
you look you see blinking red lights. ISIS is coming back in 
Afghanistan. We've got a land war in Europe. Everybody's 
running out of ammunition. Russia is outproducing the West. And 
you've got Israel in a fight for its life. So, the need to arm 
our allies is the greatest I've ever seen it, quite frankly.
    Literally, we're having to scramble to meet production 
needs. Hopefully, the aid package will get out of the House, 
but our ability to deter bad actors has completely gone away. 
There's no way to explain what's going on in the world, other 
than people believe that America is no longer a worthy 
opponent. After the withdrawal from Afghanistan, it not only 
has led to the rise of ISIS, which presents a threat to us, a 
broken border, on and on and on, a combination for another 9/11 
like I haven't seen before.
    But you see bad actors '21, the Taliban take back over 
Afghanistan; '22, Russia attacks Ukraine; '23 Hamas attacks 
Israel; '24, American soldiers killed in Jordan, of all places, 
by Iranian proxies. The world is literally on fire. And so, our 
Defense budget being presented by the Administration would take 
us to the lowest percentage of GDP spent on Defense like 
forever.
    In World War II, 37 percent of GDP was spent on Defense 
because we're in a fight for our lives. The world was being--
Hitler and Japan it was just a horrible time and that 
generation rose to the occasion; 14 percent of GDP on Defense 
during the Korean War; peak of the Cold War about 9 percent 
trying to make sure we stood up to the Soviet Union.
    On September 10, 2001, the day before 911, we're at 2.9; 
during the Global War on Terror the peak was 4.7 GDP spent on 
Defense. This budget in 2025 will be 3.2 percent. By 2034, 
we'll be spending 2.4 percent of Gross Domestic Product on our 
Defense. That makes zero sense, given what's going on in the 
world.
    Everybody worries about China. Well, you ought to. Our 
Navy, under this budget, goes from 298 ships to, I think, 292. 
The need for a Navy, according to combat China and other 
threats would be 450 ships, so we're going backwards. What 
would it take to get to 450 manned and unmanned ships, 5 
percent above inflation for a decade? We're spending below 
inflation. We're actually cutting into the bone. So, the number 
one job and goal of the federal government to me is to defend 
the nation. We're now having a Defense budget enacted that 
would be 2.4 percent negative growth. We need to grow from 3 to 
5 percent to match the threats we face.
    So, Ms. Young, this was not your doing. This was negotiated 
by other people, but I would say that of all the times I've 
been here, and I've been here a while, I've never seen both 
parties lose its edge when it comes to making sure our Defense 
Department has the resources to deal with increasing threats. 
This budget agreement has put us on track to have the lowest 
spending on Defense in modern history at a time the world is 
literally on fire. I will do everything I can to turn this 
trend around. The supplemental has money, not only for Israel, 
Taiwan, and Ukraine, it has money for our own defense needs, so 
I'm insistent that we pass that budget. Hopefully, that 
supplemental, hopefully, we can find a way to get it out of the 
House. I keep trying, non-interest forgivable loan, given $34 
trillion in debt may be the key, but when it comes to our 
Defense needs, this budget is not only inadequate, it puts us 
on a pathway to reduce our capabilities when all of our 
adversaries are increasing their capabilities, a nightmare in 
the making. Thank you. I want to thank Director Young for 
appearing before the Committee today. Her full written 
statement will be included in the record. Questions for the 
record are due by 12 o'clock noon tomorrow. We ask Director 
Young to respond to our questions within seven days of receipt. 
With no further business before the Committee, the hearing is 
adjourned. Thank you, Ms. Young.
    Director Young. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. That's 
bipartisanship.
    [Whereupon, at 12:10 p.m., Tuesday, March 12, 2024, the 
hearing was adjourned.]



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