[House Prints, 115th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]


115th Congress}                                            { Print

  2d Session  }              HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES	   { 115-15    

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                            COMMITTEE PRINT



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                        COMMITTEE ON THE BUDGET
                        HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
                        
                        
                        

          LEGISLATIVE HISTORY OF THE JOINT SELECT COMMITTEE ON
                BUDGET AND APPROPRIATIONS PROCESS REFORM



[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]


 December 19, 2018.--Committed to the Committee of the Whole House on 
            the State of the Union and ordered to be printed            
       
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           LEGISLATIVE HISTORY OF THE JOINT SELECT COMMITTEE
           
           
           
           
           
           
115th Congress}                                            { Print

  2d Session  }              HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES	   { 115-15    

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

                            COMMITTEE PRINT



                               ----------                              


                        COMMITTEE ON THE BUDGET
                        HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
                        
                        
                        

          LEGISLATIVE HISTORY OF THE JOINT SELECT COMMITTEE ON
                BUDGET AND APPROPRIATIONS PROCESS REFORM



[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]


 December 19, 2018.--Committed to the Committee of the Whole House on 
            the State of the Union and ordered to be printed



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                    U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE                    
*33-612                       WASHINGTON : 2019                     
          
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                            C O N T E N T S

                                                                   Page
Introduction.....................................................     3

Report of the Joint Select Committee on Budget and Appropriations 
  Process Reform.................................................     5

The Joint Select Committee on Budget and Appropriations Process 
  Reform Bill Text...............................................    15

Votes of the Joint Select Committee on Budget and Appropriations 
  Process Reform.................................................    39

Appendix.........................................................    53

  Hearings of the Joint Select Committee.........................    55
      Introduction...............................................    61
      April 17, 2018--Organizational Meeting Followed By Hearing 
        on Opportunities to Significantly Improve the Federal 
        Budget Process...........................................    65
      May 9, 2018--Bipartisanship in Budgeting...................   139
      May 24, 2018--The Budget Resolution-Content, Timeliness, 
        and Enforcement..........................................   207
      June 27, 2018--Members' Day: How to Significantly Reform 
        the Budget and Appropriations Process....................   301
      July 12, 2018--Opportunities to Improve the Appropriations 
        Process..................................................   479

  Congressional Budget Office Briefing Materials Prepared for the 
    Joint Select Committee.......................................   539

  Congressional Research Service Briefing Materials Prepared for 
    the Joint Select Committee...................................   547

  H.R. 7191......................................................   569

  Press Release Accompanying the Introduction of H.R. 7191.......   591



115th Congress}                                            { Print

  2d Session  }              HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES	   { 115-15    

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



 
                            COMMITTEE PRINT

                                _______
                                

    LEGISLATIVE HISTORY OF THE JOINT SELECT COMMITTEE ON BUDGET AND 
                     APPROPRIATIONS PROCESS REFORM

                                _______
                                

 December 19, 2018.--Committed to the Committee of the Whole House on 
            the State of the Union and ordered to be printed

                                _______
                                

                              INTRODUCTION

                              ----------                              


Dear Colleague:

    In the Second Session of the 115th Congress, I was honored 
to Co-Chair the Joint Select Committee on Budget and 
Appropriations Process Reform. As members of the U.S. House of 
Representatives, Article I entrusts in each of us the power of 
the purse. This is an awesome responsibility that I, and I know 
each of you, take very seriously. We owe it to the American 
people to have a process that works, and that was the goal of 
the Joint Select Committee--to produce recommendations to 
reform the federal budget and appropriations process.
    As you know, our Joint Select Committee produced a 
bipartisan, bicameral consensus package of reforms in advance 
of our statutory deadline of November 30, 2018. During our 
markup, amendments were subjected to a supermajority threshold 
to ensure those that passed reflected a true consensus of the 
panel. Some amendments passed unanimously. During the final 
debate on the bill, many members indicated that they had no 
objection to the package's underlying reforms. However, the 
bill and report developed over many months of hard work failed 
to secure the necessary supermajority of votes to pass under 
our Joint Select Committee's rules.
    Despite the unfortunate outcome of the Joint Select 
Committee's work, there is no refuting that the federal budget 
process is broken. It is vital that Congress continues these 
efforts to reform the budget and appropriations process this 
year, next year, and in the years beyond. I have assembled in 
this Budget Committee print all the relevant materials to this 
year's work. I urge all members to review this information. In 
this Committee print, you will find:

   The report of the Joint Select Committee on Budget 
and Appropriations Process Reform;
   The Co-chair's mark, as amended, and voted on, by 
the Joint Select Committee;
   The votes of the Joint Select Committee;
   Hearing transcripts of the Joint Select Committee's 
five public hearings;
   Congressional Budget Office briefing materials 
prepared for the Joint Select Committee;
   Congressional Research Service briefing materials 
prepared for the Joint Select Committee;
   H.R. 7191--a bill introduced in the House by myself 
and Representative Yarmuth, a Joint Select Committee Member and 
Ranking Member of the House Budget Committee; and
   The press release to accompany the introduction of 
H.R. 7191.

    It is my sincere hope that this important work will 
continue in the 116th Congress on a bipartisan and bicameral 
basis. I believe Members of Congress, Executive Branch 
officials, outside budget experts and academics, as well as 
engaged citizens, will find this material useful for future 
reform efforts.
    I would like to thank the Members of the Joint Select 
Committee on Budget and Appropriations Process Reform, our 
hardworking staffs, particularly Dan Keniry, David Reich, and 
Mary Popadiuk, as well as the House Rules Committee staff, Bob 
Weinhagen and Tom Cassidy in the Office of Legislative Counsel, 
budget experts at the Congressional Research Service and the 
Congressional Budget Office--particularly Mark Hadley and Teri 
Gullo--and House Parliamentarian Tom Wickham and his office, 
for the year of dedication.
    If you have any questions or would like additional 
information, please contact Dan Keniry, Staff Director of the 
House Budget Committee or Mary Popadiuk, General Counsel of the 
House Budget Committee at (202) 226-7270.
                                           Steve Womack
                                           Chairman
                                           Committee on the Budget
                                           
                                           
                                           

                       REPORT OF THE JOINT SELECT

                        COMMITTEE ON BUDGET AND

                     APPROPRIATIONS PROCESS REFORM

                              ----------                              


                                SUMMARY

    The Joint Select Committee on Budget and Appropriations 
Process Reform (JSCBAPR) was established by the Bipartisan 
Budget Act of 2018 (BBA 2018), Public Law 115-123, which was 
signed into law on February 9, 2018.\1\ The JSCBAPR was a 
bipartisan, bicameral panel tasked with considering and 
recommending legislative language to ``significantly reform the 
budget and appropriations process.''\2\ The JSCBAPR consisted 
of 16 members, equally divided between the House and Senate. 
The Speaker of the House, the Senate Majority Leader, the House 
Minority Leader, and the Senate Minority Leader each appointed 
four members to the committee.\3\ House Budget Committee 
Chairman Steve Womack (AR-3) and House Appropriations Committee 
Ranking Member Nita Lowey (NY-17) served as co-chairs of this 
panel.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \1\ Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018, P.L. 115-123 (2018).
    \2\ Id.
    \3\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
History
    The Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 
1974 (Budget Act) was enacted to establish an overall framework 
for the fairly decentralized process of making budget decisions 
in Congress--a process which involves numerous appropriations, 
authorizations, and revenue measures under the jurisdiction of 
various congressional committees and enacted on differing 
schedules. The Budget Act came five decades after 
centralization of Executive Branch budget decision making in 
what is now called the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).
    In part, the Budget Act was a response to Executive Branch 
challenges to the primacy in budgetary matters that the 
Constitution grants to Congress, including President Nixon's 
assertion of power to withhold spending of funds appropriated 
by Congress. Other factors include recognition of the growing 
complexity of the federal budget and concern over persistent 
budget deficits. The 92nd Congress created the Joint Study 
Committee on Budget Control, which called for procedural 
reforms to strengthen congressional budgeting. Following the 
actual impoundment of appropriated funds, Congress acted on the 
recommendations of the Joint Study Committee and passed the 
Budget Act in 1974.
    The Budget Act provides for annual enactment of 
congressional budget resolutions to help Congress make an 
overall budget plan and sets targets and limits for budget 
legislation to be considered during the year. It also 
established the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) to give 
Congress budget analysis capacity independent of the Executive 
Branch and created standing Committees on the Budget in the 
House and Senate to develop the annual budget resolutions and 
oversee the process.
    Since that time, Congress has reviewed the budget process 
periodically and amended the Budget Act on several occasions, 
including in 1985 and 1990. More recently, concerns about 
delays and procedural breakdowns in the budget process 
triggered the creation of the JSCBAPR to assess the current 
congressional budget and appropriations process and recommend 
reforms.
Procedures of the JSCBAPR
    The deadline for the JSCBAPR to vote on recommendations, 
legislative language, and an accompanying report was November 
30, 2018.\4\ Approval of the JSCBAPR proposed legislative and 
report language required the votes of a majority of the 
committee members appointed by the Speaker of the House and the 
Senate Majority Leader and a majority of the committee members 
appointed by the House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority 
Leader.\5\ This voting threshold was intended to ensure that 
the committee's recommendations and report comprised bipartisan 
reforms.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \4\ Id.
    \5\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Had the JSCBAPR approved the recommendations, the 
legislation and report would have been transmitted to the 
President, Vice President, the Speaker of the House of 
Representatives, and the Majority and Minority Leaders of each 
Chamber of Congress.\6\ The following would then have taken 
place:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \6\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    In the House of Representatives, the legislation would have 
been introduced and considered under regular order.
    In the Senate, the legislation would have been introduced 
on the next session day by the Majority Leader of the Senate or 
his designee.\7\ The bill would then have been referred to the 
Committee on the Budget, which would have been required to 
report the bill without any revision and with a favorable 
recommendation, with an unfavorable recommendation, or without 
recommendation no later than seven session days after the 
bill's introduction. If the Committee on the Budget failed to 
report the bill within that period, the bill would have been 
automatically discharged from the committee and placed on the 
appropriate calendar.\8\ The BBA 2018 also made in order for 
any Senator to move to proceed to consideration of the bill two 
days after it was reported or discharged from the Committee on 
the Budget. Debate on the motion was limited to ten hours, and 
the support of three-fifths of the Senate was necessary to 
consider and approve the motion.\9\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \7\ Id.
    \8\ Id.
    \9\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

                                PURPOSE

    There have been numerous breakdowns in the budget process 
in recent decades. Fiscal year 1995 was the last time Congress 
passed a conference report on the budget resolution followed by 
passage of thirteen separate appropriations bills before the 
beginning of the new fiscal year.\10\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \10\ Bill Heniff Jr., Congressional Budget Resolutions: Historical 
Information, Congressional Research Service, November 16, 2015.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Continuing resolutions (CRs) have become the status quo for 
funding the Federal Government, demonstrating Congress's 
failure to complete its work on time. CRs create uncertainty 
for agencies and the American people. In many years, there has 
been concern that parts of the government would have to shut 
down due to the failure to enact even stopgap appropriations, 
and shutdowns of various durations have actually occurred. In 
the 115th Congress alone, there have been two government 
shutdowns. Whether it is federal employees being furloughed, 
national parks shutting down, adverse effects on defense and 
law enforcement, shutdowns inflict severe damage and 
uncertainty on the nation's fiscal state. Additionally, 
multiple JSCBAPR members expressed frustration regarding the 
lack of legislative tools available for Congress to address 
national needs or the national debt in a bipartisan manner.

                            COMMITTEE ACTION

    The JSCBAPR held five public hearings, fulfilling the 
requirement set forth in the BBA 2018. In addition to these 
formal, open hearings, the JSCBAPR also held two closed 
briefings and multiple formal and informal meetings.
Hearings
April 17, 2018--Opportunities to Significantly Improve the 
Federal Budget Process

    During this hearing, members considered the current 
challenges facing the budget and appropriations process in 
Congress and discussed possibilities for improvement. Witnesses 
included:

   Douglas Holtz-Eakin, Ph.D., President, American 
Action Forum
   Martha Coven, J.D., Lecturer and John L. Weinberg/
Goldman Sachs & Co. Visiting Professor, Woodrow Wilson School 
of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University

May 9, 2018--Bipartisanship in Budgeting

    During this hearing, members discussed ways to ensure that 
the budget and appropriations process work effectively and in a 
bipartisan manner regardless of political dynamics. Witnesses 
included:

   G. William Hoagland, Senior Vice President, 
Bipartisan Policy Center
   Donald R. Wolfensberger, Fellow, Bipartisan Policy 
Center; Fellow, Woodrow Wilson International Center for 
Scholars
   Emily Holubowich, Participant, Convergence Building 
a Better Budget Process Project; Executive Director, Coalition 
for Health Funding
   Matthew Owens, Participant, Convergence Building a 
Better Budget Process Project; Vice President for Federal 
Relations and Administration, Association of American 
Universities

May 24, 2018--The Budget Resolution--Content, Timeliness, and 
Enforcement

    During this hearing, members examined the current purpose 
and role of the budget resolution and considered possible 
options, presented by expert witnesses, to bolster the budget 
resolution's impact and influence in the federal budget and 
appropriations process. Witnesses included:

   Maya MacGuineas, President, Committee for a 
Responsible Federal Budget
   James C. Capretta, Resident Fellow and Milton 
Friedman Chair, American Enterprise Institute
   Bill Dauster, Former Democratic Staff Director and 
Chief Counsel, Senate Budget Committee
   Joseph White, Professor, Department of Political 
Science and Center for Policy Studies, Case Western Reserve 
University

June 27, 2018--Members' Day

    During this hearing, members of both chambers of Congress 
testified before the JSCBAPR on their ideas for improving the 
budget and appropriations process. Members who testified before 
the JSCBAPR included:

   The Honorable Paul D. Ryan, Speaker, House of 
Representatives
   The Honorable Nancy D. Pelosi, Democratic Minority 
Leader, House of Representatives
   The Honorable Steny H. Hoyer, Democratic Minority 
Whip, House of Representatives
   Representative Hal Rogers (KY-05)
   Representative Pete Visclosky (IN-01)
   Representative Robert Aderholt (AL-04)
   Representative David Price (NC-04)
   Representative Rob Bishop (UT-01)
   Representative John Carter (TX-31)
   Representative Devin Nunes (CA-22)
   Senator Bob Corker (TN)
   Representative Jim Himes (CT-04)
   Representative Tom McClintock (CA-04)
   Representative Jim Renacci (OH-16)
   Representative Daniel Webster (FL-11)
   Representative Elizabeth Esty (CT-05)
   Representative Bill Foster (IL-11)
   Representative Keith Rothfus (PA-12)
   Senator Steve Daines (MT)
   Representative French Hill (AR-02)
   Representative Bruce Westerman (AR-04)
   Representative Warren Davidson (OH-08)
   Representative Pramila Jayapal (WA-07)
   Representative Roger Marshall (KS-01)
   Representative Lloyd Smucker (PA-16)
   Representative John Curtis (UT-03)
   Representative Ralph Norman (SC-05)

Additional statements were submitted for the record by:
   Representative Virginia Foxx (NC-05)
   Representative Mario Diaz-Balart (FL-25)
   Senator Dean Heller (NV)
   Representative Bradley Byrne (AL-01)
   Representative Paul Mitchell (MI-10)

July 12, 2018--Opportunities to Improve the Appropriations 
Process

    During this hearing, members considered the current 
challenges facing the appropriations process in Congress and 
discussed possibilities for improvement. Witnesses included:

   The Honorable Leon Panetta, Former Secretary of 
Defense, 2011-2013; Chairman, The Panetta Institute for Public 
Policy
   The Honorable David Obey, Former Chairman of House 
Appropriations Committee, 2007-2011
Briefings
April 11, 2018--Briefing with the Congressional Research 
Service

    Members of the JSCBAPR heard from experts from the 
Congressional Research Service (CRS) regarding the issues 
facing the budget and appropriations process, past reform 
efforts, and potential options for the JSCBAPR to explore.

July 17, 2018--Briefing with the Congressional Budget Office 
and the Congressional Research Service

    Members of the JSCBAPR heard from experts from CBO and CRS 
on implementation and potential impacts of reforms considered 
by the JSCBAPR.
Committee Meetings
    The JSCBAPR held multiple meetings, both formal and 
informal, since its establishment. These meetings provided a 
collegial opportunity for JSCBAPR members to discuss reforms to 
the budget and appropriations process. These meetings also 
provided the basis for the recommendations made in this report. 
A listing of the JSCBAPR's informal working sessions follows:

March 7, 2018--Initial JSCBAPR organizing meeting

August 22, 2018--JSCBAPR working group meeting

September 13, 2018--JSCBAPR working group meeting

September 26, 2018--JSCBAPR working group meeting

                            RECOMMENDATIONS

Biennial Budgeting
    Over the past few Congresses, there has been increasing 
support for a biennial budget. Since the first public meeting 
of the JSCBAPR, biennial budgeting has been viewed as a 
practical and necessary solution to the continued delays in the 
current budget and appropriations process. Additionally, the 
JSCBAPR heard repeatedly from witnesses, as well as from 
multiple outside organizations across the political spectrum, 
that biennial budgeting is an excellent starting point for any 
budget and appropriations reform effort.
    One of the principal arguments in favor of biennial 
budgeting is that it will allow for more time in the budget 
process. Providing a 302(a) allocation for two years to the 
Appropriations Committees at the beginning of a Congress will 
allow for a smoother appropriations process. It will also allow 
the Appropriators additional time to engage in dialogue with 
the Executive Branch on the Administration's priorities.
    Another key argument in favor of biennial budgeting is that 
it will allow for greater certainty in the budget process, 
particularly for Executive Branch entities. One of the chief 
complaints heard consistently by members of Congress and the 
JSCBAPR is that nearly every executive agency and department 
suffers under a protracted budget negotiation, delayed spending 
bills, and continuing resolutions.
    A biennial budget would also provide Congress additional 
time to conduct oversight on federal agencies and departments. 
When Appropriators and authorizers have more certainty, they 
can turn their attention to those entities that they fund and 
oversee, respectively. This also serves to buttress Congress's 
constitutional authority and ensures that appropriated funds 
are being used responsibly and authorized programs are 
implemented consistently with Congressional intent.
    Finally, biennial budgeting would free up time in the 
legislative calendar to enable Congress to not be mired down in 
annual budget resolution squabbles.
Second Session Revision of the Budget Resolution for Scoring Purposes
    A requirement of a biennial budget resolution would be 
authority in the second year of a biennium to adjust the budget 
resolution's spending and revenue levels, committee 
allocations, and other amounts to reflect an updated baseline 
used for scoring purposes.
Realistic Deadline for Congress to Complete Action on a Biennial Budget
    One of the challenges identified by the JSCBAPR was that 
Congress has continually failed to adopt a budget resolution by 
the statutorily required April 15th deadline. In those years in 
which Congress has adopted a budget resolution, it has adopted 
the budget resolution an average of 36 days after the target 
date.\11\ This deadline does not reflect a realistic timeline. 
To this end, the JSCBAPR believed that setting a realistic and 
achievable deadline of May 1st for the first year of the 
biennium would provide Congress an opportunity to complete its 
work on time.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \11\ This does not include fiscal year 1999, fiscal year 2003, 
fiscal year 2005, fiscal year 2007, and fiscal years 2011 through 2015. 
See Bill Heniff Jr., Congressional Budget Resolutions: Historical 
Information, Congressional Research Service, November 16, 2015.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Annual Supplemental Budget Submission by the President
    While JSCBAPR members recognized that Article I entrusts in 
the Congress the power of the purse, members also had an 
appreciation that there is critical data that Congress requires 
from the Executive Branch to begin the budget building process. 
Specifically, CBO cannot begin constructing its baseline for 
the upcoming fiscal year without receipt of data, particularly 
prior-year and current-year spending, that is normally 
transmitted with the President's budget request. Without 
receipt of CBO's baseline, Congress generally cannot begin 
writing its budget resolution. To create additional time for 
developing the baseline, and therefore, the budget resolution 
and various appropriations bills, the JSCBAPR believed that the 
Executive Branch should be required to provide a supplemental 
budget submission that is separate from the President's policy 
proposals no later than December 1st of each calendar year.
    This supplemental budget submission would include:

   Prior year fiscal data
   Current year fiscal data
   Credit re-estimates for the current year

    This data would allow CBO to begin constructing the 
baseline, as well as enable the Budget and Appropriations 
Committees to begin their respective work in writing the budget 
resolution and appropriations bills earlier in the process. The 
President would then submit policy proposals later in the 
process, which would be considered as Congress continues its 
work on the budget resolution and annual appropriations bills.
Encourage the Use of Best Practices in the Appropriations Process
    The JSCBAPR noted that Congress was more successful this 
year than in other recent years moving appropriations bills 
through the process on a timelier basis, with five fiscal year 
2019 appropriations measures, including the three largest, 
signed into law before the start of the fiscal year. One factor 
in this success appears to have been the strategic combination 
of individual bills into multi-bill packages for initial 
consideration by the House and Senate, as well as for the final 
conference stage.
    JSCBAPR members recommended that the Appropriations 
Committees review the record of recent practices for 
consideration of appropriations bills, identify practices which 
have been helpful in expediting action and increasing 
opportunities for member involvement at various stages of 
consideration, and build those successful practices into their 
work for future years. JSCBAPR members also recommended that 
the Appropriations Committees and other committees with 
responsibilities in this area study the best ways of using the 
new biennial budget resolution schedule to expedite 
congressional work on appropriations and other budgetary 
legislation.
Reconstitute Senate Budget Committee
    JSCBAPR members noted that the Senate Budget Committee 
should be reconstituted to include the Appropriations and 
Finance Chairs and Ranking Members and make it comprised of 
eight members from the majority and seven members from the 
minority. This would elevate the Senate Budget Committee to be 
more prominent and foster greater seriousness and 
bipartisanship to its important work.
Add Bipartisan Budget Resolution in the Senate
    JSCBAPR members noted that the budget process has become 
exceedingly partisan in recent years. Partisan posturing has 
contributed to numerous budget and appropriations delays and 
threats of government shutdowns. Political disagreement on the 
debt limit has imposed unnecessary costs on our nation's 
economy. This budget option would have fostered bipartisan work 
on the Senate Budget Committee. In addition to the other 
requirements of Section 301 of the Congressional Budget Act, a 
bipartisan budget resolution would have required to include a 
target for the ratio of the public debt to the gross domestic 
product and a multi-year glideslope for achieving it. The 
glideslope would have included the four primary drivers of 
deficits: health care spending, tax expenditures, discretionary 
appropriations, and revenue levels. The glideslope could have 
also included other economic and policy targets such as 
employment, income equality, and economic growth.
    Committee approval of a bipartisan budget resolution 
required a majority of Democratic members and a majority of 
Republican members. The Senate Majority and Minority Leaders 
would then have been empowered to agree on expedited floor 
consideration including limited debate and amendment votes. To 
be considered a bipartisan budget, a conferenced budget 
resolution or House budget resolution must have included the 
content requirements described above.
    Upon passage in both chambers, a bipartisan budget 
resolution would trigger biannual reporting by the 
Congressional Budget Office. This reporting requirement 
remained unless displaced by passage of a subsequent bipartisan 
budget resolution. Senate passage of a reconciliation bill 
pursuant to a bipartisan budget resolution would have required 
15 votes from the minority party.
Annual Reconciliation
    Under a biennial budgeting model, it was the JSCBAPR's view 
that the annual reconciliation process should be preserved. 
JSCBAPR's legislative intent was for reconciliation to remain 
an annual exercise. Reconciliation instructions would have been 
based on a single fiscal year, consistent with annual 
appropriations. JSCBAPR's legislative recommendations amended 
current law to clarify that reconciliation may be used each 
fiscal year of a biennium. As a result, a budget resolution 
could provide directives to one or more committees for each 
fiscal year of a biennium and over a specified period of the 
budget window; (e.g. five or ten years). Congress should have 
the ability to consider reconciliation legislation at any point 
during a biennium and have the use of reconciliation's 
expedited procedures each fiscal year to legislatively address 
mandatory spending, revenue, the debt limit, or any combination 
thereof.

    A review of the historical use of reconciliation 
demonstrates its success in significantly reducing the deficit, 
particularly in the 1980s. The JSCBAPR believed that this 
practice - the use of annual reconciliation to reduce the 
deficit - should be encouraged in future Congresses.
Require a Joint Budget Committee Hearing on the Fiscal State of the 
        Nation
    Members of the JSCBAPR believed that members of Congress 
must have access to nonpartisan information about the many 
factors contributing to the nation's debt and deficit in order 
to develop sound fiscal policies and meet our long-debt and 
deficit reduction goals. To accomplish this, JSCBAPR members 
recommended the House and Senate Budget Committees should be 
required to hold a biennial, joint hearing with testimony from 
the Comptroller General of the United States regarding the 
audited financial statement of the Executive Branch. This 
`Fiscal State of the Nation' hearing would have needed to occur 
at least once during the second session of a Congress after a 
biennial budget resolution is adopted and would have enabled 
members to assess the nation's long-term fiscal sustainability. 
As a joint hearing, the chairs of the Budget Committees should 
have alternated presiding and hosting the hearing each 
Congress. The JSCBAPR encouraged the chairs of the Budget 
Committees to follow House and Senate rules when convening the 
Fiscal State of the Nation hearing. Therefore, the chairs of 
the Budget Committees would have been encouraged to make a 
public announcement of the date, place, and subject matter of 
the hearing at least seven calendar days before the hearing. 
All members of Congress would be invited to attend the hearing, 
and the JSCBAPR strongly encouraged the chairs of the Budget 
Committees to agree to allow all members to waive onto their 
respective Budget Committee for the hearing by unanimous 
consent. A video recording of the Fiscal State of the Nation 
hearing would have been made publicly available on the Budget 
Committees' websites.
    Members of the JSCBAPR also recommended establishing 
additional forums for all members of Congress to access the 
information presented in the Fiscal State of the Nation 
hearing. To accomplish this goal, members of the JSCBAPR 
encouraged the House and Senate to implement the following 
recommendations:
    First, all four party caucuses in the House and Senate 
would have been encouraged to hold a biennial meeting with the 
same content presented by the witnesses from the required joint 
Fiscal State of the Nation hearing held by the Budget 
Committees. The JSCBAPR also encouraged the caucuses to include 
in those meetings a briefing from the Congressional Budget 
Office (CBO) to educate members on the function and role of CBO 
in the budget process.
    Second, the House and Senate should have incorporated 
content from the Fiscal State of the Nation hearing, and an 
introductory briefing from CBO, into the official orientation 
process for all newly-elected members of Congress conducted by 
the Committee on House Administration and the Secretary of the 
Senate, respectively. These new member orientations typically 
take place prior to the new members being sworn in and include 
briefings on the legislative process, congressional rules, and 
ethics policies. The JSCBAPR believed this is the ideal forum 
to present the findings from the most recent Fiscal State of 
the Nation hearing to new members of the House and Senate and 
educate them on the critical role of CBO in the budget process. 
Accordingly, the JSCBAPR urged the Committee on House 
Administration and the Secretary of the Senate to ensure that 
these two training opportunities would be provided for all new 
members.
Include Total Combined Outlays and Revenues for Tax Expenditures as an 
        Optional Item in the Budget Resolution
    JSCBAPR members expressed interest in providing greater 
transparency regarding tax expenditures because they are a 
major component of the federal budget. Therefore, JSCBAPR 
members believed that total combined outlays and revenues for 
tax expenditures should have been an optional item in the 
budget resolution's text.

                       THE JOINT SELECT COMMITTEE

                      ON BUDGET AND APPROPRIATIONS

                        PROCESS REFORM BILL TEXT

                              ----------                              


    The following text is the Co-Chair's Mark, as amended, and 
voted on by The Joint Select Committee on Budget and 
Appropriations Process Reform on November 29, 2018.
                                                        
 
                                      (Original Signature of Member)
115th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                 H. R. __

   To implement the recommendations of the Joint Select Committee on 
               Budget and Appropriations Process Reform.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES



Mr. Womack (for himself and Mrs. Lowey) introduced the following bill; 
         which was referred to the Committee on _______________

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
   To implement the recommendations of the Joint Select Committee on 
               Budget and Appropriations Process Reform.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE; TABLE OF CONTENTS.

    (a) Short Title.--This Act may be cited as the ``Bipartisan Budget 
and Appropriations Reform Act of 2018''.
    (b) Table of Contents.--The table of contents for this Act is as 
follows:

Sec. 1. Short title; table of contents.
                  TITLE I--BIENNIAL BUDGET RESOLUTIONS

Sec. 101. Purposes.
Sec. 102. Definitions.
Sec. 103. Revision of timetable.
Sec. 104. Biennial concurrent resolutions on the budget.
Sec. 105. Committee allocations.
Sec. 106. Revision of biennial budget.
Sec. 107. Additional amendments to the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 
                            to effectuate biennial budgeting.
Sec. 108. Reconciliation process.
Sec. 109. Bipartisan budget resolution.
Sec. 110. Effective date.
                        TITLE II--OTHER MATTERS

Sec. 201. Views and estimates of committees.
Sec. 202. Annual supplemental budget submission by the President.
Sec. 203. Hearing on the fiscal state of the Nation.
Sec. 204. Reform of Senate Budget Committee.

                  TITLE I--BIENNIAL BUDGET RESOLUTIONS

SEC. 101. PURPOSES.

    Paragraph (2) of section 2 of the Congressional Budget and 
Impoundment Control Act of 1974 is amended to read as follows:
            ``(2) to facilitate the determination biennially of the 
        appropriate level of Federal revenues and expenditures by the 
        Congress;''.

SEC. 102. DEFINITIONS.

    Section 3 of the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act 
of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 622) is amended--
            (1) in paragraph (4), by striking ``for a fiscal year'' 
        each place it appears and inserting ``for a biennium''; and
            (2) by adding at the end the following new paragraphs:
            ``(12) The term `direct spending' has the meaning given to 
        such term in section 250(c)(8) of the Balanced Budget and 
        Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985.
            ``(13) The term `biennium' means any period of 2 
        consecutive fiscal years beginning with an even-numbered fiscal 
        year.
            ``(14) The term `budget year' has the meaning given that 
        term in section 250(c)(12) of the Balanced Budget and Emergency 
        Control Act of 1985.''.

SEC. 103. REVISION OF TIMETABLE.

    Section 300 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 631) 
is amended to read as follows:

                              ``timetable

    ``Sec. 300. The timetable with respect to the congressional budget 
process for any Congress is as follows:


                                                 ``First Session
On or before:                             Action to be completed:
First Monday in February................  President submits budget.
February 15.............................  Congressional Budget Office submits report to Budget Committees.
 March 1................................  Committees submit views and estimates to Budget Committees.
April 1.................................  Senate Budget Committee reports biennial budget.
May 1...................................  Congress completes action on the biennial budget.
May 15..................................  Appropriation bills may be considered in the House of Representatives.
June 10.................................  House Appropriations Committee reports last annual appropriation bill.
October 1...............................  First fiscal year of the biennium begins.
 



                                                ``Second Session
On or before:                             Action to be completed:
First Monday in February................  President submits budget.
February 15.............................  Congressional Budget Office submits report to Budget Committees.
June 10.................................  House Appropriations Committee reports last annual appropriation bill.
October 1...............................  Second fiscal year of the biennium begins.''.
 

SEC. 104. BIENNIAL CONCURRENT RESOLUTIONS ON THE BUDGET.

    (a) Contents of Resolution.--
            (1) In general.--Section 301(a) of the Congressional Budget 
        Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 632(a)) is amended--
                    (A) by striking the matter preceding paragraph (1) 
                beginning with ``On or before April 15'' and inserting 
                the following: ``On or before May 1 of each odd-
                numbered calendar year, the Congress shall complete 
                action on a concurrent resolution on the budget for the 
                biennium beginning on October 1 of that calendar year. 
                The concurrent resolution shall set forth appropriate 
                levels for each fiscal year in the biennium and for at 
                least each fiscal year in the next 2 bienniums for the 
                following--'';
                    (B) in paragraph (6)--
                            (i) by striking ``for the fiscal year'' and 
                        inserting ``for each fiscal year in the 
                        biennium''; and
                            (ii) by striking ``and'' at the end;
                    (C) in paragraph (7)--
                            (i) by striking ``for the fiscal year'' and 
                        inserting ``for each fiscal year in the 
                        biennium''; and
                            (ii) by striking the period at the end and 
                        inserting ``; and'';
                    (D) by adding after paragraph (7) the following:
            ``(8) subtotals of new budget authority and outlays for 
        nondefense discretionary spending; defense discretionary 
        spending; direct spending; and net interest.''; and
                    (E) by adding at the end of the matter following 
                paragraph (8) (as added by subparagraph (D)) the 
                following: ``The concurrent resolution on the budget 
                for a biennium shall include procedures for adjusting 
                spending and revenue levels, committee allocations, and 
                other amounts in the resolution during the second 
                session of a Congress to reflect an updated baseline 
                that will be used for scoring purposes.''.
    (b) Additional Matters in Concurrent Resolution.--Section 301(b) of 
the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 632(b)) is amended--
            (1) in paragraph (3), by striking ``for such fiscal year'' 
        and inserting ``for either fiscal year in such biennium'';
            (2) in paragraph (8), by striking ``and'' at the end;
            (3) in paragraph (9), by striking the period at the end and 
        inserting ``; and''; and
            (4) by adding at the end the following:
            ``(10) include total combined outlays and revenues for tax 
        expenditures.''.
    (c) Hearings and Report.--Section 301(e)(1) of the Congressional 
Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 632(e)) is amended by striking ``fiscal 
year'' and inserting ``biennium''.
    (d) Goals for Reducing Unemployment.--Section 301(f) of the 
Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 632(f)) is amended by 
striking ``fiscal year'' each place it appears and inserting 
``biennium''.
    (e) Economic Assumptions.--Section 301(g) of the Congressional 
Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 632(g)) is amended by striking ``for a 
fiscal year'' and inserting ``for a biennium''.
    (f) Section Heading.--The section heading of section 301 of the 
Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 632) is amended by striking 
``annual adoption of'' and inserting ``adoption of biennial''.

SEC. 105. COMMITTEE ALLOCATIONS.

    Section 302 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 633) 
is amended--
            (1) in subsection (a)(1)--
                    (A) by striking ``for that period of fiscal years'' 
                and inserting ``for all fiscal years covered by the 
                resolution''; and
                    (B) by striking ``only for the fiscal year of that 
                resolution'' and inserting ``only for each fiscal year 
                of the biennium'';
            (2) in subsection (c)--
                    (A) by striking ``subsection (a)'' and inserting 
                ``subsection (a)(1)'';
                    (B) by striking ``for a fiscal year'' and inserting 
                ``for a budget year''; and
                    (C) by striking ``for that fiscal year'' and 
                inserting ``for that budget year'';
            (3) in subsection (f)(1)--
                    (A) by striking ``for a fiscal year''; and
                    (B) by striking ``the first fiscal year'' and 
                inserting ``either fiscal year of the biennium of that 
                resolution''; and
            (4) in subsection (f)(2)(A), by--
                    (A) striking ``first fiscal year'' and inserting 
                ``either fiscal year of the biennium of that 
                resolution''; and
                    (B) striking ``the total of fiscal years'' and 
                inserting ``the total of all fiscal years covered by 
                the resolution''.

SEC. 106. REVISION OF BIENNIAL BUDGET.

    Section 304 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 635) 
is amended to read as follows:

    ``permissible revisions of concurrent resolutions on the budget

    ``Sec. 304. At any time after the concurrent resolution on the 
budget has been agreed to pursuant to section 301 and before the end of 
the biennium, the two Houses may adopt a concurrent resolution that 
revises or reaffirms the most recently agreed to concurrent resolution 
on the budget. Any concurrent resolution that revises or reaffirms the 
most recently agreed to concurrent resolution on the budget shall be 
considered under the procedures set forth in section 305.''.

SEC. 107. ADDITIONAL AMENDMENTS TO THE CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET ACT OF 1974 
              TO EFFECTUATE BIENNIAL BUDGETING.

    (a) Enforcement of Section 303.--Section 303 of the Congressional 
Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 634) is amended--
            (1) in subsection (a)--
                    (A) by striking ``for a fiscal year'' and inserting 
                ``for a biennium''; and
                    (B) by striking ``the first fiscal year covered by 
                that resolution'' and inserting ``either fiscal year of 
                that biennium'';
            (2) in subsection (b)(1)(B), by striking ``the fiscal 
        year'' and inserting ``the biennium''; and
            (3) in subsection (c)--
                    (A) in paragraph (1)--
                            (i) by striking ``for a fiscal year'' and 
                        inserting ``for a biennium''; and
                            (ii) by striking ``for that year'' in each 
                        instance and inserting ``for each year of that 
                        biennium''; and
                    (B) in paragraph (2), by striking ``after the year 
                the allocation referred to in that paragraph is made'' 
                and inserting ``after the years the allocations 
                referred to in that paragraph are made''.
    (b) Section 305.--Subsections (a)(3) and (b)(3) of section 305 of 
the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 636) are amended by 
striking ``for a fiscal year''.
    (c) Section 311 Point of Order.--
            (1) In the house of representatives.--Section 311(a)(1) of 
        the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 642(a)) is 
        amended--
                    (A) by striking ``for a fiscal year'';
                    (B) by striking ``the first fiscal year'' each 
                place it appears and inserting ``either of the first 
                two fiscal years covered by such resolution''; and
                    (C) by striking ``that first fiscal year'' and 
                inserting ``either of the first two fiscal years''.
            (2) In the senate.--Section 311(a)(2) of the Congressional 
        Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 642(a)(2)) is amended--
                    (A) in subparagraph (A), by striking ``for the 
                first fiscal year'' and inserting ``for either of the 
                first two fiscal years''; and
                    (B) in subparagraph (B)--
                            (i) by striking ``that first fiscal year'' 
                        the first place it appears and inserting 
                        ``either of the first two fiscal years''; and
                            (ii) by striking ``that first fiscal year 
                        and the ensuing fiscal years'' and inserting 
                        ``all fiscal years''.
            (3) Social security levels.--Section 311(a)(3) of the 
        Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 642(a)(2)) is 
        amended by--
                    (A) striking ``for the first fiscal year'' and 
                inserting ``for either of the first two fiscal years''; 
                and
                    (B) striking ``that fiscal year and the ensuing 
                fiscal years'' and inserting ``all fiscal years''.

SEC. 108. RECONCILIATION PROCESS.

    Section 310(a) of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 
641(a)) is amended--
            (1) in the matter before paragraph (1), by striking ``A 
        concurrent'' and all that follows through ``shall'' and 
        inserting ``A concurrent resolution on the budget for a 
        biennium shall, for each fiscal year of the biennium'';
            (2) in paragraph (1)(A), by striking ``for such fiscal 
        year'' and inserting ``for each fiscal year of the biennium'';
            (3) in paragraph (1)(C), by striking ``such fiscal year'' 
        and inserting ``each fiscal year of the biennium''; and
            (4) in paragraph (1)(D), by striking ``such fiscal year'' 
        and inserting ``each fiscal year of the biennium''.

SEC. 109. BIPARTISAN BUDGET RESOLUTION.

    (a) Definition.--Section 3 of the Congressional Budget and 
Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 622), as amended by section 
102, is further amended by adding at the end the following:
            ``(15) The term `bipartisan budget resolution' means a 
        concurrent resolution on the budget for a biennium--
                    ``(A) ordered reported to the Senate by the 
                Committee on the Budget of the Senate by an affirmative 
                vote of not less than half of the Senators that are 
                members of the majority party in the Senate and not 
                less than half of the Senators that are members of the 
                minority party in the Senate;
                    ``(B) that establishes--
                            ``(i) a target for the ratio of the public 
                        debt to the gross domestic product as of the 
                        end of the period covered by the concurrent 
                        resolution or a later date; and
                            ``(ii) for each fiscal year covered by the 
                        concurrent resolution, targets for--
                                    ``(I) the ratio of the public debt 
                                to the gross domestic product;
                                    ``(II) the amount of health care 
                                spending by the Government;
                                    ``(III) the amount of tax 
                                expenditures;
                                    ``(IV) the amount of discretionary 
                                appropriations (as defined in section 
                                250 of the Balanced Budget and 
                                Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985 
                                (2 U.S.C. 900)); and
                                    ``(V) the amount of revenues; and
                    ``(C) which may include other economic or policy 
                targets.''.
    (b) Consideration of Bipartisan Budget Resolutions.--Section 305 of 
the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 
636) is amended by adding at the end the following:
    ``(e) Procedures in the Senate for Bipartisan Budget Resolutions.--
            ``(1) Other expedited process.--In the Senate, upon the 
        agreement of the majority leader and the minority leader, 
        additional procedures to expedite consideration of a bipartisan 
        budget resolution (which may include limiting the number of 
        amendments upon which the Senate shall vote) shall apply to 
        consideration of the bipartisan budget resolution. The majority 
        leader shall submit a written statement for the Congressional 
        Record reflecting any agreement described in this paragraph.
            ``(2) Passage.--In the Senate, a bipartisan budget 
        resolution shall be agreed to only upon the affirmative vote of 
        not less than--
                    ``(A) three-fifths of the Members, duly chosen and 
                sworn; and
                    ``(B) 15 Members that are members of the minority 
                party in the Senate.
            ``(3) Amendments between the houses and conference 
        reports.--To be considered a bipartisan budget resolution, a 
        conference report or an amendment between the Houses on a 
        concurrent resolution on the budget shall--
                    ``(A) comply with section 3(15)(B); and
                    ``(B) be agreed to in the Senate by an affirmative 
                vote of not less than--
                            ``(i) three-fifths of the Members, duly 
                        chosen and sworn; and
                            ``(ii) 15 Members that are members of the 
                        minority party in the Senate.''.
    (c) Reconciliation Under Bipartisan Budget Resolutions.--Section 
310(e)(2) of the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 
1974 (2 U.S.C. 641(e)(2)) is amended--
            (1) by inserting ``(A)'' before ``Debate''; and
            (2) by adding at the end the following:
            ``(B) In the Senate, a reconciliation bill reported under 
        subsection (b) pursuant to reconciliation instructions in a 
        bipartisan budget resolution, a House amendment thereto, and a 
        conference report thereon shall be agreed to only upon the 
        affirmative vote of not less than--
                    ``(i) a majority of the Members voting, a quorum 
                being present; and
                    ``(ii) 15 Members that are members of the minority 
                party in the Senate.''.
    (d) Reporting.--Section 202 of the Congressional Budget and 
Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 603) is amended by adding at 
the end the following:
    ``(h) Report on Ratio of the Public Debt to the Gross Domestic 
Product.--On and after the date on which the first bipartisan budget 
resolution is agreed to, the Director of the Congressional Budget 
Office shall submit to Congress semiannual reports on the ratio of the 
public debt to the gross domestic product, which shall evaluate whether 
the targets in the most recently agreed to bipartisan budget resolution 
have been met.''.

SEC. 110. EFFECTIVE DATE.

    This title and the amendments made by this title shall take effect 
immediately before noon January 3, 2019.

                        TITLE II--OTHER MATTERS

SEC. 201. VIEWS AND ESTIMATES OF COMMITTEES.

    Section 301(d) of the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control 
Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 632(d)) is amended to read as follows:
    ``(d) Views and Estimates of Other Committees.--
            ``(1) In general.--Not later than March 1 of the first 
        session of a Congress, or upon the request of the Committee on 
        the Budget of the House of Representatives or the Senate, each 
        committee of the House of Representatives and the Senate having 
        legislative jurisdiction shall submit to its respective 
        Committee on the Budget its views and estimates (as determined 
        by the committee making such submission) with respect to the 
        following:
                    ``(A) Any legislation to be considered during that 
                Congress that is a priority for the committee.
                    ``(B) Any legislation within the jurisdiction of 
                the committee that would establish, amend, or 
                reauthorize any Federal program and likely have a 
                significant budgetary impact.
            ``(2) Additional matters.--Any committee of the House of 
        Representatives or the Senate and any joint committee of the 
        Congress may submit to the appropriate Committees on the Budget 
        its views and estimates with respect to all matters set forth 
        in subsections (a) and (b) which relate to matters within its 
        jurisdiction.
            ``(3) Joint economic committee.--The Joint Economic 
        Committee shall submit to the Committees on the Budget of both 
        Houses its recommendations as to the fiscal policy appropriate 
        to the goals of the Employment Act of 1946.''.

SEC. 202. ANNUAL SUPPLEMENTAL BUDGET SUBMISSION BY THE PRESIDENT.

    Section 1106 of title 31, United States Code, is amended by adding 
at the end the following:
    ``(d) On or before December 1 of each calendar year, the President 
shall submit to Congress an administrative budget for the fiscal year 
beginning in the ensuing calendar year, which shall include up-to-date 
estimates for current year and prior year data and credit reestimates 
for the current year (as included in the Federal credit supplement of 
such budget).''.

SEC. 203. HEARING ON THE FISCAL STATE OF THE NATION.

    (a) In General.--Not later than 45 days (excluding Saturdays, 
Sundays, and holidays) after the date on which the Secretary of the 
Treasury submits to Congress the audited financial statement required 
under paragraph (1) of section 331(e) of title 31, United States Code, 
on a date agreed upon by the chairs of the Committees on the Budget of 
the House of Representatives and the Senate and the Comptroller General 
of the United States, the chairs shall conduct a hearing to receive a 
presentation from the Comptroller General reviewing the findings of the 
audit required under paragraph (2) of such section and providing, with 
respect to the information included by the Secretary in the report 
accompanying such audited financial statement, an analysis of the 
financial position and condition of the Federal Government, including 
financial measures (such as the net operating cost, income, budget 
deficits, or budget surpluses) and sustainability measures (such as the 
long-term fiscal projection or social insurance projection) described 
in such report.
    (b) Effective Date.--The requirement under subsection (a) shall 
apply with respect to any audited financial statement submitted on or 
after the date of the enactment of this Act.

SEC. 204. REFORM OF SENATE BUDGET COMMITTEE.

    In the Senate, the Committee on the Budget shall be composed of 15 
members as follows:
            (1) Six members who are a member of or caucus with the 
        political party in the majority in the Senate, of which 1 of 
        whom shall be designated as the Chairman by the members of the 
        committee.
            (2) Five members who are a member of or caucus with the 
        political party in the minority in the Senate, of which 1 of 
        whom shall be designated as the Ranking Member by the members 
        of the committee.
            (3) The Chairman and Ranking Member of the Committee on 
        Appropriations.
            (4) The Chairman and Ranking Member of the Committee on 
        Finance.

                       VOTES OF THE JOINT SELECT

                        COMMITTEE ON BUDGET AND

                     APPROPRIATIONS PROCESS REFORM

                              ----------                              


    By unanimous consent, the Joint Select Committee on Budget 
and Appropriations Process Reform applied a voting rule for the 
adoption of amendments consistent with the rule required by law 
for final adoption of the Joint Select Committee's 
recommendations. Under that rule, passage or adoption required 
separate majorities of the appointees from each party.

 1. An amendment offered by Senator Bennett and Senator 
        Lankford to reform the membership of the Senate Budget 
        Committee. The amendment would reconstitute the 
        membership of the Senate Budget Committee to include 8 
        members from the majority and 7 members from the 
        minority in addition to the Chairs and Ranking Members 
        of both the Senate Appropriations and Finance 
        Committees.

        The amendment was agreed to by a roll call vote of 7 
        ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the Speaker 
        of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and of 6 
        ayes and 1 no of the Members appointed by the House 
        Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.


                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 1
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........     X   .....  .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......     X   .....  .......
Rep. Sessions..........................  .....  .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............     X   .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......     X   .....  .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....  .....  .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


 2. An amendment offered by Representative Woodall to eliminate 
        functional categories in the budget resolution in lieu 
        of budget authority and outlays for the following 
        categories: nondefense discretionary spending, defense 
        discretionary spending, direct spending, and net 
        interest. The amendment would also require the 
        inclusion of a debt-to-GDP ratio.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        7 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 0 ayes and 7 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 2
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....     X   .......
Rep. Sessions..........................  .....  .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....     X   .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....     X   .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............  .....     X   .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....  .....  .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


 3. An amendment offered by Senator Whitehouse, Senator Blunt, 
        and Senator Perdue to establish an optional bipartisan 
        path for the budget resolution in the Senate.

        The amendment was agreed to by a roll call vote of 7 
        ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the Speaker 
        of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and of 7 
        ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the House 
        Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 3
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........     X   .....  .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......     X   .....  .......
Rep. Sessions..........................  .....  .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............     X   .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......     X   .....  .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....  .....  .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


 4. An amendment offered by Senator Schatz to include tax 
        expenditures in the list of subtotals reported in the 
        biennial budget.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        3 ayes and 5 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 7 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 4
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................  .....     X   .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........     X   .....  .......
Senator Blunt..........................  .....     X   .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....  .....  .......
Rep. Sessions..........................  .....     X   .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............     X   .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................  .....     X   .......  Senator Bennet...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......     X   .....  .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Arrington.........................  .....     X   .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........     X   .....  .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


 5. An amendment offered by Senator Perdue to increase the 
        threshold for passing the budget resolution in the 
        Senate from a simple majority (51 votes) to a super 
        majority (60 votes).

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        3 ayes and 4 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 0 ayes and 8 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 5
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................  .....     X   .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................  .....     X   .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....     X   .......
Rep. Sessions..........................  .....  .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....     X   .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....     X   .......
Senator Lankford.......................  .....     X   .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................  .....     X   .......  Rep. Kilmer..............  .....     X   .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....     X   .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 6. An amendment offered by Senator Perdue to turn 50 hours of 
        debate on the budget resolution in the Senate into 50 
        hours of consideration.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        7 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 0 ayes and 8 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 6
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................  .....  .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....     X   .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....     X   .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....     X   .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............  .....     X   .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....     X   .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


 7. An amendment offered by Representative Kilmer to prohibit 
        any reconciliation bill that would cause or increase a 
        deficit or reduce a surplus over the period of years 
        covered by the reconciliation instructions in the 
        budget resolution.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        0 ayes and 8 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 8 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 7
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................  .....     X   .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........     X   .....  .......
Senator Blunt..........................  .....     X   .......  Senator Whitehouse.......     X   .....  .......
Rep. Sessions..........................  .....     X   .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............     X   .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................  .....     X   .......  Senator Bennet...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Woodall...........................  .....     X   .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......     X   .....  .......
Senator Lankford.......................  .....     X   .......  Senator Schatz...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Arrington.........................  .....     X   .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................  .....     X   .......  Senator Hirono...........     X   .....  .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 8. An amendment offered by Senator Lankford to include 
        reconciliation directives as a required element in the 
        contents of the budget resolution.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        8 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 0 ayes and 7 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 8
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....  .....  .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....     X   .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....     X   .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............  .....     X   .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....     X   .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


 9. An amendment offered by Senator Lankford to make 
        reconciliation a mandatory element of the budget 
        resolution. The amendment would also establish a new 20 
        percent limitation on provisions in a reconciliation 
        bill that either increase direct spending or reduce 
        revenues beyond 20 percent of the gross savings in the 
        budget resolution's reconciliation directives.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        6 ayes and 2 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 0 ayes and 7 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 9
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................  .....     X   .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....  .....  .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....     X   .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....     X   .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................  .....     X   .......  Rep. Kilmer..............  .....     X   .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....     X   .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

10. An amendment offered by Senator Blunt, Senator Whitehouse, 
        and Representative Woodall to maintain annual 
        reconciliation.

        The amendment was agreed to by a roll call vote of 8 
        ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the Speaker 
        of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and of 8 
        ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the House 
        Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 10
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........     X   .....  .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......     X   .....  .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............     X   .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......     X   .....  .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........     X   .....  .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


11. An amendment offered by Representative Sessions to 
        establish a permanent bipartisan, bicameral debt 
        reduction committee.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        7 ayes and 1 no of the Members appointed by the Speaker 
        of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and of 1 
        aye and 7 noes of the Members appointed by the House 
        Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 11
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....     X   .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....     X   .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....     X   .......
Senator Lankford.......................  .....     X   .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....     X   .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

12. An amendment offered by Senator Hirono to authorize the 
        Treasury Secretary to suspend the debt ceiling.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        0 ayes and 7 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 6 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 12
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................  .....     X   .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........     X   .....  .......
Senator Blunt..........................  .....  .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......     X   .....  .......
Rep. Sessions..........................  .....     X   .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....  .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................  .....     X   .......  Senator Bennet...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Woodall...........................  .....     X   .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....  .....  .......
Senator Lankford.......................  .....     X   .......  Senator Schatz...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Arrington.........................  .....     X   .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................  .....     X   .......  Senator Hirono...........     X   .....  .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


13. An amendment offered by Representative Arrington and 
        Senator Lankford to limit and ultimately phase out the 
        use of changes in mandatory programs (CHIMPs).

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        8 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 0 ayes and 6 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 13
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....     X   .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....  .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....  .....  .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............  .....     X   .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....     X   .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

14. An amendment offered by Representative Kilmer to require 
        the House and Senate Budget Committees to hold a joint 
        committee hearing on the Fiscal State of the Nation.

        The amendment was agreed to by a roll call vote of 8 
        ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the Speaker 
        of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and of 6 
        ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the House 
        Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 14
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........     X   .....  .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......     X   .....  .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....  .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....  .....  .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........     X   .....  .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


15. An amendment offered by Senator Schatz to include total 
        outlays and revenues for tax expenditures as an 
        optional item in the budget resolution.

        The amendment was agreed to by a roll call vote of 8 
        ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the Speaker 
        of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and of 6 
        ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the House 
        Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 15
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........     X   .....  .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......     X   .....  .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....  .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....  .....  .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........     X   .....  .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

16. An amendment offered by Senator Perdue to align the fiscal 
        year with the calendar year and incorporate milestones 
        into the funding process connected with penalties. The 
        milestones are based on a percentage of completion of 
        funding bills signed into law (25/50/75/100). The 
        penalties connected with these milestones includes no 
        recess or use of official funds for member travel if 
        these funding milestones are not met.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        8 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 0 ayes and 7 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 16
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....     X   .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....  .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....     X   .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............  .....     X   .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....     X   .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


17. An amendment offered by Senator Perdue to incorporate 
        milestones into the funding process connected with 
        penalties. The milestones are based on a percentage of 
        completion of funding bills signed into law (25/50/75/
        100). The penalties connected with these milestones 
        includes no recess or use of official funds for member 
        travel if these funding milestones are not met.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        8 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 1 aye and 6 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 17
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....     X   .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....  .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....     X   .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....     X   .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

18. An amendment offered by Senator Ernst and Senator Lankford 
        to establish live quorum calls if the Senate fails to 
        adopt a budget resolution by May 1st or fails to pass 
        all regular appropriations bills by October 1st.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        8 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 1 aye and 6 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 18
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....     X   .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....  .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....     X   .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....     X   .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


19. An amendment offered by Senator Ernst to prohibit the 
        Senate from recessing or adjourning if it fails to pass 
        all regular appropriations bills by October 1st of each 
        year.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        8 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 1 aye and 6 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 19
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....     X   .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....  .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....     X   .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....     X   .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

20. An amendment offered by Senator Ernst to prohibit the 
        Senate from recessing or adjourning if it fails to pass 
        a budget resolution by May 1st of an odd-numbered 
        calendar year.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        8 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 1 aye and 6 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 20
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....     X   .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....  .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....     X   .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....     X   .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


21. An amendment offered by Senator Ernst to prohibit the 
        obligation or expenditure of funds for official travel 
        by a Senator if the Senate fails to adopt a budget 
        resolution by May 1st of each odd-numbered year or all 
        appropriation bills individually or collectively, by 
        October 1st of each year.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        8 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 1 aye and 6 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 21
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....     X   .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....  .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....     X   .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....     X   .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

22. An amendment offered by Representative Arrington, 
        Representative Kilmer, and Senator Ernst to expand the 
        prohibition against adjournment resolutions in the 
        House to include the August recess.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        8 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 2 ayes and 5 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 22
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....     X   .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....  .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....     X   .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....     X   .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


23. An amendment offered by Senator Perdue to align the fiscal 
        year with the calendar year.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        8 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 2 ayes and 5 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 23
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....     X   .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....     X   .......
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....  .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Bennet...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....     X   .......
Senator Lankford.......................     X   .....  .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............  .....     X   .......
Senator Ernst..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Hirono...........     X   .....  .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

24. An amendment offered by Representative Roybal-Allard on 
        behalf of Representative Yarmuth to repeal the 
        statutory discretionary spending limits.

        The amendment was not agreed to by a roll call vote of 
        1 aye and 7 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader and 
        of 7 ayes and 0 noes of the Members appointed by the 
        House Minority Leader and the Senate Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 24
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................  .....     X   .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........     X   .....  .......
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......     X   .....  .......
Rep. Sessions..........................  .....     X   .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............  .....  .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................  .....     X   .......  Senator Bennet...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Woodall...........................  .....     X   .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......     X   .....  .......
Senator Lankford.......................  .....     X   .......  Senator Schatz...........     X   .....  .......
Rep. Arrington.........................  .....     X   .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................  .....     X   .......  Senator Hirono...........     X   .....  .......
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


25. Vote on the bill as amended and the report as amended.

        The bill and report as amended was not agreed to by a 
        roll call vote of 1 aye and 7 noes of the Members 
        appointed by the Speaker of the House and the Senate 
        Majority Leader and of 7 ayes and 0 noes of the Members 
        appointed by the House Minority Leader and the Senate 
        Minority Leader.

                                              ROLL CALL VOTE NO. 25
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Republicans                 Aye     No   Present          Democrats           Aye     No   Present
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Co-Chair Womack........................     X   .....  .......  Co-Chair Lowey...........  .....  .....       X
Senator Blunt..........................     X   .....  .......  Senator Whitehouse.......  .....  .....       X
Rep. Sessions..........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Yarmuth.............     X   .....  .......
Senator Perdue.........................  .....     X   .......  Senator Bennet...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Woodall...........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Roybal-Allard.......  .....  .....       X
Senator Lankford.......................  .....     X   .......  Senator Schatz...........  .....     X   .......
Rep. Arrington.........................     X   .....  .......  Rep. Kilmer..............     X   .....  .......
Senator Ernst..........................  .....     X   .......  Senator Hirono...........  .....  .....       X
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


                                APPENDIX

                              ----------                              


    This appendix includes five items produced by the Joint 
Select Committee on Budget and Appropriations Process Reform 
(JSCBAPR). The first consists of the complete transcripts of 
the five public hearings held by the JSCBAPR. The second and 
third items are briefing materials prepared by the 
Congressional Budget Office and the Congressional Research 
Service for the JSCBAPR. The fourth is H.R. 7191, a bill 
introduced by Representative Steve Womack, Chairman of the 
House Committee on the Budget, and Representative John Yarmuth, 
the Ranking Member of the House Committee on the Budget. This 
bill reflects the work of the JSCBAPR and excludes only those 
recommendations that dealt solely with Senate procedure and the 
Senate Budget Committee. The final item is the press release 
that accompanied the introduction of H.R. 7191.

                          Hearing Transcripts

    Following the creation of the JSCBAPR in February 2018, the 
Committee held five public hearings, fulfilling the requirement 
in the BBA 2018.\12\ The JSCBAPR held the following hearings.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \12\ Id.

April 17, 2018--Opportunities to Significantly Improve the 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Federal Budget Process

May 9, 2018--Bipartisanship in Budgeting

May 24, 2018--The Budget Resolution--Content, Timeliness, and 
Enforcement

June 27, 2018--Members' Day

July 12, 2018--Opportunities to Improve the Appropriations 
Process

    A complete compilation of the transcripts of each of these 
Hearings follows:



                 HEARINGS OF THE JOINT SELECT COMMITTEE

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

                       JOINT SELECT COMMITTEE ON
                       BUDGET AND APPROPRIATIONS
                             PROCESS REFORM

                     ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION


                               __________


              HEARINGS HELD IN WASHINGTON, D.C., APRIL 17,
               MAY 9, MAY 24, JUNE 27, AND JULY 12, 2018


                               __________

                            Serial No. 115-1

                               __________


           Printed for the use of the Joint Select Committee


                       Available on the Internet:
                            www.govinfo.gov
                  JOINT SELECT COMMITTEE ON BUDGET AND
                     APPROPRIATIONS PROCESS REFORM

Republicans                          Democrats
REP. STEVE WOMACK, Arkansas          REP. NITA LOWEY, New York
  Co-Chair                             Co-Chair
SEN. ROY BLUNT, Missouri             SEN. SHELDON WHITEHOUSE,
REP. PETE SESSIONS, Texas              Rhode Island
SEN. DAVID PERDUE, Georgia           REP. JOHN YARMUTH, Kentucky
REP. ROB WOODALL, Georgia            SEN. MICHAEL BENNET, Colorado
SEN. JAMES LANKFORD, Oklahoma        REP. LUCILLE ROYBAL-ALLARD, 
REP. JODEY ARRINGTON, Texas              California
SEN. JONI ERNST, Iowa                SEN. BRIAN SCHATZ, Hawaii
                                     REP. DEREK KILMER, Washington
                                     SEN. MAZIE HIRONO, Hawaii
                            
                            
                            C O N T E N T S

                                                                   Page

INTRODUCTION.....................................................    61

                               __________

                             APRIL 17, 2018

ORGANIZATIONAL MEETING FOLLOWED BY HEARING ON: OPPORTUNITIES TO 
  SIGNIFICANTLY IMPROVE THE FEDERAL BUDGET PROCESS...............    65

    Hon. Steve Womack, Co-Chair, Joint Select Committee..........    66
        Prepared statement of....................................    68
    Hon. Nita M. Lowey, Co-Chair, Joint Select Committee.........    70
        Prepared statement of....................................    71
    Martha Coven, J.D., Lecturer and John L. Weinberg/Goldman 
      Sachs & Co. Visiting Professor, Woodrow Wilson School of 
      Public and International Affairs, Princeton University.....    88
        Prepared statement of....................................    90
    Douglas Holtz-Eakin, Ph.D., President, American Action Forum.    95
        Prepared statement of....................................    97
    Hon. Lucille Roybal-Allard, Joint Select Committee, statement 
      submitted for the record...................................   126
    Hon. Steve Womack, Co-Chair, Joint Select Committee, 
      questions to Ms. Martha Coven submitted for the record.....   127
        Ms. Martha Coven's answers to questions submitted for the 
          record.................................................   128
    Hon. Steve Womack, Co-Chair, Joint Select Committee, 
      questions to Dr. Douglas Holtz-Eakin submitted for the 
      record.....................................................   131
        Dr. Douglas Holtz-Eakin's answers to questions submitted 
          for the record.........................................   132
    Hon. David Perdue, Joint Select Committee, questions to Ms. 
      Martha Coven submitted for the record......................   134
        Ms. Martha Coven's answers to questions submitted for the 
          record.................................................   135
    Hon. David Perdue, Joint Select Committee, questions to Dr. 
      Douglas Holtz-Eakin submitted for the record...............   137
        Dr. Douglas Holtz-Eakin's answers to questions submitted 
          for the record.........................................   138

                               __________

                              MAY 9, 2018

BIPARTISANSHIP IN BUDGETING......................................   139

    Hon. Steve Womack, Co-Chair, Joint Select Committee..........   139
        Prepared statement of....................................   140
    Hon. Nita M. Lowey, Co-Chair, Joint Select Committee.........   141
        Prepared statement of....................................   142
    G. William Hoagland, Senior Vice President, Bipartisan Policy 
      Center, U.S. Senate Staff 1982-2007........................   143
        Prepared statement of....................................   146
    Donald R. Wolfensberger, Fellow, Bipartisan Policy Center, 
      Fellow, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars...   151
        Prepared statement of....................................   154
        Supplemental statement of................................   158
    Emily Holubowich, Participant, Convergence Building a Better 
      Budget Process Project; Executive Director, Coalition for 
      Health Funding.............................................   162
        Prepared statement of....................................   164
        Addendum to the Testimony of Emily Holubowich............   167
    Matt Owens, Participant, Convergence Building a Better Budget 
      Process Project, Vice President for Federal Relations and 
      Administration, Association of American Universities (AAU).   170
        Prepared statement of....................................   172
    Hon. Sheldon Whitehouse, Joint Select Committee..............   198
        Letter submitted for the record..........................   198
    Hon. Sheldon Whitehouse, Joint Select Committee, question to 
      Emily J. Holubowich and M. Matthew Owens submitted for the 
      record.....................................................   204
        Emily J. Holubowich and M. Matthew Owens's answer to a 
          question submitted for the record......................   205

                               __________

                              MAY 24, 2018

THE BUDGET RESOLUTION--CONTENT, TIMELINESS, AND ENFORCEMENT......   207

    Hon. Steve Womack, Co-Chair, Joint Select Committee..........   207
        Prepared statement of....................................   209
    Hon. Nita M. Lowey, Co-Chair, Joint Select Committee.........   211
        Prepared statement of....................................   212
    Maya MacGuineas, President, Committee for a Responsible 
      Federal Budget.............................................   213
        Prepared statement of....................................   216
    James C. Capretta, Resident Fellow, Milton Friedman Chair, 
      American Enterprise Institute..............................   224
        Prepared statement of....................................   226
    Bill Dauster, Former Democratic Staff Director and Chief 
      Counsel, Senate Budget Committee...........................   236
        Prepared statement of....................................   238
    Joseph White, Professor, Department of Political Science and 
      Center for Policy Studies, Case Western Reserve University.   242
        Prepared statement of....................................   244
        Congressional Budget Office letter submitted for the 
          record.................................................   275

                               __________

                             JUNE 27, 2018

MEMBERS' DAY: HOW TO SIGNIFICANTLY REFORM THE BUDGET AND 
  APPROPRIATIONS PROCESS.........................................   301

    Hon. Steve Womack, Co-Chair, Joint Select Committee..........   301
        Prepared statement of....................................   303
    Hon. Nita M. Lowey, Co-Chair, Joint Select Committee.........   304
        Prepared statement of....................................   305
    Hon. Paul D. Ryan, Speaker of the House of Representatives 
      from the State of Wisconsin................................   306
        Prepared statement of....................................   310
    Hon. Nancy Pelosi, Democratic Minority Leader of the House of 
      Representatives from the State of California...............   316
        Prepared statement of....................................   320
    Hon. Steny H. Hoyer, Democratic Whip of the House of 
      Representatives from the State of Maryland.................   324
        Prepared statement of....................................   327
    Hon. Bob Corker, United States Senator from the State of 
      Tennessee..................................................   329
        Prepared statement of....................................   331
    Hon. Peter J. Visclosky, U.S. House of Representatives from 
      the State of Indiana.......................................   334
        Prepared statement of....................................   336
    Hon. Devin Nunes, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of California........................................   340
        Prepared statement of....................................   342
    Hon. Keith J. Rothfus, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of Pennsylvania......................................   344
        Prepared statement of....................................   346
    Hon. Lloyd Smucker, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of Pennsylvania......................................   348
        Prepared statement of....................................   350
    Hon. Warren Davidson, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of Ohio..............................................   353
        Prepared statement of....................................   355
    Hon. J. French Hill, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of Arkansas..........................................   357
        Prepared statement of....................................   359
    Hon. James B. Renacci, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of Ohio..............................................   363
        Prepared statement of....................................   365
    Hon. Pramila Jayapal, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of Washington........................................   368
        Prepared statement of....................................   371
    Hon. David E. Price, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of North Carolina....................................   373
        Prepared statement of....................................   376
    Hon. Steve Daines, United States Senator from the State of 
      Montana....................................................   382
        Prepared statement of....................................   385
    Hon. Robert B. Aderholt, U.S. House of Representatives from 
      the State of Alabama.......................................   390
        Prepared statement of....................................   392
    Hon. Elizabeth H. Esty, U.S. House of Representatives from 
      the State of Connecticut...................................   399
        Prepared statement of....................................   401
    Hon. Tom McClintock, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of California........................................   405
        Prepared statement of....................................   407
    Hon. Bill Foster, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of Illinois..........................................   410
        Prepared statement of....................................   412
    Hon. Bruce Westerman, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of Arkansas..........................................   414
        Prepared statement of....................................   416
    Hon. John Curtis, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of Utah..............................................   421
        Prepared statement of....................................   423
    Hon. Jim Himes, U.S. House of Representatives from the State 
      of Connecticut.............................................   426
        Prepared statement of....................................   428
    Hon. Roger Marshall, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of Kansas............................................   430
        Prepared statement of....................................   432
    Hon. Hal Rogers, U.S. House of Representatives from the State 
      of Kentucky................................................   434
        Prepared statement of....................................   436
    Hon. Daniel Webster, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of Florida...........................................   442
        Prepared statement of....................................   444
    Hon. Ralph Norman, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
      State of South Carolina....................................   446
        Prepared statement of....................................   448
    Additional statements submitted for the record:                
              ...................................................
        Hon. Rob Bishop, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
          State of Utah..........................................   450
        Hon. John Carter, U.S. House of Representatives from the 
          State of Texas.........................................   459
        Hon. Bradley Byrne, U.S. House of Representatives from 
          the State of Alabama and Hon. Paul Mitchell, U.S. House 
          of Representatives from the State of Michigan..........   462
        Hon. Mario Diaz-Balart, U.S. House of Representatives 
          from the State of Florida..............................   470
        Hon. Virginia Foxx, U.S. House of Representatives from 
          the State of North Carolina............................   473
        Hon. Dean Heller, United States Senator from the State of 
          Nevada, submitted a letter for the record..............   477

                               __________

                             JULY 12, 2018

OPPORTUNITIES TO IMPROVE THE APPROPRIATIONS PROCESS..............   479

    Hon. Steve Womack, Co-Chair, Joint Select Committee..........   479
        Prepared statement of....................................   481
    Hon. Nita M. Lowey, Co-Chair, Joint Select Committee.........   483
        Prepared statement of....................................   484
    Hon. Leon E. Panetta, Former Secretary of Defense, 2011-2013; 
      Chairman, The Panetta Institute for Public Policy and 
      Former Secretary of Defense................................   485
        Prepared statement of....................................   489
    Hon. David R. Obey, Former Chairman of House Appropriations 
      Committee, 2007-2011.......................................   498
        Prepared statement of....................................   501


 
                              INTRODUCTION

                              ----------                              


                  The Joint Select Committee on Budget

                   and Appropriations Process Reform

The Joint Select Committee on Budget and Appropriations Process 
Reform (JSCBAPR) was established by the Bipartisan Budget Act 
of 2018 (BBA 2018), which was signed into law on February 9, 
2018.\1\ The JSCBAPR is a bipartisan and bicameral panel tasked 
with considering and recommending legislative language that 
will ``significantly reform the budget and appropriation 
process.'' The JSCBAPR is comprised of 16 members, equally 
divided between the House and Senate. Four members each were 
appointed by the Speaker of the House, the Senate Majority 
Leader, the House Minority Leader, and the Senate Minority 
Leader. House Budget Committee Chairman Steve Womack (R-AR) and 
House Appropriations Ranking Member Nita Lowey (D-NY) serve as 
co-chairs of this panel.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \1\ Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018, P.L. 115-123 (2018).

Members Appointed by the Speaker:
Representative Steve Womack (AR-3)
Representative Pete Sessions (TX-32)
Representative Rob Woodall (GA-7)
Representative Jodey Arrington (TX-19)

Members Appointed by the House Minority Leader:
Representative Nita Lowey (NY-17)
Representative John Yarmuth (KY-3)
Representative Lucille Roybal-Allard (CA-40)
Representative Derek Kilmer (WA-6)

Members Appointed by the Senate Majority Leader:
Senator Roy Blunt (MO)
Senator David Perdue (GA)
Senator James Lankford (OK)
Senator Joni Ernst (IA)

Members Appointed by the Senate Minority Leader:
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (RI)
Senator Michael Bennet (CO)
Senate Brian Schatz (HI)
Senator Mazie Hirono (HI)

The deadline for the JSCBAPR to vote on recommendations, 
legislative language, and an accompanying report was November 
30, 2018.\2\ For the JSCBAPR to report recommendations, 
including legislative language and an accompanying report, it 
required votes of a majority of the committee members appointed 
by the Speaker of the House of Representatives and the Majority 
Leader of the Senate; and a majority of the committee members 
appointed by the Minority Leader of the House of 
Representatives and the Minority Leader of the Senate.\3\ This 
voting threshold was intended to ensure that these 
recommendations and this report are comprised of bipartisan 
solutions.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \2\ Id.
    \3\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

                                Purpose

JSCBAPR was created in part because Congress has not followed 
regular order for the congressional budget and appropriations 
processes for more than two decades. Fiscal year 1995 was the 
last time Congress passed a conference report on the budget 
resolution and thirteen separate appropriations bills before 
the beginning of the fiscal year.\4\ Congress has continually 
failed to complete its work before the start of the fiscal year 
and as a result, continuing resolutions (CRs) have become the 
norm for funding the federal government.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \4\ Grant A. Driessen, The Federal Budget: Overview and Issues for 
FY2019 and Beyond, Congressional Research Service, May 21, 2018.

Members have also expressed concerns regarding the lack of 
legislative tools available for Congress to address the 
national debt in a bipartisan manner. In 2018, the national 
debt eclipsed $21 trillion and is projected to rise to $34 
trillion by 2028 unless Congress acts. The JSCBAPR viewed its 
purpose through the lens of these challenges: a broken budget 
process and an unsustainable fiscal trajectory.

                                Hearings

Following the creation of the JSCBAPR in February 2018, the 
Committee held five public hearings, fulfilling the requirement 
in the BBA 2018.\5\ In addition to these public hearings, the 
JSCBAPR has also held two closed briefings and multiple formal 
and informal meetings. The JSCBAPR held the following hearings.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \5\ Id.

April 17, 2018--Opportunities to Significantly Improve the 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Federal Budget Process

During this hearing, members considered the current challenges 
facing the budget and appropriations processes in Congress and 
discussed possibilities for improvement. Witnesses included:

   Douglas Holtz-Eakin, Ph.D., President, American 
Action Forum
   Martha Coven, J.D., Lecturer and John L. Weinberg/
Goldman Sachs & Co. Visiting Professor, Woodrow Wilson School 
of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University

May 9, 2018--Bipartisanship in Budgeting

During this hearing, members discussed ways to ensure that the 
budget and appropriations processes work in a bipartisan manner 
and are effective regardless of political dynamics. Witnesses 
included:

   G. William Hoagland, Senior Vice President, 
Bipartisan Policy Center
   Donald R. Wolfensberger, Fellow, Bipartisan Policy 
Center; Fellow, Woodrow Wilson International Center for 
Scholars
   Emily Holubowich, Participant, Convergence Building 
a Better Budget Process Project; Executive Director, Coalition 
for Health Funding
   Matt Owens, Participant, Convergence Building a 
Better Budget Process Project; Vice President for Federal 
Relations and Administration, Association of American 
Universities (AAU)

May 24, 2018--The Budget Resolution--Content, Timeliness, and 
Enforcement

During this hearing, members examined the current purpose and 
role of the budget resolution and considered possible options, 
presented by expert witnesses, to bolster the budget 
resolution's impact and influence in the federal budget and 
appropriations processes. Witnesses included:

   Maya MacGuineas, President, Committee for a 
Responsible Federal Budget
   James C. Capretta, Resident Fellow and Milton 
Friedman Chair, American Enterprise Institute
   Bill Dauster, Former Democratic Staff Director and 
Chief Counsel, Senate Budget Committee
   Joseph White, Professor, Department of Political 
Science and Center for Policy Studies, Case Western Reserve 
University

June 27, 2018--Members' Day

During this hearing, members of both chambers of Congress 
testified before the JSCBAPR on their ideas for improving the 
budget and appropriations processes. Members who testified 
before the JSCBAPR included:

   The Honorable Paul D. Ryan, Speaker of the House of 
Representatives
   The Honorable Nancy P. Pelosi, Democratic Minority 
Leader of the House of Representatives
   The Honorable Steny H. Hoyer, Democratic Whip of the 
House of Representatives
   Representative Hal Rogers (KY-05)
   Representative Pete Visclosky (IN-01)
   Representative Robert Aderholt (AL-04)
   Representative David Price (NC-04)
   Representative Rob Bishop (UT-01)
   Representative John Carter (TX-31)
   Representative Devin Nunes (CA-22)
   Senator Bob Corker (TN)
   Representative Jim Himes (CT-04)
   Representative Tom McClintock (CA-04)
   Representative Jim Renacci (OH-16)
   Representative Daniel Webster (FL-11)
   Representative Elizabeth Esty (CT-05)
   Representative Bill Foster (IL-11)
   Representative Keith Rothfus (PA-12)
   Senator Steve Daines (MT)
   Representative French Hill (AR-02)
   Representative Bruce Westerman (AR-04)
   Representative Warren Davidson (OH-08)
   Representative Pramila Jayapal (WA-07)
   Representative Roger Marshall (KS-01)
   Representative Lloyd Smucker (PA-16)
   Representative John Curtis (UT-03)
   Representative Ralph Norman (SC-05)

Additional statements submitted for the record:

   Representative Virginia Foxx (NC-05)
   Representative Mario Diaz-Balart (FL-25)
   Senator Dean Heller (NV)
   Representative Bradley Byrne (AL-01)
   Representative Paul Mitchell (MI-10)

July 12, 2018--Opportunities to Improve the Appropriations 
Process

During this hearing, members considered the current challenges 
facing the appropriations process in Congress and discussed 
possibilities for improvement. Witnesses included:

   The Honorable Leon Panetta, Former Secretary of 
Defense, 2011-2013; Chairman, The Panetta Institute for Public 
Policy and Former Secretary of Defense
   The Honorable David Obey, Former Chairman of House 
Appropriations Committee, 2007-2011



    ORGANIZATIONAL MEETING FOLLOWED BY HEARING ON: OPPORTUNITIES TO 
            SIGNIFICANTLY IMPROVE THE FEDERAL BUDGET PROCESS

                              ----------                              


                        TUESDAY, APRIL 17, 2018

                          House of Representatives,
                      Joint Select Committee on Budget and 
                             Appropriations Process Reform,
                                                   Washington, D.C.
    The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:32 a.m. in Room 
HVC-210, Capitol Visitor Center, Hon. Steve Womack and Hon. 
Nita M. Lowey [co-chairs of the committee] presiding.
    Present: Representatives Womack, Sessions, Woodall, 
Arrington, Lowey, Yarmuth, Roybal-Allard, and Kilmer.
    Senators Blunt, Perdue, Lankford, Ernst, Whitehouse, 
Bennet, Schatz, and Hirono.
    Co-Chair Womack. Good morning. The committee will come to 
order.
    I want to welcome everyone, and welcome to the first public 
hearing of the Joint Select Committee on Budget and 
Appropriations Process Reform. Before we begin our hearing, we 
will first conduct the organizational meeting.
    After our administrative business, the co-chair and I 
intend to recognize members for opening statements. I encourage 
opening statements at the hearing. In future hearings we hope 
to minimize them.
    Finally, we will hear from our distinguished witnesses who 
have joined us.
    Before we consider the committee's rules, we would like to 
designate the committee's staff director. Pursuant to the co-
chair's authority under the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018, Dan 
Keniry, who currently serves as the staff director for the 
House Budget Committee, will serve as the Joint Select 
Committee staff director, with the understanding that he will 
consult with David Reich, counsel to Co-Chair Lowey.
    We will now consider the committee's rules of procedure. 
The proposed rules have been shared with all members of the 
committee. These rules set out the committee's procedures and 
are consistent with both House rules and the Bipartisan Budget 
Act of 2018. If there are any questions, staff are available to 
answer those queries.
    The committee will now proceed to the consideration of the 
committee rules package. My understanding is that we will have 
no amendments. So I would like to move from the chair to the 
adoption of the rule.
    Senator Lankford. Mr. Chairman, can I ask one question, a 
parliamentary inquiry?
    Co-Chair Womack. The gentleman will state his inquiry.
    Senator Lankford. My question was I had raised before just 
a clarification on what a majority is. The way the actual bill 
was written is it is unclear whether a majority--it is a 
majority from each party or a majority total. So that could be 
10 people to pass the final product or 12 people. Has that been 
clarified yet?
    Co-Chair Womack. Based on guidance that the co-chairs have 
received, 10 votes total, including a minimum of 5 Republicans 
and 5 Democrats, are required to report the committee's 
legislative recommendations and report.
    Senator Lankford. Thank you. Thanks for putting that on the 
record.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you.
    Today's formal hearing record will provide this guidance.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Mr. Chairman, our staffs have consulted 
regarding these rules. We are both in agreement. This is a 
pretty simple, plain vanilla package. The committee will be 
fundamentally guided by the legislation that set it up, but 
these rules provide a useful supplement. So I move that the 
proposed rules be adopted and that the co-chairs be authorized 
to submit them for printing in the Congressional Record.
    Co-Chair Womack. Within a timeframe specific? Thirty days?
    Co-Chair Lowey. Correct.
    Co-Chair Womack. Okay.
    Is there any debate on the motion by the co-chair?
    If not, the question is on the motion offered by the 
gentlelady from New York.
    All those in favor, say aye.
    Those opposed, no.
    The ayes have it. The rules package is adopted.
    That concludes the business portion of the meeting.
    Now we will begin the hearing portion of the meeting, and I 
yield myself 5 minutes.
    Established by the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018, our panel 
of 16 members is charged with the task of significantly 
reforming the budget and appropriations process. Prior to this 
hearing, our panel has met twice to start the conversation and 
identify the problems. While this Select Committee is comprised 
of a diversity of political thought, we have clearly shared a 
common goal from the start. We believe that the current process 
isn't working, and reform is long overdue.
    Perhaps the most visible sign of dysfunction is that 
Congress has not followed regular order for the budget process 
for more than 20 years. Fiscal 1995 was the last time Congress 
passed a budget conference agreement followed by all of the 
separate appropriation bills before the beginning of the fiscal 
year.
    Since then it has become commonplace for Congress to rely 
on short-term funding measures and continuing resolutions in 
order to avoid government shutdowns, and even those efforts 
have not always been successful.
    It is our job to keep the government's lights on. We have 
failed to do it five times. The most important role given to 
Congress under the Constitution is the power of the purse. This 
panel is charged with ensuring we can fulfill this essential 
duty.
    It is no mistake that our Constitution begins in Article I 
by describing the powers and role of the legislative branch, 
and I believe that any proposals of this panel should affirm 
the distinct role intended by our Founding Fathers. Congress 
should always be at the center of deciding budget and spending 
issues for our nation.
    While respecting the role of the other two branches of 
government, any recommendations from this committee should 
reflect improvements to the congressional process rather than 
offer prescriptions for specific budgetary outcomes that 
benefit Republicans or Democrats. Our goal is to ensure a 
framework that works regardless of what party holds the 
majority in either Chamber of Congress.
    And it is my hope that we can come to agreement on 
recommendations and ultimately develop legislation that 
significantly reforms the budget and appropriations process. If 
we can design a better budget process to allow Congress to more 
effectively put forward its proposals, the budgetary outcomes 
will ultimately be returned to the American people through the 
elections.
    While the Bipartisan Budget Act requires that our panel 
come up with solutions by November 30, I believe we can and 
should get agreement on solutions sooner. So in the coming days 
and weeks, it is important that we quickly and thoughtfully 
move through our work. As we identify possible solutions, I 
urge my colleagues to bring up proposals that encourage and 
incentivize the completion of budget and appropriations work on 
time.
    In recent years, there have been four 2-year budget 
agreements. Our work should build on this trend, developing an 
overarching framework for Congress and ensuring certainty for 
funding decisions earlier.
    I look forward to today's discussion with experts on the 
advantages and disadvantages of various fixes. Today we will 
have two esteemed witnesses to help talk us through ideas for 
solutions.
    I am pleased to welcome Dr. Douglas Holtz-Eakin, who was 
appointed as Director of Congressional Budget Office in 2003 
and led the agency for nearly 3 years. He served on President 
George W. Bush's Council of Economic Advisers, and he is 
currently president of the American Action Forum.
    Also joining us is Martha Coven, who previously served at 
the Office of Management and Budget and at the Domestic Policy 
Council during the Obama administration. Prior to her work in 
the executive branch, she spent several years at the Center on 
Budget and Policy Priorities. Currently a lecturer and visiting 
professor at Princeton University.
    Thank you.
    And with that, I yield to the distinguished co-chair, the 
gentlelady from New York, Mrs. Lowey.
    [The prepared statement of Co-Chair Womack follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT] 
    
    Co-Chair Lowey. And I would like to say thank you and 
welcome to Co-Chairman Womack, all of our members and 
witnesses, to the first public meeting of the Joint Select 
Committee.
    We all have our discontents with the budget process. Having 
recently emerged from the marathon negotiations over the 2018 
omnibus appropriations package, I would put at the top of my 
list not enacting spending bills until the fiscal year is half 
over, our reliance on numerous short-term continuing 
resolutions, and appropriations getting bogged down by 
extraneous issues.
    But the process itself, which has served Congress well in 
the past, is not the fundamental cause of all these problems. 
The root cause of our current situation has much more to do 
with deep policy disagreements, often over issues that 
shouldn't be part of appropriation bills and a lack of 
political will.
    Procedural reforms alone are insufficient. But perhaps an 
improved process could facilitate reaching and implementing 
agreements when there is the will to do so. And perhaps changes 
to the process could help change some norms and expectations 
about how we function. It is well worth consideration.
    What kinds of problems should we be tackling? I would like 
to find a way to reach much earlier agreement on topline totals 
we need in order to make serious progress on appropriations 
bills. Among other things, that would make consideration of 
appropriation bills in the House and Senate much more 
meaningful as we would be working with common totals and bills 
more likely to be enacted, rather than leaving all that to the 
last minute.
    I would also like to find a better way of handling the debt 
ceiling, a process that currently serves no useful purpose but 
invites brinksmanship that menaces our economy. And I would 
like to find ways to once again make budget resolutions more 
meaningful and more useful.
    I look forward to working with my colleagues on this panel 
and to making progress on the task we have been given.
    Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Co-Chair Lowey follows:]
    [GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the Co-Chair.
    We are in the opening statements' portion of this hearing, 
and we will alternate House and Senate and Republican and 
Democrat.
    And with that, I will yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from 
Georgia, Senator Perdue.
    Senator Perdue. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    I really am honored to be a part of this Select Committee. 
I don't think there is anything this year that we are going to 
do that will have a longer-term potential impact on the fiscal 
nature of our country and our ability to do what we all want to 
do. We are losing the right to do the right things financially.
    First of all, my learned opinion after the last 3 years of 
looking at this very, very closely is that our budget, and I am 
going to include our funding process in the United States 
Senate, is totally broken. While our appropriations process in 
the House indeed does work, I agree with the Co-Chair, Mrs. 
Lowey, that the lack of will keeps us from doing many things in 
the Senate.
    But I will argue this, that the budget process itself is 
totally broken. April 15 was this past Sunday, 2 days ago. It 
is a date that, in the Senate, we are supposed to have, by 
statute, we are supposed to have the budget complete. We 
haven't even talked about the budget yet this year, and I 
indeed believe we will not do a budget this year, just like we 
didn't do a budget last year and we didn't do a budget the year 
before.
    In 2015 we did a budget in the Senate. It took $7.5 
trillion out of the future expenditures of the federal 
government. But it was fake, it was partisan, and it only lived 
for 4 months. It was waived in order to do the grand bargain so 
that we could fund the government that fall.
    The next year we deemed a budget so the Republicans could 
get to reconciliation and do what they wanted to do at 51 votes 
under the reconciliation law. Then last year we did the same 
thing. So we attempted healthcare, we attempted taxes all under 
reconciliation, which is part of the budget process. In my 
opinion, reading the Budget Act of 1974, that is a bad way to 
use, that is it is an improper use of the reconciliation rule.
    But the reality is that results speak for themselves, Mr. 
Chairman. Our budget process has only funded the government 
four times by the end of the fiscal year in the last 44 years 
since the 1974 Budget Act was put in place. Four times. 
Actually, the federal government has been closed down 20 times 
in the last 44 years because Congress did not fund the 
government by the end of a due date, either the fiscal year or 
the end of a continuing resolution.
    We are supposed to in the Senate, since 2000, we are 
supposed to appropriate 12 appropriation bills a year. The 
truth is we have only averaged 2\1/2\ appropriation bills being 
put on the floor of the Senate and passed in the Senate over 
those 44 years, an average of 2\1/2\ out of 12.
    Mr. Chairman, I would argue that there is no way anybody 
can argue that this process does not need dramatic 
revitalization. As a matter of fact, I think it takes a zero-
based budget approach to the budget process itself, and that is 
a clean-page approach.
    We are indeed in a crisis financially. We just passed $21 
trillion. I would argue that we will not solve the debt crisis 
unless and until we solve this budget process and funding 
crisis that we have today.
    In my opinion, other countries have to fund their 
government on time. And many countries, their constitution says 
that if you don't fund the government by the end of the current 
fiscal year, they dissolve that particular government and they 
form another one.
    I just believe that we have release valves in our system 
here that allow us in the Congress to not do our duty. The 
number one responsibility of the U.S. Congress is to fund the 
government. Article II very clearly lays out the 
responsibilities of the executive branch. Nowhere in there, in 
those itemized responsibilities, is to be involved in the 
funding of the government or, indeed, providing budgetary 
advice. The OMB Act of 1921 in many ways, in my view, violates 
that Article II piece of the Constitution.
    And so when I look at where we are today, we don't even 
start this process until we get an executive branch budget. I 
think that is wrong. I personally believe there is no higher 
calling right now for the United States Congress than to 
finally face up to the failure of this Budget Act of 1974, take 
a clean page approach, and finally, once and for all, develop a 
politically neutral platform that allows us to fund the 
government on time without all this drama and without creating 
crisis for the rest of the world regarding what are we going to 
do in terms of funding the federal government the next year.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentleman.
    The Senator from Rhode Island, Mr. Whitehouse.
    Senator Whitehouse. Thank you, Chairman. Thank you to you 
and your Co-Chair, Representative Lowey, for your leadership of 
this group. I hope that we are able to be effective and to 
discharge our duties here.
    I note that we are both Senators and House members, and the 
Senate and the House have different perspectives and different 
procedures. And the problem areas are budget and 
appropriations, and budgeters and appropriators have different 
procedures and perspectives.
    I do believe there are some commonalities. I think we can 
probably agree together that a 2-year budget cycle makes more 
sense. We could perhaps even agree that a 2-year appropriations 
cycle, perhaps staggered year to year, might make some sense.
    We can perhaps agree that the executive branch doesn't need 
to have a formal role in the budget timeframe and process, that 
there is plenty of political interaction to take place so that 
we don't need to boil that into our scheduling.
    But I would just like to say a few words from my 
perspective as a Senator who sits on the Senate Budget 
Committee.
    I would concur with Senator Perdue that the Senate Budget 
Committee process is completely broken. It became ineffectual 
when the Senate went to a 60-vote baseline for virtually 
everything, and the penalty for violating the Senate budget is 
60 votes. A fence that is at the level of the ground is no 
fence at all.
    Moreover, the Senate Budget Committee is the mechanism for 
the delivery of reconciliation, which has been morphed over the 
years away from its original purpose to become a general 
partisan delivery system. Both sides, I think, need to stand 
down on that and redirect the Senate Budget Committee to a 
budget process.
    Now, in order to do that, I think there are some baselines 
that we have to achieve. The first is that we have to create 
within the Senate Budget Committee at least the possibility of 
a bipartisan process. Everything about the Senate process right 
now pushes towards partisanship. We need to create a rule that 
provides the option of traveling a bipartisan road.
    If we can get over the hurdle of bipartisanship, then there 
are some other things we need to consider. If we are going to 
look at debt and deficit, we have to comply with the 
mathematics of debt and deficit, which means you have to look 
at appropriated spending, you have to look at healthcare 
spending, you have to look at tax spending, and you have to 
look at revenues.
    If you are not looking at all of them, you are necessarily 
mathematically incomplete, and it is virtually impossible to 
get anything meaningful done.
    I think everybody who has ever been before the Senate 
Budget Committee has agreed that debt to GDP is the measure of 
safety with respect to long-term debt and with respect to 
regular deficits. So we need to do the basic task of deciding, 
and I think we can do this, bipartisan fashion, what is a fair 
and sustainable debt-to-GDP ratio.
    And then how long is it going to take us to get there? You 
don't land a plane by driving it straight down to the ground. 
You have a glide slope. And we need to have a glide slope. And 
what should that glide slope be? That is something I think we 
can also agree to.
    And then what are the warnings that let you know you are 
off your landing path, that you are not on the glide slope? I 
think we can install those as well.
    If we have a bipartisan path that considers all those 
elements, tracks us towards a sustainable debt-to-GDP ratio, 
and warns the public when we are off course, I think we will 
have accomplished a very significant task, and the Senate 
Budget Committee will once again be somewhat useful.
    I would close by echoing what Representative Lowey said 
about the debt ceiling. I see the debt ceiling as like somebody 
who put a bear trap in their bedroom. And they know they are 
going to get up in the night, and if they are lucky, their 
best-case scenario is that they avoid the bear trap.
    There is no good that comes out of having that bear trap in 
the bedroom. There is the chance that you step in it. And if 
you step in it, it is a catastrophe.
    If we can build through this process some sense of public 
confidence that we have a track towards a sustainable debt-to-
GDP ratio, then perhaps we can undo this completely unhelpful, 
completely manipulable, and dangerous debt ceiling process that 
we go through, which appeals to the nature of our very worst 
angels.
    So with that, I look forward to working productively with 
everyone. I do think it is important that we understand that 
the Senate operates a little differently from the House, and 
budget folks have different perspectives from appropriators. 
And we all need to pull together to try to come up with 
something that can solve this problem.
    I think it is very doable, and I look forward to joining 
all my terrific colleagues in doing it. And I thank you both 
for your leadership.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Senator.
    Based on order of arrival, the next opening statement will 
be given by the gentleman from Texas, Representative Arrington.
    Representative Arrington. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and 
Chairman Lowey, for your leadership to take on this daunting 
task. I am grateful to join my distinguished colleagues in 
solving what I believe is not a fundamental, but the 
fundamental problem for Congress, the budget and appropriations 
process.
    We all start with one thing in common. We believe that the 
process is broken, and I believe we are all truly committed to 
fixing it and doing it in a bipartisan and bicameral fashion, 
not just for our institutions, respectively, but for the 
American people, more importantly. Because if there is one area 
that I think highlights that Congress plays by a different set 
of rules than the American people, it is certainly the budget 
process.
    All someone has to do is review the tape of the past reform 
efforts, we went over that in painful detail last meeting, and 
look at the budget outcomes to appreciate the abysmal failure 
of past reform efforts and the Herculean challenge we have to 
implement any meaningful reforms in this one.
    If we don't do something to improve our situation, we will 
not only fail our frustrated colleagues and ourselves, we will 
fail our children. As a new member and a new generation 
policymaker, I am convinced that getting to the right budgetary 
outcome and the right budgetary process is the challenge of the 
21st century. And if we stay on the current trajectory, I 
believe that it is the biggest threat to our nation's future. I 
don't think I could overstate that.
    Whether your priorities include infrastructure and the 
benefits to our economy in that regard, or the food supply and 
the Farm Bill safety net that we are working on, I believe that 
is important to food security, and R&D, as a former Vice 
Chancellor for research, I know that helps our global 
competitiveness, the list goes on and on. We all have our list 
of what we believe are national priorities. I think we would 
all agree on national defense.
    But it is all going to be in jeopardy if we, God help us, 
enter a sovereign debt crisis, not to mention the terrible 
economic conditions we will thrust on the next generation of 
Americans if we don't do something.
    I don't think that an external threat is going to take this 
country down. And when I say down, I mean lose our 
exceptionalism. I think it is going to be like most great 
civilizations, I think our most formidable foe is ourselves. I 
think it is our inability to govern ourselves, in many ways, 
but I think this being the greatest example. This inaptitude 
for self-governance, self-restraint, self-discipline is 
highlighted, again, I think most prominently in this process.
    So it seems to me that we are either going to make the 
sacrifices that other generations have made and muster the 
courage to put our country's interest ahead of our own 
political interest, or we are not going to have a choice. The 
harsh and indiscriminate realities of a sovereign debt crisis 
will force us to make the changes that we must make.
    And that is a sad state of affairs, that we know the train 
is heading for a collision. We know probably, I think 
collectively, we know what needs to be done. Will we have the 
courage to do it? Even in this group, even among this 
committee, will we have the collective courage to do it?
    Because if we do wait, we will have lost that privilege, 
that unwritten pledge that we made when we took this office to 
hand this country better than we found it to our children and 
grandchildren.
    What is our mission? I think, Mr. Chairman, we should start 
with what is our task at hand? And it should be something that 
we should be able to attain, but something that is aspirational 
at the same time, and we will have to figure out the balance of 
the two.
    But it is simply to ensure a process that results in timely 
and continuous funding for our government instead of this 
stopgap shutdown show that we have seen that you guys have 
described and my friend, Senator Perdue, described in his 
opening statement.
    I think the other component, I hope we can get there, I 
believe we can, is to not just focus on the process, but to 
ensure that we have the process, mechanisms, and incentives in 
place for responsible and cost-effective budget outcomes. I 
hope we can do that.
    We have to learn from history. We have to learn from our 
own experiences. But I believe fundamentally, and I hate to say 
this, but actually I am going to lump myself in this, but 
Congress as a whole and by nature I don't think has the 
collective will to do this. We have to find ways to align 
incentives. And if we do that, I think we will be successful.
    I will yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentleman.
    Next to the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the Ranking Member 
on the House Budget Committee, the gentleman, Mr. Yarmuth.
    Representative Yarmuth. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 
And I want to thank you and Co-Chair Lowey for getting this 
process off to a very good start.
    As I said in one of our initial meetings, I think it is key 
that we focus on defining the problems we are seeking to fix. 
And from the tenor and the substance of the opening remarks 
that I have heard from our members so far, I can see where this 
is going. This is going to be a situation in which everything 
will have been said but not everybody has said it.
    And I think that is actually very encouraging, because I 
think it shows that this committee is committed to a very 
serious nonpartisan approach to solving what is a very 
difficult problem. And I find that very encouraging.
    I think it has been said several times already that 
whatever we propose should not be aimed at some kind of a 
philosophical result or any kind of outcome. And I think that 
is very positive in the way we ought to approach it.
    I just have a couple of thoughts that have occurred to me, 
and having been on the Budget Committee now for almost 10 
years, one of the things that I think is very important is that 
most people when they look at the federal budget think of it as 
in terms of the context that they see elsewhere, a corporate 
budget, a personal family budget.
    And I think this is a mistake. I think a governmental 
budget is something that is very, very different from a 
business budget and from a personal family budget.
    In the government, we have a responsibility for coming up 
with a budget, but we are not the managers. The managers are 
the voters.
    We are also not the customers. The voters are the 
customers. And we have to figure out what they want us to do. 
Of course, that is part of our campaigns.
    But it is a very different perspective when we are trying 
to figure out what is an appropriate level of spending for 
which categories when we are not the ones who are actually 
finally ratifying our choices.
    And the other thing that concerns me, and Senator 
Whitehouse mentioned this as well, is that in practice revenues 
have been totally detached from the budget process. And if you 
are in a business, as I have been, when you are thinking about 
what you want to accomplish in your business, other than making 
money, you think about, first, what you want to accomplish.
    I was in the newspaper business. I decided on what kind of 
product I wanted to produce, and then I decided what resources 
were necessary. If there weren't enough resources, I hired a 
new sales manager or a new sales representative who would go 
out and try to generate more income.
    And I don't think we can view government quite the same 
way, but we also can't ignore the fact that revenue is a very 
critical part of what we do. And this process, at least as long 
as I have been involved in it, has totally ignored revenue as a 
component of the budget.
    When we put out an alternative budget last year and the 
year before that, the Democratic budget actually called for 
increased revenues, and of course that lead to political 
challenges from the other side. And I don't expect to hear that 
in this process.
    But that, I think, is something that we cannot fail to 
recognize, that as much as expenditures are important, we have 
expectations that our managers place on us. They know what they 
want government to do for them. And we have to figure out not 
only how to allocate money for those responsibilities, those 
functions, but we also have to figure out how to generate the 
revenue as well.
    So once again I am very encouraged by the tenor of the 
discussions so far in our prior meetings and today, and I look 
forward to a very productive process.
    I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. Next to the State of Iowa and the 
distinguished Senator, Ms. Ernst.
    Senator Ernst. Thank you, Mr. Co-Chairman. And I truly am 
thrilled to have the opportunity to serve on this committee.
    The most fundamental role of Congress as laid out in 
Article I, section 8 of the Constitution is to raise revenue 
and fund the federal government. And, unfortunately, Congress 
has consistently failed to execute this responsibility in a 
timely or an effective manner.
    As noted before, since 1974 Congress has only passed all of 
its appropriations bills four times. Over the past 20 years we 
have passed a budget resolution only 11 times. And since 1999 
we are averaging five continuing resolutions per year. Five per 
year.
    Unsurprisingly, our dysfunctional process has also yielded 
dysfunctional outcomes, growing deficits and $21 trillion in 
debt. This ineffectiveness is not only bad governance, it is a 
threat to our national security.
    Our reliance on continuing resolutions has a devastating 
effect on our military. As a result of our continued reliance 
on continuing resolutions, only 3 of the Army's 31 brigade 
combat teams are capable of deploying immediately to conflict. 
During continuing resolutions, the Army has $400 million less 
per month in their operating accounts.
    Richard Spencer, the Secretary of the Navy, has said that 
inefficiencies stemming from continuing resolutions have 
consulted in $4 billion in waste for the Navy since 2011.
    Our constituents deserve better than this cycle of 
governing crisis to crisis, and I look forward to working with 
my colleagues in a bipartisan manner to put in place reforms to 
get our budget and appropriations process working again.
    Again, I am thrilled to have the opportunity to spend this 
time with my colleagues working towards, again, a bipartisan 
fix to this very devastating situation.
    So again, thank you, Mr. Co-Chair. And I will yield.
    Co-Chair Womack. The gentleman from Colorado, Senator 
Bennet.
    Senator Bennet. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you and 
your Co-Chair for such an encouraging start. I appreciate the 
comments of my colleagues.
    When I first came to the Senate, I was a little more 
optimistic than I am today about the ability of Congress to 
deal with our long-term fiscal challenges. By coming together, 
I thought we would figure out ways to pay for investments in 
the future while curbing spending to stay within our means. In 
other words, I thought there was a bipartisan commitment to do 
for our kids and grandkids what our grandparents had done for 
us.
    Unfortunately, as we have heard today in a bipartisan way, 
Congress has excelled over and over again taking the path of 
least resistance. We have had, I think by my count, roughly 39 
continuing resolutions since I became a member of the United 
States Senate.
    And following recent tax and spending decisions by 
Congress, we are now on a path to have the largest deficits 
outside of a recession since World War II. The Congressional 
Budget Office now projects that even as we are approaching full 
employment we will have deficits approaching $1 trillion next 
year and on track to grow every year after that.
    At some point, the growing gap between spending and revenue 
will catch up with us if we don't do anything and will 
certainly catch up with the next generation of Americans.
    In the meantime, we are grinding down the parts of our 
government vital to our future--education, innovation, 
infrastructure, and efforts to reduce child poverty--and we are 
putting at risk the obligations we have made to our seniors, 
our veterans, and most vulnerable, including Medicare, 
Medicare, and Social Security.
    Mr. Chairman, I am under no illusion that reforming our 
budget process is a silver bullet to address the toxic levels 
of partisanship that seem to infect, for no good reason, 
everything we do around here. And no process reform can produce 
the political courage needed to take on the tough fiscal 
challenges that we face. But I do believe this committee can 
make important bipartisan progress and demonstrate leadership.
    I hope that we will work in good faith. We have a rare 
opportunity to do that on this committee. My hope is that all 
of us will keep an open mind and remain constructive in the 
face of hard and inevitable differences.
    Here are a few areas that I think we could think about 
working together.
    We might create more predictability for appropriators by 
putting in place a 2-year cycle for topline discretionary 
spending levels through so-called biennial budgeting.
    We will also need to come up with reasonable enforcement 
mechanisms that are a constructive push for us to act within 
deadlines.
    We should consider creating an appropriations process that 
is more predictable and inclusive, one that encourages 
bipartisan work, not partisan work, and limits the meaningless 
showboats that have become an unfortunate tradition around 
here.
    Lastly, we should de-weaponize the debt limit. Senator 
Schatz and I have a bill to eliminate the debt limit entirely 
since it serves no purpose other than risking default. I am 
open to considering alternative mechanisms to focus our 
attention on our actual fiscal problems while eliminating the 
threat of default once and for all. We should be responsible 
when we decide revenue and spending levels instead of trying to 
walk out on a bill when it comes due.
    I look forward to working with you, Mr. Chairman, and all 
of my colleagues up here to see where we can make progress, to 
see where we can make a difference. And I hope that we can show 
the world that even in these troubled times bipartisan progress 
really is possible.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Womack. The gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Woodall.
    Representative Woodall. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank 
you and our Co-Chairman for our leadership here. I appreciate 
Speaker Ryan entrusting me with a spot on this committee.
    My very first vote of significance, Mr. Chairman, that I 
took in this institution back in 2011, you will remember it, 
you were a freshman as I was, was the vote for the Budget 
Control Act that created the last Joint Select Committee that 
had a chance to make a difference here.
    And I was so excited. We only had two Republicans in 
Georgia who supported that bill. I was so excited. I knew I was 
going to get defeated without question, but I knew I was going 
to have an opportunity to move the needle for our children and 
our grandchildren, which is what everybody has been talking 
about.
    I can't tell you the disappointment I had when that 
committee adjourned having agreed on absolutely nothing. Now, 
we entrusted, the Congress entrusted that committee with 
looking at the entire budget over a decade-upon-decade-long 
window, and they couldn't find a thing to do to make anything 
better for anybody.
    I would tell you the men and women of that committee I am 
sure regret that today and found themselves in a political 
environment that made that difficult.
    Mr. Chairman, everything I have heard from every member on 
this committee in the times we have gathered has led me to 
conclude we are not going to meet that same fate.
    To my friend from Texas' point, we have big, lofty 
aspirational goals that I hope that we will achieve. I believe 
that we can.
    But we also have those areas of fundamental agreement, as 
the Senator from Colorado pointed out, that we absolutely can 
achieve. There are some floors on our success as well. And I 
recognize that this is an opportunity that many of us came to 
Congress to be a part of, doing those things that otherwise 
would be unable to be done.
    And I want to encourage my colleagues. We talk about our 
current situation as if we are experiencing something that no 
generation before us has experienced, as if we are the first 
ones to overpromise and underdeliver, to cut taxes while 
promising new benefits.
    I will remind everyone of the story of Ida May Fuller, the 
very first woman to ever receive a Social Security pension. 
Those were our colleagues in 1935 that made those promises on 
behalf of a nation.
    And Ida May Fuller worked for 3 years under the Social 
Security system, paid in just over $24 in her 3 years. Her very 
first Social Security pension check was for just over $22, and 
she received that benefit over a lifetime that ultimately paid 
her almost $23,000 in Social Security benefits.
    So lest you think that our track record together is not 
that praiseworthy, I will tell you, we have not made $22 
commitments for which we have paid out $22,000 in exchange. 
This has long been a problem. And much of the burden that is on 
us today is to solve problems not that we have created, but 
that previous generations of Members of Congress have created. 
And I am pleased to be a part of that.
    I appreciate the discussion of a glide slope forward, that 
we are not going to be able to get this all done overnight.
    But I think back to the Social Security amendments of 1983, 
another big vote that folks thought they would lose their seats 
over, restored solvency to the Social Security trust fund for 
decades, raised taxes, reduced benefits in many cases, but took 
effect far enough out into the future that folks had a chance 
to plan.
    I have read the testimony of both of our witnesses. Both 
suggest that we have process problems, flawed processes produce 
flawed products, and process problems that lead us to tools 
that were supposed to be productive and we use them in 
gimmickry fashions today.
    I think that much of our job, Mr. Chairman, is to build 
trust. I have often commented on Chairman Lowey and the trust 
that she builds on the Appropriations Committee, and we have a 
chance to do that.
    I would just close with a cautionary tale, though. I have 
never served on the United States Senate. I have spent a decade 
as a chief of staff on the House side, a decade as a member. I 
don't have any idea the challenges that go on in the United 
States Senate. But I hear the mention of the debt ceiling over 
and over again.
    You know, on the House side, that provides a minority voice 
opportunity in ways that otherwise the minority has no voice on 
the House side. Whether you are in the Progressive Caucus or 
whether you are in the Freedom Caucus, a debt ceiling 
conversation allows a stop in the process and requires that 
folks come together. Every single debt ceiling increase, Mr. 
Chairman, since you and I have come to Congress has resulted in 
moving the needle for more responsible spending or more 
responsible governing, every single time.
    I think we have to think through those challenges that 
obviously create lots of headaches. But sometimes those 
headaches are designed to create opportunities.
    And I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. The gentleman from Washington, Mr. Kilmer.
    Representative Kilmer. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. And I thank 
both of our Co-Chairs for your leadership on this.
    In the fall of 2012, I came to freshman orientation. I was 
elected for the first time. And they had a presentation from 
the Congressional Research Service to talk about how the budget 
process works.
    And after explaining the rules and the timelines in 
tremendous detail, they then said, ``But it never actually 
works that way. Let us tell you how it actually works.'' And I 
understand you have a similar experience teaching at Princeton.
    I have only served in Congress for 5 years, but I have 
spent a lot of time over the last few weeks trying to think 
through the budget process as I prepared to serve on this 
committee. And I think I have an idea why Congress doesn't 
follow the 1974 Budget Act, and it is because it would require 
Congress to make tough choices. And it is a whole lot easier to 
simply waive the rules.
    They tell me the last time Congress passed all 12 bills 
into law before the expiration of the fiscal year was back in 
the 1990s. And to me what that means is that no one in a 
position of leadership today feels like they are opening 
themselves up to any sort of criticism if they stray from the 
budget rules.
    Here we are 2 days after the Budget Act says Congress was 
supposed to have passed a budget resolution, and there is no 
uproar. There is no downside to having failed the act. It has, 
in fact, become an expectation that Congress won't follow the 
budget rules. And that seems like a problem.
    But I think it also creates an opportunity. If we are able 
to recommend some reforms and if congressional leaders from 
both parties support these new budget rules, then hopefully it 
will create some accountability and some pressure to follow 
those rules next year when the new Congress is sworn in.
    And that is not to say that a new budget process will lead 
to significantly better fiscal outcomes right away. I don't 
think this committee will be able to balance the budget or put 
us on a quick path to eliminating our deficit and paying down 
our debt overnight.
    But I do think there are very real problems that we can 
solve, and those are shutdowns, the threat of shutdowns, the 
persistent use of long-term continuing resolutions to fund the 
government.
    And we are going to hear from one of our witnesses today 
that those are wasteful and inefficient and destabilizing to 
our economy and unfair to our federal workforce and unfair to 
our military. And I think we have got to stop playing that 
record.
    I think there are a few principles that should guide the 
work that we are doing as we work toward those goals. First, 
whatever the budget process we put down on paper, in my view, 
should reflect the reality of how Congress actually works.
    I have only served in the post-BCA world where the budget 
resolution is purely a messaging and political exercise that 
is, frankly, largely a waste of time in a Congress that has 
plenty of opportunities for messaging and political efforts.
    The real budget process that I have seen involves Congress 
coming together on a bipartisan basis and passing a 2-year 
budget law and then working within that framework. And it seems 
like we should decide which of these paths we want to follow 
and have a process on paper that reflects that.
    Second, we should empower the independent, nonpartisan 
budget organizations. Someone needs to call balls and strikes. 
And we should do everything we can to insulate the CBO from the 
excessive partisanship that seems to have affected every other 
part of our legislative system.
    And, third, we should have a budget that is as honest and 
as transparent as possible. Congress may need gimmicks to get 
over the line, but it shouldn't rely on them to make the 
process work.
    So as we consider ideas for reform, I think there are a few 
things that we ought to avoid. First, inducements or incentives 
to actually be positive and not negative. We have already seen 
what happens when Congress puts a gun to its head. It ends up 
pulling the trigger. And I can't think of a single trigger that 
we could design to force action that wouldn't end up being some 
faction's preferred policy outcome.
    On top of that, I think we should create incentives for 
action, not inaction. Given the option, Congress always seems 
to want to kick the can and avoid hard choices.
    And the last thing we need to do is create a process that 
incentivizes delaying difficult decisions.
    And I want to close by saying that I approach serving on 
this committee with genuine hope and excitement that we can 
make a positive difference. I have had a chance to meet with 
and talk to many of you who I am serving with on this, and I 
hope to get to know all of you better as we undertake this work 
together. I think it is really important.
    And I thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank you the gentleman;
    Let's go to Oklahoma now, and the Senator from Oklahoma, 
and my classmate, James Lankford.
    Senator Lankford. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    I had folks in Oklahoma that I visited with a couple of 
weeks ago in a townhall meeting. I tried to describe this 
process to them, and they said, ``What are your thoughts on the 
success of this process?''
    I said, ``I am in the early optimistic phase of this,'' 
that we are all together, we are all nodding our heads saying 
something needs to be done. Ask me again in July how we are 
doing, because at some point we will move from larger concepts 
of recognizing problems to having to fight through how do we 
actually get to a solution on this.
    The problems are fairly obvious to us. In fact, it has been 
obvious for decades. As one of our witnesses today will 
mention, I am sure, today is April the 17th, 2 days past when 
the budget is required to be done by Congress, yet the Congress 
hasn't even taken up the budget much less actually passed it.
    We have clear issues that we continue to face with the 
deadlines and the structure as it exists. Eighteen of the past 
20 years, we have had an omnibus bill. We are not even trying 
to be able to go through the process.
    What is interesting is to be able to see the history of 
this. This is not something new. But the battle over leaving it 
as is or saying that we need to actually have major changes is 
something that we have not only seen, but it seems to be every 
time the solutions seem to be the same, and we are reoccurring 
those over and over again.
    For instance, Senator Byrd, who was the Chairman of the 
Senate Appropriations Committee in the 1990s, made the comment 
that there is not a need to make a change in the budget process 
because the Senate always gets its 13, at that time, 13 bills 
done expeditiously, was his words, and so there is no need to 
be able to change the budget process.
    At the same time, the Budget Committee was making 
bipartisan recommendations to be able to make major changes to 
the budget process.
    I would expect that would occur again. There will be 
individuals that will stand up in this body and say, ``Things 
are going fine, we are still open, we are still functioning,'' 
while this body stands up and says, ``No, there are major 
changes that are needed, this is not working.'' We are going to 
have to be able to work through that.
    Most of these issues are not new to us. As I have gone back 
through the history, as most of the members of this committee 
have already done as well, and as we walk through as a body 
together, we have seen some very basic things. Biennial 
budgeting. Do we need to do this every 2 years? How does the 
appropriations process work into that? Does the leadership 
committee need to be able to take the lead on forming the 
budget, or do we need to have a Budget Committee determine 
that?
    The big fight between authorizing and appropriating that 
only makes sense in Washington, D.C., continues to come up 
decade after decade after decade in the arguments, but yet we 
have still not resolved that. How many bills should come to the 
floor? How should those bills come to the floor? What is the 
process for the Finance Committee? Do they engage with that in 
Ways and Means?
    The oversight committees and the lack of oversight from the 
appropriations process. I can't tell you what it is in the 
House right now, but I believe the Senate did exactly zero 
oversight committees on anything in appropriations last year. 
With over a trillion dollars in spending, you would think we 
could work in at least one oversight hearing through that 
process.
    The CBO was designed to be a neutral balls-and-strikes 
arbitrator. It has become a great way to be able to game the 
system to be able to get done what you want to get done with 
fun rules like ChIMPs and pension smoothing and whatever rules 
that may be devised to create a new way to be able to spend 
money, not to actually be able to get insight and information. 
CRs, government shutdowns, debt ceilings, all of those things 
all fall into the chaos of the system.
    So my hope is that we can take the optimism that we 
currently have and the recognition that something needs to be 
done to look back at what has been discussed for decades and to 
say, how do we break through individuals who will say, 
``Everything is working fine because I still have power in the 
process,'' and everyone else saying, ``No, this process is 
broken''?
    Just for the House Members that are here, let me describe 
the Senate appropriations process that I have the joy to be 
able serve on the Senate Appropriations Committee.
    The bills come to the Subcommittee--out of the 
Subcommittee--and you get the text of it the night before. You 
can't get it digitally, because if you got it digitally, you 
could search it.
    You get the text if you go into a room, much like you are 
going into a classified setting, to be able to flip through the 
text of that, and then you vote on it with no amendments the 
next day in the Subcommittee.
    And then it comes to the full committee, and you fight off 
all amendments during the full committee process. And then you 
never see it again until it shows up in the omnibus bill.
    By the way, may I mention, when it comes to the full 
committee and you actually vote on it in the full committee, 
each bill, you vote on it first, passing it up or down, and 
then amend it second.
    The process is broken from the subcommittee process, the 
budgeting process, all the way through. And I would hope this 
is something that we can address and should address.
    With that, I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. To the great State of Hawaii, Senator 
Schatz.
    Senator Schatz. I thank the Co-Chairs for their great work. 
And I want to agree with almost everything that has been said. 
I have a couple of additional thoughts.
    I think we should do this on an ongoing basis. We may want 
to consider doing this during every Congress as a good 
housekeeping for rules and process issues.
    It took us decades to get where we are. And although I am 
optimistic, I am in the early optimistic phases of this process 
as well, I am not optimistic that we can fix this in a matter 
of months, and I think we have to be committed over the long 
run to iterate this.
    We are in the beginning stages of the NBA playoffs, and the 
NBA has a Competition Committee that continually considers rule 
changes and brings those recommendations to the NBA's Board of 
Governors for their approval. And I think this is a good model 
for us. The Joint Select Committee should be just the beginning 
of a regular effort to develop reforms in our processes.
    In terms of specific proposals, under normal circumstances 
I wouldn't repeat what was said before, but I want to reiterate 
my determination to deal with this debt ceiling problem. I see 
no benefit.
    I understand what Representative Woodall is talking about 
in terms of giving the minority rights, but I think that is a 
broader question about the functioning of the House and Senate. 
And although there are sometimes some salutary effects, for 
both parties and both ideological perspectives, I think it is 
basically a trap for ourselves.
    A couple of final thoughts. We are talking a lot about 
budget and appropriations and not a lot about finance and Ways 
and Means. We are very possibly the only legislative body left 
on the planet that divides budget, appropriations, and revenue 
in the way that we do. I don't think it is the main problem, 
but it is a quite convoluted way to do our business.
    And the final point I will make is that success in this 
process depends on goodwill. The House has their Rules 
Committee in which they establish a rule for a bill, which 
usually deviates from the normal rules. And in the Senate, just 
to be clear, the only way the Senate functions and the only way 
the Senate has ever functioned is if you deviate from what they 
call the regular order.
    We need unanimous consent on a daily and sometimes hourly 
basis to allow the Senate to function, and the only way you get 
UCs is if you have goodwill. So I want to be cautious about our 
instinct to establish new rules when, in fact, what we need in 
the Senate in order for things to function is the waiving of 
the rules on a regular basis.
    But the reason that I am hopeful is that this process is 
the beginning of establishing trust and goodwill, and that is 
at least what will help on the Senate side.
    So I yield back.
    Chairman Womack. I thank the gentleman.
    To Missouri, the distinguished Senator from Missouri, Roy 
Blunt.
    Senator Blunt. Well, thank you, Chairman.
    And as my friend Mr. Yarmuth pointed out, everybody has 
said almost everything now, and with great commonality, 
actually, which is the interesting thing here. The tremendous 
sense of common purpose and an understanding that what we are 
doing now is just not working. We are down, essentially, to one 
bill that not only, as Mrs. Lowey pointed out, is the 
appropriations bill, but now is more and more the one big 
legislating bill.
    And this really has to stop. We are in a situation now 
where, basically, four members of the Congress, the leaders of 
the House and the leaders of the Senate, maybe five, maybe 
possibly six, and a dozen staffers make way too many decisions 
in way too closed an environment with not nearly enough 
information. And all these bills always reflect how far afield 
some of those decisions have wound up in that environment.
    At least the appropriators in the House and Senate get a 
chance to have input on the initial bill, and many questions 
are decided before they get to those four leaders. But bringing 
this down to one vote, you have one vote on one bill to decide 
whether you are going to do all the things in that bill and try 
to weigh that balance.
    The system was never designed that way. Early on, there was 
one vote on one bill, but it was a little bill that spent, what 
did we learn the other day, maybe $5 million was the funding of 
the government. And that is not the case.
    The President then has also one decision. He gets a chance 
to sign that one big bill and keep the government operating or 
to veto that one bill.
    This is a foolish position we have gotten ourselves in, and 
I think everybody understands that. Last week we had 229 years 
of congressional history in 36 minutes. But it was a pretty 
good reminder of just how this system worked so well for so 
long and has stopped working in recent years.
    Today we have two really extraordinary witnesses who 
understand this process as well as anybody, Mr. Chairman. And 
thanks to you and thanks to Congresswoman Lowey for leading 
this effort.
    Co-Chair Womack. And finally, to the great State of Texas 
and the Chairman of the House Rules Committee, Mr. Sessions.
    Representative Sessions. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much. 
Much has been said here today that I completely agree with. I 
am just going to add my few comments. I am not sure it has all 
been said yet, but a lot has been said.
    First of all, let me say this: I think we need to use the 
word ``common sense.'' I think we need to use the word 
``goals.'' And I think we need to use the word 
``recommendations.''
    I think that there is a cadre of things that we see. We 
should call them out. We talk about balls and strikes. There 
are about probably 200 pitches along the way that take place in 
not only the budgeting process, but the appropriations process, 
and I think we should delineate those.
    I think we should have a good idea upfront about, what are 
our goals? What are our recommendations? What do we look at as 
common sense? Perhaps we can or cannot come to an idea.
    The gentleman, Rob Woodall, spoke clearly about, not 
disagreeing with Mrs. Lowey or others, but about raising the 
debt ceiling. I think that that should be a huge stop sign. I 
don't think it should be something that we should blow through 
and take as pro forma. I think we should expect that that is an 
important element for us to look at.
    Once again, I will agree with Mrs. Lowey, but we have to do 
it. We cannot allow us to default. But we need to look at it, 
at what is the goal and what is the recommendation that we 
would receive out of it.
    I think we should also include, and I intend to be a part 
of this, making sure that we put some delineation in about cost 
of noncompliance. A few people have talked about the real cost 
that happens to the United States Navy since 2011, us not 
accurately giving the government, in particular Health and 
Human Services, and in particular the United States military, 
their money day one.
    I think it should come as a goal, I think it should come as 
a recommendation that the largest elements of the United States 
Government must be funded first. It must be a goal. It must be 
a recommendation.
    And we should look at those items on a bipartisan basis, on 
a bicameral basis, and with, certainly, the President of the 
United States and Article II of a delineation that we believe 
would be common sense. And that is, giving someone that has 
$600 billion worth of responsibility, that you must allow them 
that opportunity to effectively make plans, do the things that 
are in the best interest of the country.
    You can vote for it or against it, but we ought to decide 
that we are going to do it day one.
    The other areas, look, I would like to say, sure, we need 
to fund all the other areas, and we should not drag that on. 
But the largest items, I think, common sense should prevail.
    Secondly, I think we should have an idea, and it has been 
spoken about by our Republican and Democrat colleagues, that I 
am very pleased to hear, but I think we should call it a 
pathway to balance. What are we aiming at? We have used the 
terms, ``can't get there overnight,'' I agree with that. But I 
think we ought to have an idea about a goal and a 
recommendation that we follow about how we are going to proceed 
and not add to it.
    Lastly, I am going to see if I can push to getting my arms 
around a look at nonfunded or unfunded liabilities in the 
future. I think we have got to be driven by facts that we all 
agree with. Instead of saying, ``Well, we didn't get our work 
done, maybe the American people did not expect us to do that,'' 
I think that there has to be some opportunity for us to 
understand why we are doing what we are doing and that we make 
tough decisions.
    I was elected to make tough decisions. We all were. I hope 
we can use this time to effectively look at goals, 
recommendations, and common sense.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentleman.
    In the first hour of this first public hearing, you have 
heard from 14 of the 16 members of this Joint Select Committee, 
a very thoughtful opening discussion of the challenges that we 
face and the opportunities that lie in front of us.
    I would like now to, again, welcome our witnesses, Dr. 
Holtz-Eakin and Martha Coven. Thank you for your time today. 
The committee has received your written statements. They will 
be made part of the formal hearing record. You will each have 5 
minutes to deliver your oral remarks.
    At this time, I would like to briefly yield to the 
distinguished Co-Chair, Mrs. Lowey, to welcome our first 
witness.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Well, thank you.
    And it is such an honor for me to introduce Martha Coven, 
who brings 25 years of experience working on domestic policy 
and the federal budget, inside and outside of government.
    She is currently a visiting professor, lecturer at 
Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson's School of Public 
Affairs. Ms. Coven started her career as a staff member in the 
House of Representatives, spent several years at the nonprofit 
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. She has a BA in 
economics, a JD from Yale.
    And we look forward to hearing your testimony. Thank you 
for being here today.

    STATEMENTS OF MARTHA COVEN, J.D., LECTURER AND JOHN L. 
WEINBERG/GOLDMAN SACHS & CO. VISITING PROFESSOR, WOODROW WILSON 
     SCHOOL OF PUBLIC AND INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS, PRINCETON 
UNIVERSITY; AND DOUGLAS HOLTZ-EAKIN, PH.D., PRESIDENT, AMERICAN 
                          ACTION FORUM

                   STATEMENT OF MARTHA COVEN

    Ms. Coven. Co-Chairs Lowey and Womack and Members of this 
Joint Select Committee, thank you for inviting me to testify 
today.
    When I arrived at OMB, I had no idea I would soon acquire 
such skills as how to implement a midyear sequestration, 
including how to furlough staff; how to prepare to hit the debt 
ceiling; how to structure exception apportionments under 
protected continuing resolutions; and how to manage the 
government during shutdowns.
    So much wasted energy has gone into tasks like that over 
the last several years. So I commend the Congress for forming 
this committee.
    As a further sign that it is time to rethink things, I 
found myself earlier this year cutting dozens of pages from my 
syllabus. Teaching students how Congress assembles and enforces 
a budget resolution felt quaint, to put it mildly.
    So my hope is that I have only temporarily lightened my 
students' load and that by this time next year they will be 
reading about the well-considered reforms you have produced.
    Let me begin by offering a few reflections on the existing 
process.
    However imperfect a tool the Congressional Budget Act has 
become, it has left an important legacy. It has created the 
Congressional Budget Office, a neutral voice telling it 
straight to members of both parties. And more broadly, as the 
saying goes, plan beats no plan.
    And the Budget Act has had a pretty good run. Its framework 
and complementary measures, like the PAYGO rule, helped guide 
Presidents and Congresses of both parties to a situation where 
we fleetingly had budget surpluses. So I would caution you 
against tearing up the existing rules until you are certain you 
have a better approach.
    I will turn now to some specific recommendations for 
improving the process. So I will start with a caveat.
    A wise colleague once observed to me that budget rules are 
much better at enforcing agreements than at forcing them. What 
we most need, as many of you have said, is for Congress and the 
President to set responsible fiscal goals and make tough 
choices.
    With that said, there are three specific measures I would 
urge you to consider.
    My first recommendation is to restructure the 
appropriations calendar to match the congressional calendar. It 
has become laughable to imagine that appropriations bills could 
be done by September 30.
    Chronic delays in the appropriations process make 
implementation difficult and get in the way of a shared 
bipartisan goal of making the most efficient use of whatever 
funds are appropriated. Your jobs may be done when you finally 
pass the bills, but for everyone else, the work is just 
beginning.
    Delays are frustrating, not only to federal agencies, but 
also to the many other individuals and institutions across the 
country whom we ask to carry out activities with those funds, 
including state and local governments, nonprofits, and private 
contractors.
    It is hard to make smart decisions or do good planning if 
you have to scramble midyear just to get the money out the 
door.
    Nothing can fully prevent delays, but two steps would help 
restore regular order.
    First, shift the federal fiscal year to the calendar year. 
Both Congress and the President take office in January, so it 
makes sense to treat that as the start of the budget year as 
well. You would have the full year to get your work done, and 
legislation does tend to get wrapped up in December as jingle 
bells start to chime.
    Secondly, at the beginning of each Congress, both Chambers 
and the President should negotiate aggregate discretionary 
levels for the next 2 years. You have done this three times 
already through bipartisan budget acts, but not at predictable 
times or in standardized ways.
    My second recommendation is to end the debt ceiling 
brinksmanship. Indulging in buyer's remorse at the point when 
Treasury has to pay the bills risks damaging our economy and 
harming vulnerable citizens.
    And my third recommendation is to reserve reconciliation 
for fiscally responsible legislation. Reconciliation should be 
used for the politically difficult work of deficit reduction, 
not the politically convenient work of cutting taxes or 
increasing spending.
    Let me close by echoing the comments many of you made in 
encouraging you to approach your tasks in a politically neutral 
manner. Efforts to stack the deck in a progressive or 
conservative direction will hamper your ability to carry out 
your mission.
    Future Congresses need to retain the flexibility to make 
decisions about the appropriate levels of revenue and spending 
to meet the changing economic needs of their time and stay true 
to the people they represent. You can provide a framework for 
those decisions, but you can't make decisions for them.
    To that end, I encourage you to set aside proposals that 
would establish rigid targets or enforcement mechanisms that 
aim to steer mandatory spending or revenues in a particular 
direction or to lock our nation onto a particular fiscal path 
without knowing what the future holds.
    Thank you, and I look forward to your questions.
    [The prepared statement of Martha Coven follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Ms. Coven.
    Our next witness is Doug Holtz-Eakin, who has served in a 
variety of very important policy positions since 2001. During 
2001 and 2002, chief economist for the President's Council of 
Economic Advisers, where he also served as the senior staff 
economist. But most notably, from 2003 to 2005 as the sixth 
Director of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
    He brings a wealth of experience in the subject matter 
before this Select Committee, and we are delighted that he has 
joined us here this morning on this panel.
    Dr. Holtz-Eakin, the time is yours.

                STATEMENT OF DOUGLAS HOLTZ-EAKIN

    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. Chairman Lowey, Chairman Womack, Members 
of the Committee, thank you for the privilege of being here 
today. And let me open by simply thanking you for your 
willingness to serve on this very important committee.
    I am a long-time observer of this very broken process, and 
everything I have heard today leaves me in the early optimistic 
stage as well. I hope I see you again later in a comparably 
optimistic stage and that your service turns out not to be 
thankless.
    There are enormous budget problems. They take the form of 
both debt trajectory as a threat to this nation and a process 
that regularly threatens shutdowns of the government, 
brinksmanship over the debt ceiling, and I think it is 
important that everyone here recognizes that. I think that it 
is an important early sign.
    We know that those problems will not be solved by process 
reforms alone, that, in fact, there will have to be some very 
important policy changes as well.
    But in thinking about the process reforms, there really are 
two branches, and we have heard both of them today. I would 
urge you to pick early between radical reforms, clean pages, 
starting over from scratch, versus modifications of the Budget 
Act.
    I am willing to entertain the former, but I think my 
experience leads me to suggest that on the timetables you have, 
the latter might be the way to go.
    I would concur with some previous sentiment that those 
process reforms should be policy-neutral. This should not be a 
committee that stacks the deck for a particular set of 
outcomes, however much I might want one or the other.
    And in my written testimony I have some suggestions, for 
example, in reformulating the baseline so that it is truly 
neutral between tax and spending decisions as you come to terms 
with the large debt problem.
    And I guess I would echo what has now been said several 
times about the importance of building on success. There are 
things that the Congress and the President have gotten done in 
recent years, and they have been 2-year agreements on how to 
fund the appropriations and what the levels of spending will 
be.
    Those are, perhaps, a sign that the budget resolution 
should be a 2-year resolution, that we should have something 
closer to a biennial budget. It is also true that the President 
has signed those agreements in every case.
    Perhaps that is indication that it is time to move from a 
concurrent resolution to a joint resolution where there is 
agreement on budgetary totals, appropriations, mandatories, 
taxes, and the borrowing between the House, the Senate, and the 
White House, something that doesn't happen right now.
    I regularly tell people, the U.S. Government does not have 
a budget. It doesn't have a fiscal policy. It doesn't have any 
single document that everyone agrees on for how it will add up. 
Instead, we have budgetary outcomes, usually bad. And it is 
time to change that record. And so I think building on that 
success, I think, would be an important thing.
    There is a lot of talk about different ways to manage 
internally the enforcement, carrots and sticks on getting 
things done. And there have been attempts at No Budget, No Pay, 
No Budget, No Recess, a variety of sticks.
    I was encouraged to think about carrots in the process of 
preparing my testimony. I try not to think about vegetables 
very often, but I did. It is hard.
    But it seems to me that there are some techniques that 
would be modeled on, essentially, the Gephardt Rule, which used 
to provide for deeming the debt limit as being passed when you 
pass the budget resolution, that would allow Congress to 
address some votes that are politically toxic, but which are 
real, like giving yourself a pay raise, which should happen and 
which is an impossible vote for anyone to take, and that if you 
pass a budget resolution, there would be a process to expedite 
those kinds of votes.
    And I would encourage you to think about those things, 
because we do need to both fix the budget process, but we also 
need to fund the government and fund the people who make this 
government run in a timely and efficient fashion.
    And so I thank you for the chance to be here today. I would 
say that I would be happy to aid this process in any way, not 
just at this hearing, but in the months to come.
    [The prepared statement of Douglas Holtz-Eakin follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Dr. Holtz-Eakin, and Ms. Coven 
as well, for your prepared testimony here today. We are going 
to move into the Q&A period.
    Dr. Holtz-Eakin, you have a thoughtful analysis in your 
prepared remarks of the pros and cons of making the budget 
resolution a joint resolution and sending it to the President 
early in the year.
    On one hand, it certainly establishes executive branch buy-
in early in the process, but on the other hand, could be giving 
the White House a little more power than they currently have 
and turn even more authority over to them, even make the 
congressional budget process worse if, in fact, there is no 
agreement.
    So expand on your prepared testimony on these thoughts. 
Talk about the tradeoffs, if you will.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I think you expanded on it perfectly.
    I offer it with mixed emotions, quite frankly. Funding the 
government is a congressional obligation under the 
Constitution. The power of the purse belongs in the Congress. 
The Congress is responsive to the voters, and I think there 
should be a deep commitment to that.
    But the way we are doing things right now, as I said, 
doesn't constitute genuine budgeting. There is no place where 
we require that it all add up and that people sign off on that 
plan on behalf of the voters.
    So the argument for going to a joint resolution is to have 
some vehicle for that buy-in by all parts of the government so 
that we actually get coherent fiscal policy and don't find 
ourselves in the position we are today.
    It could make things worse. It certainly changes the 
balance of power. You now have a President who has to sign off, 
and it is one more person who can play brinksmanship, one more 
person who can hold up the process. And it might, in the end, 
turn out to produce outcomes that are even worse than right 
now. I don't know for sure.
    So I can't give an enthusiastic no reservations 
endorsement, but I do think we need to be cognizant of the fact 
that we aren't really doing budgeting. We are doing a subset of 
it, and not very well.
    Co-Chair Womack. Ms. Coven, you mentioned in your testimony 
that delays in getting the final appropriation numbers for an 
agency in any given year produces a significant impact on the 
agency's operation. Can't plan, and when they do a lot of 
contingency planning, a lot of what-ifs, there is a lot of 
inefficiency in that type of process. As an appropriator, I 
certainly agree with your testimony.
    Automatic CRs have been suggested as one way to reduce the 
potential of this brinksmanship. What impacts would an 
automatic CR have on the appropriations process and agency 
operations, in your opinion?
    Ms. Coven. Well, with all due respect, Mr. Chairman, I 
think if you passed automatic CR legislation, you may as well 
disband the appropriations committees. It removes the incentive 
for there to be that process of carefully looking at the 
funding levels for each program.
    I think, further, it creates a risk that we will not have 
adequate funding. Our funding will go to the wrong places, 
speaking of inefficiencies, if the government just continues. 
Circumstances change on the defense side of the equation, on 
the nondefense side of the equation.
    We have private market forces that affect where those needs 
are in veterans' medical care, in housing assistance.
    So the idea that the default plan is to just continue where 
the funding had been previously, I think is recipe for greater 
inefficiency rather than for a better process.
    Co-Chair Womack. My last question for you is that many 
state and local governments have procedures in place to ensure 
that government still functions even if a new budget is not 
passed. I particularly like what Arkansas does. You know, it 
has a Revenue Stabilization Act, a form of a balanced budget 
agreement that forces the legislature to have to look at 
different components of government from time to time.
    Are these forms of government guardrails, as it were, 
appropriate? And if so, is there a model out there that we 
should look to?
    Ms. Coven. Well, I don't know the precise model that you 
are pointing to in Arkansas. I will caution you, I think it is 
wonderful to set out to provide yourselves with information 
about where we are heading so that you can judge whether the 
sum total of the actions that you have taken are pushing you in 
the right direction.
    I think if you move to something that is more rigid, like a 
cap, like a balanced budget requirement, anything like that, 
you are setting up a situation where you are ignoring the 
underlying factors, which we know are an aging population and 
healthcare and revenues and the matters that you have 
considered, and you are sort of dodging the idea of making 
thoughtful policy choices, and instead, potentially letting 
some sort of automatic mechanism, like sequestration, be the 
solution. I don't think that was very popular here and I don't 
think it was very popular around the country.
    So I think it is wonderful to provide yourself with 
information, and that is one role that budget committees can 
play, but I would really caution against putting yourselves on 
some kind of autopilot.
    Co-Chair Womack. My distinguished Co-Chair, Mrs. Lowey.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Thank you.
    And thank you both for your testimony.
    It is interesting to me that while our two witnesses have 
different perspectives, you both make the point that budget 
process reforms should be policy-neutral. And we would hope 
that reforms should help facilitate good decision-making by 
Congress. But we should avoid things that try to force 
particular policy outcomes, such as fixed targets enforced by 
automatic spending cuts.
    I would appreciate if either of you would elaborate on that 
point.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I think there are a couple of reasons why 
this committee is not the right place to do that policymaking. 
First of all, you are tasked with the budget and appropriations 
process, not the fiscal policy of the United States. And so it 
seems like a bit of an overreach.
    The second, though, is if there isn't genuine buy-in, not 
just by your colleagues in the House and Senate, but by the 
public, inevitably whatever targets, triggers, mechanisms you 
put in place will be overridden.
    We have seen this again and again and again, whether it was 
the SGR mechanism in the docs pay in Medicare. I am old enough 
to remember Gramm-Rudman-Hollings and fixed deficit targets, 
which we overrode because we couldn't hit them. People hadn't 
bought into matching them.
    As Martha said, you can use these kinds of things to 
enforce an agreement, but you can't force a policy outcome. And 
I would urge you to not try.
    Ms. Coven. I agree with that. The only thing I would add is 
that you really--and this is really as to what Doug said--you 
want your reforms to be durable. And as you all know, control 
of Congress and the Presidency shifts from time to time, and 
you don't want the first order of business of each new Congress 
to be to rejigger the rules that the previous one set.
    So I think establishing policy-neutrals will help make sure 
that these are lasting reforms.
    Co-Chair Lowey. I think I will save my other questions and 
give opportunities to others. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you.
    Senator Perdue.
    Senator Perdue. Thank you.
    And I am so excited by your testimony. I have been through 
every word of it.
    Mrs. Coven, there must be something wrong today. You are 
the Democratic witness today, and I agree with every word you 
have written here.
    In all seriousness, you make four recommendations: shift 
the fiscal year, look at biennial budgeting, get rid of debt 
ceilings, and use reconciliation, if you are going to use it at 
all, use it for what it was written for, and that is to reduce 
the deficit.
    But the thing I like the most, and we have all said this in 
different ways, not just the process here of the Select 
Committee should be politically neutral, but I believe the 
budgeting and funding process itself, the process, should be a 
politically neutral platform. And you say: I encourage you to 
approach this task in a politically neutral manner.
    Dr. Holtz-Eakin, you say the same thing.
    Here is my question for both of you. There are a lot of 
things we can do to change the process, but there are two 
issues. One is policy and one is outcome.
    The policy we are talking about. Let's separate the process 
from the policy in this Select Committee, is my opinion, and 
look for a politically neutral platform.
    Senator Hirono said it best, I think, in our first meeting, 
that her only wish here is that we have a process in which we 
will never have to use a CR again. I think that is a high 
calling, and I love it, because I think it is very simple and 
it ought to be our outcome. The thing that we are trying to do 
here is fund the government.
    Would you both help me? You both talked about consequences. 
You both talked about incentives. But if we have a process and 
we get to the end of the fiscal year, and let's say it is 12:31 
along with the calendar year--Ms. Coven, would you start, and, 
Dr. Holtz-Eakin, I would love to get your opinion--what can we 
do to hold ourselves accountable and get that done so that we 
don't have to deal with, ``What if we don't do it?'' That is 
where sequestration was born. That is where the Budget Control 
Act was born.
    We need a process that functions without all the drama. And 
by the way, every other country in the world, every company I 
know of and every state I know of does this without the drama 
of the U.S. federal government.
    Would you guys just address how we get there at the end of 
this process?
    Ms. Coven. So I will start, I guess. Thank you. And I 
thought a bit about this, obviously, after being invited to 
testify.
    I think the best you can do is look for the natural 
breakpoints for the U.S. Congress. And December, usually the 
end of the year is the most natural breakpoint in the action 
for you. Sometimes it is the end point, because you know a new 
Congress is taking over.
    Senator Perdue. Yeah, I agree with that. And it gives us 
more time during the year, too.
    Ms. Coven. Right.
    Senator Perdue. So my question is, if you don't get that 
done by that date, what happens? And what are the things you 
would suggest to us to hold us accountable to where we would do 
it?
    Ms. Coven. So, I mean, Doug put some of those ideas on the 
table. You all are adults. You take your responsibility 
seriously. To me, having something that actually withholds your 
pay or something else from you, I don't know if that is a road 
that you want to walk down.
    My hope is that by rejiggering the calendar so that there 
is an expectation--and a lot of budget process operates through 
norms and expectations--that that is enough to get things on 
course. But if you want to talk about stronger measures, I 
don't know----
    Senator Perdue. Well, I am sorry, I am not looking for 
stronger measures. But the reality is, if you start January 1, 
which we do today, you get a document from the White House. 
When we start, we have 14 weeks for budgeting. In the Senate, 
you have 16 authorizing committees.
    And by the way, we haven't authorized in years. The State 
Department for a while wasn't authorized for 15 years, until 2 
years ago. It is a joke. We are the only real entity that still 
uses an authorizing process.
    But that is 16 weeks. Another 12 weeks for the 
appropriations. That is if you do one a week in the Senate, 
which has really never been done, obviously. Well, that is 42 
weeks out of a 52-week calendar. Even if you change the fiscal 
year, it is not going to happen. So I understand there have to 
be some structural changes.
    But, Dr. Holtz-Eakin, help us with it, very quickly, as I 
want to yield time to the other guys here as well.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I don't have a magic solution on that. I 
really don't. I mean, if you walk through the mechanics that 
you just outlined, the first thing that jumps out is maybe 
there are too many appropriations bills. Maybe 12 is the wrong 
number.
    Senator Perdue. Is that what you meant by potentially 
incrementalizing our way there? Then let's say you do that, you 
go to biennial, you reduce the number of appropriation bills, 
you give yourself a better chance. Then the question, major 
question is, do we still need an authorizing process?
    I don't have time. I will submit that question to both of 
you. I would love to get your response on that.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. Sure.
    Senator Perdue. Most every other entity we looked at in the 
last 3 years has a budgeting process that has efficacy, it has 
an appropriating process that works. Very few, if any, had an 
authorizing built in there. Authorizing was part of the 
budgeting allocation process.
    Are you familiar with that?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. Yeah. Why don't I get back to you in 
writing?
    Senator Perdue. Okay. All right.
    Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Whitehouse.
    Senator Whitehouse. Thank you both for your testimony, not 
only here but in many other Budget Committee hearings.
    Is it fair to say that you can't even calculate the deficit 
in any given year without looking at revenues, appropriated 
spending, healthcare spending, and tax spending? It is just a 
mathematical truth, correct?
    Ms. Coven. Yes.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. Yes.
    Senator Whitehouse. Both witnesses agree that is a 
mathematical truth. Good.
    And how broadly accepted is debt-to-GDP ratio as the 
metric, whatever the number actually is, but as the metric that 
we should be looking at with respect to a sustainable national 
debt?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I think that is pretty widely accepted. 
The footnote on that would be what measure of debt do you want 
to put, debt of the hands of the public or the total debt.
    Senator Whitehouse. Correct.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. So I would be a fan of debt in the hands 
of the public as the economically relevant measure.
    Senator Whitehouse. Ms. Coven.
    Ms. Coven. I would agree. But you made an important 
distinction, which is what the number actually is, and that can 
vary with the business cycle. So it is not that there even is 
one number, but as a general measure----
    Senator Whitehouse. The conversation should be about debt-
to-GDP with those asterisks.
    Ms. Coven. It is a very useful conversation to have.
    Senator Whitehouse. Okay. That is good to know.
    And are we going to be able to fix this in a year or do you 
need to plan for a glide slope that gets you from where we are 
to where we need to be?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. It will certainly take many years.
    And in terms of where you need to be, I think the 
economically relevant thing is that the U.S. display to global 
capital markets that debt-to-GDP is on a downward trajectory, 
even if a tiny slope. But right now it is going straight up.
    Senator Whitehouse. Let me jump in on that because that is 
a point that I would like to ask you guys about.
    Let's say that all that this committee was to secure the 
passage through Congress of a plan that set a sustainable debt-
to-GDP ratio and set a mechanism for a glide slope to get there 
and some alarms to let you know if you got off course. How do 
you believe global markets would react to that achievement now?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I don't think they would react at all 
because I think global markets would view that the way I view 
it, which is a fairly empty promise since you haven't got 
political buy-in on the policies that would make it happen.
    Senator Whitehouse. So you would actually have to start 
doing it.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. Yeah.
    Senator Whitehouse. Okay. And then how would they react?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. That would be a very good day.
    Senator Whitehouse. Okay.
    You have talked about the reconciliation process. In my 
view, in the Senate it has been hijacked to completely 
unrelated purposes from dealing with the debt or the deficit.
    It is a bipartisan sin. We used reconciliation to help pass 
ObamaCare. The Republicans just used reconciliation to pass 
massive deficit-creating tax cuts.
    And make this a response for the record if it is going to 
take a long time, but I would be interested in what constraints 
or restrictions you think we might be able to agree on that 
would actually be effective in limiting reconciliation to its 
intended purpose now that it has kind of gotten out of control. 
How do we get it back in the cage?
    Ms. Coven. Yeah, I want to make one very important 
distinction, though, which is that, whatever your feelings on 
this panel may be about ObamaCare, that was not legislation 
that was scored as adding to the deficit. I think we have seen 
that more in the tax arena. But it is certainly possible in the 
entitlement arena.
    Senator Whitehouse. And as somebody who supported it very 
energetically, I like it, too. I get all that. But I don't 
think it was our view that we were doing that as part of a debt 
and deficit measure.
    Ms. Coven. That was not the primary purpose, right.
    Senator Whitehouse. That was designed as a healthcare 
measure and to help people across the country. And we used this 
process because it worked, not because we were trying to solve 
primarily a debt or deficit problem.
    Ms. Coven. Right. Right. But I think the point, the 
important thing is that it is more important that 
reconciliation not be abused and increase the deficit than to 
set some particular target for how much deficit reduction has 
to be achieved in order to have that tool.
    Senator Whitehouse. Exactly.
    Ms. Coven. The risk is in the negative direction. So what I 
do is implement something like what used to be the Conrad Rule 
in both Chambers, which is to say that you can't use it to 
increase the deficit.
    Senator Whitehouse. Okay. And if you have any further or 
more complicated thoughts than that that you want to put in 
writing for me, I would be interested. Because we do need to 
solve, I think, the abuse of the reconciliation process in all 
of this.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. So, briefly, the thing I would just 
mention for everyone is that reconciliation is really a way to 
get around the rules of the Senate.
    Senator Whitehouse. Yeah. Exactly.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. In the end.
    Senator Whitehouse. And the Senate Budget Committee has 
become a delivery system for that rule breaking.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. And so, since this is a general entity, I 
would hesitate to dictate to one Chamber how they are going to 
run themselves.
    Senator Whitehouse. I am just asking for recommendations. 
You are not going to be dictating.
    Last thing is the debt ceiling. Upside? Downside? 
Specifically, what does it look like if one day we should fail 
at passing a needed debt ceiling and went into default?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. U.S. Treasury's are the foundation of the 
global financial system. Impairing their liquidity even a 
little bit would be an economic catastrophe. It can't happen.
    Ms. Coven. And similarly, the programmatic consequences of 
having to tell the American people, our contractors, everyone 
else we do business with that we are not sure when we can pay 
you is--and we had to deal with planning for this a few years 
ago when we actually got up to it--it is no way to run a 
railroad.
    Senator Whitehouse. Thank you both.
    Thank you to the chairman.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Arrington of Texas.
    Representative Arrington. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    And I want to thank the panelists for your thoughtful 
testimony and responses to our questions.
    As a new Member, I have been surprised by a lot of things, 
but not the least of which has been the lack of accountability 
and oversight, which is the governing part of the job I thought 
was going to take most of my time.
    I think in my, again, year of service, whether it was on 
the VA Committee or some other, Agriculture, Authorizing 
Committee where we have oversight responsibilities, I think the 
lack of oversight has created a culture that lacks 
accountability and a focus on results. And so the federal 
government is not operating effectively in service to its 
citizens.
    I can't tell you how many times I have asked the question: 
So tell me, before we fund or reauthorize your program or make 
recommendations for such, how is it going? Are you achieving 
the desired outcomes? Are you off-the-chain great or are you 
way underperforming? And maybe we need to invest more money in 
this because it is working so well to serve the veterans or the 
farmers or what have you.
    So I believe that we could have a policy-neutral 
recommendation to have oversight before we actually throw money 
at something that may not be achieving its desired outcome, 
whether it is a Republican idea or program or it is a Democrat 
idea or program.
    Can you both comment on how in the world we get back to 
that component of regular order, good business, and as my 
friend and fellow Texan says, common sense?
    Ms. Coven. So I absolutely agree with what you are saying. 
I think we don't take a hard enough look at, particularly, some 
of the programs that we set in motion and ask ourselves: Do we 
know it is working? Is it achieving the result that we are 
asking?
    The question was raised earlier, I think by Senator Perdue, 
about what the role for the authorizing committees are. And I 
think one useful reform coming out of this process could be to 
step up the expectation that they are the partners with the 
Appropriations Committee in asking those hard questions.
    Now, in fairness to the appropriators, those questions do 
get asked of federal agency witnesses and others who come 
before them every year to defend their budget request and 
explain why the administration thinks funding should be 
increased in one place and cut in another.
    But the authorizing committees have a lot of scope to do 
this, to delve more deeply to answer the questions you have 
asked. And I think their thoughts should have more input into 
the decisions that are made by appropriators.
    Representative Arrington. Thank you.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I am going to echo that, and I will do it 
via a very particular example, which is Chairman Womack 
recently had me testify in front of an oversight hearing for 
the Congressional Budget Office. It was the first time I had 
delivered such testimony, even though I ran it. There were no 
oversight hearings.
    The closest that I came to an oversight hearing was the 
legislative branch appropriations bill when I had to defend 
CBO's budget request and to explain what it did and how we were 
going to use that money. I think that's a real problem.
    And I would echo that a good use of the authorizing 
committees is to have them be your partners with a much more 
explicit role for this. And if you have a different calendar, 
they can go first and then you can appropriate based on the 
results.
    Representative Arrington. Senator Whitehouse has gone. Is 
he here? No, he has left.
    Well, I want to say that I align my thinking about how we 
ultimately get at responsible and effective outcomes. I 
recognize that we may not get there and we may just have a 
better process, a smoother and more seamless process. I am for 
that, by the way. So I like the glide slope. I like the 
targets.
    I don't know what mechanisms or accountability or pain or 
shame or carrot or stick that is going to move this seemingly 
immovable body. So it is discouraging after we got the history 
of almost 200 years of reforms and then we look and it is $21 
trillion in debt.
    I do think the fixed target and glide slope idea, I think 
it is a great idea. I just don't know how in the world we are 
going to change the behavior of the United States Congress.
    Isn't that the million-dollar question here on anything, 
whether it is timeliness, whether it is unauthorized to now 
authorized spending? Whatever it is, isn't the million-dollar 
question how do we change the behavior of this animal that 
doesn't seem to want to change?
    Give us some ideas on that in that regard.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. So this has come up a number of times 
around the globe. And the essential issue is that there is 
nothing that you can do in the way of a mechanism that you 
can't also undo. And so you can't bind yourself to delivering 
any particular outcome or process or whatever.
    So in other places, Scandinavia, there are a couple 
countries who did this, you adopt fixed fiscal rules that 
bind--the parliament in that case--that they have to adhere to.
    In our case, that would require amending the Constitution. 
That is the thing which you cannot change to which you must 
adhere, and that is a very high bar for changes.
    Representative Arrington. I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. The gentleman from the Commonwealth of 
Kentucky, Mr. Yarmuth.
    Representative Yarmuth. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Thank you both for your testimony. And I am glad to hear 
you both reject the notion of No Budget, No Pay or No Budget, 
No Recess. It seems to me that is a recipe for doing shoddy, 
sloppy work. There is an incentive to do anything to avoid 
those repercussions rather than to do responsible work.
    Ms. Coven, I have a question for you. Dr. Holtz-Eakin 
suggested that we consider a joint budget resolution to get the 
President more involved in the process earlier. He also 
suggested that change would have pluses and minuses. What is 
your view of that potential change and how would you weigh the 
advantages and disadvantages for that change?
    Ms. Coven. So I am not a fan of that proposal. And Doug 
helped to explain some of the pitfalls. Let me just amplify 
briefly.
    So, first of all, if you think what we need is more 
gridlock, that, to me, is the recipe for it. It is hard enough 
to get an ordinary budget resolution done. As you all have 
said, they often don't get done. Inviting another party into 
that negotiation could make it more difficult.
    Secondly, it is a power shift in two directions, not only 
shifting some of your Article I power down the other end of 
Pennsylvania Avenue, but also, if we are talking about this 
resolution being a 51-voter, shifting power away from the 
minority party in the Senate.
    And as the saying goes, sometimes you are the windshield, 
sometimes you are the bug. You don't know which party you are 
in that situation. So the idea that you would permanently say, 
``Well, the minority just doesn't have a voice,'' doesn't make 
sense to me on something as important as this.
    And the third thing is that it risks, if it is a bill, 
which it would be if it were signed into law by the President, 
becoming a Christmas tree, a mega budget bill, a mega revenue 
bill that tangles everything up in one big knot.
    So while I understand and appreciate the notion that you 
want the Congress and the President to be on the same page, and 
I have suggested it with regard to caps and appropriations 
because that is just practical, otherwise the government shuts 
down, the idea of trying to do the whole ball of wax in one 
fell swoop seems to me too ambitious and likely to deteriorate 
the process rather than improve it.
    Representative Yarmuth. I appreciate that.
    This morning I woke up to see that Senator Enzi has floated 
the idea of possibly doing away with the Budget Committee. I 
don't know if he was talking about in just the Senate. So I am 
interested in getting your thoughts on that.
    And also something that occurred to me once, an idea, I 
have no idea whether it makes any sense or not to even think 
about it, but the possibility of a Joint Committee to 
essentially save a step, where the Senate and House developed a 
budget resolution together. Any thoughts on either of those?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I am not familiar with what possessed Mr. 
Enzi to suggest getting rid of this committee, so I won't 
answer that one.
    In the template that was the Budget Act, the Budget 
Committee as a coordinating function and as a consolidator and 
as handling the reconciliation process made perfect sense. Like 
much of this, it just hasn't worked out so well, so that 
suggests that some change does make sense.
    I see no reason why a Joint Committee wouldn't be a good 
first step. If nothing else, the act of looking at the problems 
together, identifying the range of solutions together would 
inform both Chambers in a much more effective fashion than we 
are getting right now. There is a lot to be said for just 
knowing what ideas will and will not fly on the other side of 
the Capitol.
    Representative Yarmuth. Thank you.
    Do you have some thoughts, Ms. Coven.
    Ms. Coven. Just really briefly. The only thing I would say 
is that I do like the idea that a number of people have 
expressed, and I think members of this panel, is making sure 
that the Budget Committee can speak for both Chambers, whether 
that is a Joint Committee or separate committees, and is well 
represented in terms of your leadership, the tax-writing 
committees, the entitlement committees, and so on.
    So I just think if it remains, it should make sure that it 
does speak for the Chamber and can provide leadership for the 
rest of the Chamber.
    Representative Yarmuth. Thank you very much. I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Ernst.
    Senator Ernst. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    And I would like to go back and revisit. We have had an 
interesting conversation about the sticks and the carrots. 
Because it is wonderful we are going through this process, and 
I believe it is extremely important that we find a solution 
that we can adhere to. But I think that many that have served 
in the Senate and the House before us thought that they also 
had a process that we could adhere to.
    And I would argue, I again want to go back and visit some 
of the sticks, because like No Budget, No Pay or No Budget, No 
Recess, we have found that--and I am going to push back on the 
shoddy workmanship, because I would say the omnibus bill that 
we just had was shoddy workmanship. Four or five people 
involved in a process. It is thrown together, we vote on it, we 
go home. You know, everybody is maybe not necessarily happy, 
but, wow, look, we have a product.
    We have to do our job. And what we have seemed to find 
lately in the United States Senate is, especially if you look 
at our nominations process, which also seems to be hampered, is 
that when the leader starts threatening to hold over weekends 
or cancel recesses, all of a sudden we start getting our 
nominations through the process.
    So I do think that we should have a discussion. We should 
not dismiss this just outright. I think that we need to be 
doing our jobs. But we are humans, and we like to go home on 
the weekends and we like to see our family at Christmas and 
Thanksgiving. If those sticks are out there, perhaps we know 
and we can plan ahead and understand that we need to get our 
jobs done.
    Would you please, if you could, maybe make comments about 
sticks and carrots that have been used in the past, maybe in 
your experience, that have tended to work or not tended to 
work?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I don't have a long list of things. Most 
of the things that have been used have been mechanisms designed 
to make you hit a particular budgetary target, say, a deficit 
target or a spending target. And you can override those 
mechanisms. So they have not been effective at all. By and 
large, process doesn't produce solutions.
    There has been some No Budget, No Pay sort of sentiment, 
and at least my understanding is that is probably not 
constitutional, so I would suggest not going that route. It is, 
however, I think constitutional for you not to see your family.
    So I would echo what Martha said about the empirical 
regularity with which things get done as you back up against a 
recess or some other part of the calendar. That does seem to 
motivate people to get things done.
    Senator Ernst. Thank you.
    Ms. Coven. Just one thing to add to that, which is that, as 
you think about those kinds of mechanisms, make sure that the 
collateral consequences fall on Congress and not on the 
American people.
    Senator Ernst. Exactly. I would agree wholeheartedly with 
that. It is incumbent upon us to make sure that we get our jobs 
done. And I would say, just as I stated in my opening comments, 
that for 44 years only four times have we done our job.
    So that speaks to, it is wonderful going through a process, 
making sure we have rules in place to do that, but we have to 
have the desire to get it done. Otherwise we just find ways 
around it and we end up with continuing resolutions and omnibus 
bills.
    Yes, Dr. Holtz-Eakin.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I want to just echo something that Martha 
said earlier, which I think is a good thing that you revisit 
the budget process. There is no reason why you should budget 
the same way all the time. Budgets should reflect priorities 
and problems, and these change for the nation, and the process 
should change with it.
    And if you make changes, I believe the folks who make those 
changes, meaning your colleagues and you, will have a buy-in to 
make them work. And there is more to this than rigid mechanical 
things. There is pride of craftsmanship and doing one's job 
well. And if you settle on a new budget process, I think it 
will, at least for some time, be in and of itself enough to get 
things moving better.
    Senator Ernst. Thank you. And I appreciate the time. And, 
again, I am truly looking forward to this. I think we can find 
a solution that hopefully we will be able to market and sell to 
the rest of our colleagues. But it is up to us to get it done 
and not look for specific loopholes that we can use in the 
process.
    So thank you. I yield.
    Co-Chair Womack. Representative Kilmer.
    Representative Kilmer. Thanks, Chairman.
    And thanks again for being with us.
    I think this conversation around carrots and sticks is 
actually kind of an important one, in part because it seems 
like a lot of the sticks that have been used that damage has 
accrued to the American taxpayer or to the military. And in 
part because when the sticks accrued to Congress, it finds a 
way to get around it, right? It waives them.
    So I think it is worth thinking about, is there more of a 
positive inducement to get Congress to do the right thing? And 
I know you have been asked that in various ways. But I would 
just encourage us, collectively, to think about that down the 
road.
    I want to ask about when we get on the eve of a shutdown. 
The Chairman asked should there be an auto CR. Some have 
suggested an auto CR minus a percent or some have suggested an 
auto CR plus a percent. And it seems like the problem is, 
whichever route you choose, someone will like that route. And 
it creates an incentive for inaction.
    I understand that during the Clinton years they said no CR 
beyond 2 days, and they did 21 of them, but they eventually got 
there on an agreement.
    What is the right, what do you think, on the eve of a 
potential shutdown, what would you recommend as a smarter 
approach?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. My first recommendation would be for this 
committee to be so successful that we are not on----
    Representative Kilmer. Amen, I am with you.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. That is the fundamental indictment of this 
era, right?
    Representative Kilmer. Yeah.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. The second is, I think you should not rely 
on a mechanism. Mechanisms become someone's preferred policy, 
whether you anticipate it or not. Mechanisms can be overridden. 
That happens all the time.
    So if you are going to have a situation like that, empower 
someone in the Congress, someone who has been elected to make 
decisions, to make a decision to keep the government open. And 
the idea of you handing over all of your hard-earned clout from 
running for elections and being in the Congress, handing it 
over to someone else to do whatever they want, is going to 
really make you not want to do it.
    Ms. Coven. I agree with that. I think you can't automatic 
anything in this process.
    Representative Kilmer. I know that there has been some 
suggestion of taking OMB out of the budget process. I wanted to 
get your reaction to that. And if that happened, wouldn't CBO 
need a whole lot more resources?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I was unaware of that. It is a bad idea. 
The CBO was created because up until the 1974 Budget Act the 
only source of budgetary information was the Office of 
Management and Budget, and prior to that the Bureau of the 
Budget. It is a good thing for the executive and for the 
legislature to have their own entities.
    And, bluntly, competition is a good thing. It is a good 
thing for CBO to look over to OMB and say, ``Gee, do you think 
they did a better job of figuring out what is going to happen 
here?'' and vice versa. So I am inherently skeptical of 
monopolies and government monopolies who know better than any 
other.
    Ms. Coven. I would also add to that that another really 
important function of OMB, and particularly agency budget 
offices, is they just have a lot more information about what is 
going on, because they are operating in the executive branch.
    So CBO performs a somewhat different function, and it is 
the ultimate truth-teller, but you also need the agencies and 
OMB aggregating this information, which they are privy to 
because they are actually in the day-to-day operational mode.
    Representative Kilmer. Yeah. You spoke about the importance 
of CBO as a neutral voice, sort of calling the balls and 
strikes. Are there measures you think we ought to take to 
protect the integrity of CBO as an impartial referee in the 
budget process?
    Ms. Coven. I think it does a pretty good job. And I would 
more caution you against tampering with their ability to tell 
it straight than say that there are major reforms that are 
needed now.
    Representative Kilmer. Okay. You know what, I think I am 
just going to leave it at that.
    Thank you, Chairman. I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you.
    Senator Lankford.
    Senator Lankford. Thank you. I appreciate this.
    Let me try to pepper you all with a whole series of 
questions. And first let me push on a little bit what we were 
already talking about with auto CR.
    You had mentioned not wanting to have auto anything, and I 
understand that. We are trying to figure out how to be able to 
make sure we protect us from having shutdowns. And at the end 
of the day at some future Congress there is no resolution, how 
do we keep us going, as you mentioned, hold the American people 
harmless, put consequences here, to be able to get it done?
    That has been the conversation about we don't go home, 
there are automatic quorum calls where we stay in session 
continuously until we get it finished. But there has to be some 
kind of process to make sure that the American people are held 
harmless in this. That is going to require some mechanism in 
place, policy-neutral or not, some mechanism has to be there. 
Agree or disagree? That would mean something has to be 
automatic, I would say.
    Ms. Coven. Not if it means an automatic CR, no.
    Senator Lankford. Okay. What would you recommend instead, 
you get to the end of a budget year?
    Ms. Coven. I think what we find is Congress pretty quickly 
figures out that it has created a mess and it cleans it up. And 
that is a better thing than putting the government on 
autopilot.
    Senator Lankford. Okay.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. My suggestion was an automatic decision-
making process, kick it to the majority leader of the House and 
the President pro tempore of the Senate, just to make it up on 
the spot. But somebody has to make a decision on what will or 
will not get funded, and the threat of handing it over to those 
individuals is what should motivate you to not end up there.
    Senator Lankford. Okay. Let me bring back up the issue 
about Budget Committee going away. That is an issue that has 
been around for several decades at this point.
    As I go through the notes of this body, in 1993, kicking 
around budget reforms even at that point, 20 years into the 
Budget Reform Act, the act of 1974, there was already this 
conversation that was brewing about leadership establishing the 
302(a)'s. And it would be leadership of the House and the 
Senate being able to work through the process and then bringing 
that to the body to be able to vote on. And then the body 
establishes those 302(a)'s.
    But basically you have got, as the term that was used 
during that time by Senator Kassebaum, you have got someone 
with a little more clout in the process to be able to make that 
decision earlier on.
    What is your thoughts about a budget, the 302(a)'s being 
established by a leadership group, voted on by the House and 
the Senate, obviously the President would have to vote on that 
as well to be able to make it law, and then to be able to work 
on from there?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. So I think the key insight is that the 
budget committees as they are currently constituted can't 
remain. And the question is, do you want to make them more 
powerful by putting on them leadership, Ways and Means, Senate 
Finance, key committees like that, or do you want to make them 
go away?
    But they existed the way they do now because there was 
supposed to be the entire scope of operation, revenues, 
mandatories, discretionaries. They had that key coordinating 
function. No one is doing all that so the Budget Committee has 
no role.
    Senator Lankford. Right.
    Martha, do you have a thought on this.
    Ms. Coven. I agree with that. I would just say that there 
is some role for oversight of the budget broadly and that it 
worries me to think that Congress would have no group of people 
whose task was to be looking at the reports that CBO comes out, 
to be thinking about the long-term fiscal trajectory, et 
cetera.
    Senator Lankford. No, I would agree with that. Currently, 
our process is leadership decides everything at the end. How do 
we switch it to where there is a decision at the beginning on 
what the main number is and get more people involved in 
oversight throughout the process, rather than no oversight 
anywhere in the process and try to figure out how to be able to 
resolve that?
    Ms. Coven. Right.
    Senator Lankford. The concept of CBO in some of the scoring 
issues brought up before, CHIMPs, pension smoothing, payments 
shifts. Even PAYGO has become just a speed bump of late rather 
than something that is an actual mechanism.
    Are there recommendations that you would make to be able to 
reform some of these processes to make sure that they work?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. So that is an issue that is broader than 
CBO. There are scorekeepers, the OMB folks, CBO folks, 
appropriators, Budget Committee staff, minority and majority, 
who have met regularly for years and years, decades, and agreed 
upon the budgetary treatment of certain transactions like 
CHIMPs and a variety of other things.
    You could legislate that they go away. Other than that, 
there is nothing else that can you do.
    Senator Lankford. Is there a gain to having them?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. They are the little grease that is left to 
get things through. And grease is great until you abuse it. And 
so the question is, is it being abused?
    Senator Lankford. Okay.
    Ms. Coven. There is a stock of them built into the base. So 
I think you can't just say let's get rid of CHIMPs without 
acknowledging you are getting rid of billions of dollars of 
budget authority that is supporting programs that you all have 
voted for.
    Senator Lankford. Does that budget authority, does that at 
the deficits or is that----
    Ms. Coven. It is part of the aggregate totals that you 
provide when you pass an omnibus spending bill. And I just 
think we need to acknowledge that that is part of the totals 
that we----
    Senator Lankford. Totally agree. Yeah, I totally agree. And 
that has been my challenge, is if CHIMPs go away, you are not 
reducing deficit, but you are getting a more accurate number 
that is out there.
    And part of the challenge that we have right now is 
actually getting to the number. We have the number that is 
budgeted, then you have CHIMPs, then you have OCO, and then you 
have emergency funding. And everyone just says, no, but just 
look at this number. But the total aggregate debt is something 
completely different.
    And if we are going to go through this process, I think 
there should be some gain and to try to clean up so we get a 
number that is actually the number.
    With that, I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Hirono.
    Senator Hirono. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Thank you both for testifying.
    Just before this hearing White House economic advisor Larry 
Kudlow said, and I quote, ``Never believe CBO,'' end quote, 
because he claims they don't score tax cuts right. Do you 
agree?
    Ms. Coven. I don't agree with that.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I have a lot of disagreement with that, 
beginning with his misunderstanding the Joint Committee on 
Taxation is responsible for scoring tax bills.
    Senator Hirono. Congressman Kilmer asked whether we should 
move to protect CBO's independence. And, Ms. Coven, you said 
that you thought they do a pretty good job. But when we start 
talking about some people wanting them to engage in dynamic 
scoring and other ways to make whatever programs they are 
pushing look better, maybe we do need to ensure the 
independence of CBO, as long as we are looking to them as that 
independent voice for us.
    Ms. Coven. I think anything you can do to strengthen that 
function would be terrific. And it is interesting to see how 
that discussion played out on dynamic scoring because there is 
what the Joint Tax Committee said and then there is what lots 
of other people said. And then there is what a one-pager out of 
the Treasury Department said. And people are hanging their hats 
on whatever is convenient.
    But I agree that protecting the integrity of what they 
produce and the Joint Tax Committee is really important.
    Senator Hirono. Do you agree?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I do. I would just hasten to add that in 
my experience this is a very common occurrence. People are 
always lobbying for their programs to be fantastic and free, 
and they want you to say that. And it is business as usual to 
ignore that and just do the work.
    Senator Hirono. Well, I like what you said, that 
competition is good, that we have the executive branch putting 
out their best explanation of what is going to happen and then 
we rely on CBO as an independent voice.
    Well, hope does spring eternal that this Select Committee 
will be able to come up with a budget reform that is policy-
neutral, because the broken process we have hurts real people.
    And I wanted to ask Ms. Coven, one of our tasks is to 
explain to the American people why the budget and 
appropriations process, or lack of process, matters in their 
everyday lives. And I am sure many people are unaware of the 
serious challenges that agencies face during shutdowns or CRs. 
And in particular, I am sure many people don't realize that 
agencies like Labor, Education, and the others that you oversaw 
face potential life-and-death concerns when faced with 
congressional inaction.
    My question to you is, could you elaborate on the situation 
or situations you were referring to in your testimony where you 
had to determine when a situation was so precarious that there 
is a threat to human life?
    Ms. Coven. Yes, I would be glad to. And thank you for 
asking that.
    So we have a law that has existed I think since the 1800s, 
I want to say, called the Anti-Deficiency Act, that makes it 
such that the executive branch cannot expend funds that 
Congress has not provided.
    So when the government is operating during a shutdown, one 
of the tasks that executive branch officials are engaged in is 
making sure that we do not violate that statute. There are 
criminal penalties attached, too, if you want to talk about 
sticks.
    So we were in a situation during one of the shutdowns where 
the WIC program, which provides nutritional support for infants 
and pregnant women and young children, was starting to run out 
of carryover and contingency funds.
    And right before the government, thankfully, reopened, we 
were in the process of trying to make a determination of 
whether or not, per the terms of the Anti-Deficiency Act, there 
was an imminent threat to the safety of human life if babies 
were not going to be able to get nutritional support, 
consulting with medical experts.
    These are hours of my life I can't believe I spent and I 
would love to have back. The idea that that is what we should 
be engaged in when we are implementing the federal budget is 
absurd, and it was heartbreaking to go through those 
discussions with medical experts.
    Senator Hirono. And that is just one concrete example of 
our inaction, our inability to do our jobs, how it impacts real 
life people, literally, in life-or-death situations.
    Are both of you familiar with the Convergence Center's 
``Building a Better Budget Process Report''?
    Ms. Coven. Yes.
    Senator Hirono. So would you care to comment, both of you, 
on the report or any of the recommendations?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I would be happy to get back to you. It 
would be a long, long answer. I would be happy to provide it. 
There are a lot of interesting ideas in there.
    Ms. Coven. I think the one quick thing I would call out is, 
I do like the idea of sort of standardizing and more regularly 
presenting to Congress and the public the snapshot of where we 
stand and where we might be headed. And CBO does lots of 
products like that. But I think there is some logic to 
consistently providing information in a form that people start 
to recognize and can use.
    Senator Hirono. I think that is really important because of 
their suggestion that we have a fiscal state of the nation 
report every 4 years, for example, and a pretty regular 
performance of portfolio of federal programs reports just to 
let people know what the heck is happening. I think that is 
good.
    And then they also say that we should synchronize the 
budget cycle with the electoral cycle. That is a pretty 
straightforward recommendation. Do you have an opinion about 
that particular recommendation?
    Ms. Coven. The only thing I would say I think there was 
some hinting at things that are a little bit more like a joint 
budget resolution in that document, and I have urged caution on 
that. I think that is not the best path to walk down. But in 
terms of synchronizing the calendar, and particularly setting 
limits on appropriations every 2 years, makes a ton of sense to 
me.
    Senator Hirono. Did you want to add to that?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I concur with that.
    Senator Hirono. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Woodall.
    Representative Woodall. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    I will pick up on the Anti-Deficiency Act. We have talked a 
lot about the 1974 Budget Act. But prior to the 
reinterpretation of the Anti-Deficiency Act during the Reagan 
era we didn't have these kinds of shutdowns, we were kind of on 
autopilot.
    Given your experience at OMB, Ms. Coven, you would have 
said you would not support an autopilot. You don't want to go 
back to the Carter days where the American people are held 
harmless and the shutdown is just a word document. You want it 
to have consequences.
    Ms. Coven. I want Congress to make choices, yes.
    Representative Woodall. Right.
    Thinking about your calendar year idea, of course, we 
started down this road in 1976, went back in 1986, and moved 
the fiscal year from July to October. I went back and looked. 
Just over the past 20 years, it turns out in 11 of those last 
20 years, we didn't make it by January 1 either. So you have 
solved half the problem with that idea.
    Candidly, I think solving half the problem sometimes is a 
pretty good start. Knowing of our failure to have those funding 
decisions resolved even by January 1, you still see the merit 
of the calendar year vision.
    Ms. Coven. I do because the delays are shorter, which means 
the implementation can happen more quickly and the agencies and 
others who receive federal funds can make better use of them, 
yes.
    Representative Woodall. Mr. Holtz-Eakin, when we talked 
about misusing reconciliation, I appreciate those comments in 
Ms. Coven's testimony. She quickly corrected the record of 
ObamaCare being a money saver, which, of course, is exactly 
what CBO reported. Any time you start taxes in year one and 
benefits in year five, you tend to create a money saver. We 
gamed the system there. If we looked out over 20 years, we 
would have gotten a different number, 30 a different number.
    You said some of those games, CHIMPs, in response to 
Senator Lankford's questions, weren't the purview of the CBO to 
sort out. But given your experience as the scorekeeper, in the 
same way that process changes can be used, to Mr. Kilmer's 
point, in favor of or against folks who simply prefer that 
policy, I found our CBO scores to be that very same way. I can 
draft the legislation to achieve my goals in ways that pervert 
CBO's scoring to give me the freedom I need to have my 
language.
    What have you learned about how we could address CBO in 
ways that limit the perversion of some of the scoring games 
that go on now?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. CBO's job is to identify the federal 
budget costs of legislation. That is its primary function as a 
scorer. And it is not supposed to identify the benefits. It 
identifies the federal budget costs over the budget window 
specified by the budget committees at that point in time. 
Sometimes it has been 2 years. Right now it is 10. It has been 
a lot of things.
    And for that reason, it is always possible to, quote, game 
CBO, because they will score the legislation and not the 
legislation's intent. And you can, by front-loading things and 
leaving things out of the budget window, give a misleading 
presentation of the intent of a bill.
    I don't think you should pretend that you can fix CBO or 
fix the scoring process to avoid that. You need to provide a 
lot of information. You can ask CBO, what do the second 10 
years look like? You can bring that into the debate on the 
floor. And the way you stop those things is voting no.
    Representative Woodall. I find it incongruous to have a 
conversation about the critical importance of a nonpartisan 
referee calling the balls and the strikes as they exist and the 
understanding that I can recraft the rules for CBO to get just 
about any result I want.
    At the same time, it seems that the utility of an unbiased 
scorekeeper is undermined by biased rules. I would also point 
out, when we no longer even use the CBO's baseline, when we 
find it not useful, there is some opportunity for change.
    But let me close with this and ask you if you have counsel. 
Yes, it is true we do things differently than anybody else 
does. We have a budget that seems fairly partisan. We have 
authorizers that do some oversight and not. And we have 
appropriators who actually get the job done at the end of the 
day.
    I think that structure can be politically useful. It allows 
lots of places to let steam out the system. Yes, we could be 
more efficient. But I am not sure that efficiency and utility 
are synonyms.
    Do you all have thoughts on that as experts in the field?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. I think it is a good observation. I mean, 
I can say honestly that I thought one of my jobs at CBO was to 
have Congress scream at me and vent their frustration. And that 
was just part of going to the office, and that was fine, 
because Congress needs to vent on occasion, but it also needs 
to get its work down. If you need to do the venting first, 
good.
    Ms. Coven. The only thing I would add is that the biggest 
observation I had, shifting from working in the legislative 
branch to the executive branch, is that here there are 535 
people all up for reelection. In the executive branch there is 
one person up for reelection at most once. So it makes sense 
that your process, with 535 people constantly responding to the 
needs of the American people, is going to be a little bit more 
complex than it is when one person is making decisions.
    Representative Woodall. Thank you both.
    Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. Ms. Roybal-Allard.
    Representative Roybal-Allard. I apologize for being late, 
but I had another hearing at the same time.
    Being that I just came out of an appropriations hearing, I 
am going to ask the question with regards to the appropriations 
process.
    One of the things that has always been annoying is to 
receive a President's budget request that zeroes out funding 
for a popular program that the administration knows Congress is 
going to add back to the final appropriations bill. And then 
this has a ripple effect throughout the budget and 
appropriations, because in order to fund the program that is so 
popular something else has to give. And then there is the 
debate as to what that is going to be.
    What recommendations do you have to maybe stop this 
practice, which has been used by both administrations and both 
parties? And what are your thoughts about how we should look at 
the duplicative programs or cases where agencies are operating 
somewhat outside the lanes even if the programs are popular? 
Because I believe that that contributes to the overall budget 
delays and problems that we face today.
    Ms. Coven. So I think this happens in two kinds of 
circumstances, and one, I think, is legitimate and one isn't.
    The nonlegitimate use of what you described is when the 
President fully supports that activity and is just playing 
games to get the numbers to fit. And I think that is not 
something that should continue. And, Congress, whatever 
pressure you can apply to make sure it discontinues, 
particularly in the agencies.
    But there is a legitimate use of it, which is if what you 
are asking the President for is a request that reflects what he 
or she thinks the best distribution of resources across the 
country is, it may well be that the President, again, who is 
not quite as interactive with the voters on a regular basis, is 
exerting some courage and saying: This isn't working and I am 
zeroing it out, and I know it is popular, but I think these 
resources can be spent somewhere else.
    And I, frankly, think you want a President's budget that 
makes some of those kinds of choices and shows you where, with 
the full expertise of the executive branch, where you can make 
shifts towards better use of resources. Then you all can decide 
if that is a direction you want to follow or not. But you 
wouldn't want the President anticipating what your political 
choices are rather than providing you his or her best judgment.
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. So let me echo the second part of that. In 
my experience in two White Houses, there were a long, long list 
of programs that the career staff at OMB had identified as 
candidates for elimination.
    And so it wasn't so much the political process that was 
doing it, it was the review process that looked for the 
effectiveness of programs and whether they were meeting their 
objectives. And then if they weren't, they should not be there. 
So I think that is a legitimate thing and that you should 
respect it.
    I think the second part of the question was about really 
oversight, right? If we have got duplicative programs and we 
have things that are wandering outside their legislative 
intent, the oversight process should be catching that and 
reining it in. And if it is not, then that is the call for 
better oversight.
    Representative Roybal-Allard. And when I came in, was there 
a question by Senator Hirono with regards to how we could make 
the budget more transparent and understandable for the public? 
Did I hear that?
    Ms. Coven. I think she was referencing a proposal by the 
Convergence Group that included this fiscal report, yes.
    Representative Roybal-Allard. And you are going to be 
responding in writing to that?
    Mr. Holtz-Eakin. She asked for our thoughts on the whole 
Convergence report and I thought it would be more efficient to 
just get back to her.
    Representative Roybal-Allard. Okay. All right. Okay, then I 
will just leave it at that.
    And it seems to me that there has been a growth also in the 
number of policy riders that we have been considering in the 
appropriations bills and that these policy fights are also 
contributing to delays in the process.
    Why do you think that is happening? And are there any ideas 
that you might have as to how we can address this?
    Ms. Coven. So I think it is happening because you have the 
must-pass bills. And the remedy lies not necessarily in your 
committee, the Appropriations Committee, although stricter 
parameters, keeping those riders out would be terrific, but 
more in the rest of the Congress making sure that there are 
other pathways for those legislative priorities to get 
addressed so the appropriations bills don't get bogged down 
with them.
    Representative Roybal-Allard. Okay. I think my time has 
about run out.
    Co-Chair Womack. All right. So the gentlelady is yielding 
back.
    All right. We have completed the Q&A round. Recognizing 
that there is only a handful of our members left, I think it 
would be appropriate, if anybody has a burning question that 
can elicit a very brief response, I would be more than willing 
to give that alibi right now to somebody if they wanted to ask 
something.
    Senator Perdue.
    Senator Perdue. I am sorry. I would like to iterate, 
though, for the record, I would love to ask both these 
witnesses to provide this back to us, though, as a more in-
depth conversation about the Senate's--the budget is a 
resolution. We pass it with 51 percent of the votes. The 
authorization is a law. We pass it with 60. The appropriation 
is a law. We pass it with 60.
    Once the minority party has a budget resolution crammed 
down their throat, it is very difficult for them, Republican or 
Democrat, to come back in the authorizing process and play 
ball. It is very difficult for them to come back in the 
appropriation process and play ball.
    Please give us your thoughts about that three-step process, 
and talk to us about other countries that you found that have 
done that. We can't find anybody that does a three-step 
process.
    So I think this authorizing issue is one we need to really 
focus on. We haven't talked about it much today. But in 
subsequent hearings, I suspect that we will end up going more 
in-depth. But because of your two backgrounds, I would love to 
get you on the record relative to that issue.
    Thank you.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Senator.
    Mrs. Lowey.
    Co-Chair Lowey. In conclusion, I think we have all asked 
many questions, and perhaps we will save some of the other 
questions or repeat them again for the next time. So I would 
like to thank you both.
    As I look back upon the appropriations process, it would 
seem to me there are two things that are very evident. Number 
one, when we got a topline number, the 302(b)'s, for each of 
the committees, no problem. Our staffs worked together.
    Number two, the only thing that caused some problems was 
169 of them, shall we say, what some of us would call poison 
pills, others might say, oh, this is a very important policy 
decision.
    So maybe if the authorizers did their work and the question 
would be how do we keep those authorizing items away from the 
appropriations process, we would be better off.
    And I think, Mr. Holtz-Eakin, you mentioned something about 
OMB, I think that is what you said, that we should be 
respecting it and the process. And it really depends on who is 
there at the time, because I would say I have had totally 
different experiences.
    And I don't want to blame it on different parties. But I 
can remember one head of OMB who used to check in with me 
three, four times a week. And I don't think I have spoken to 
this head of OMB in the last 6 months.
    So how do you keep the politics out of the process? Give 
us, as appropriators, the information so we can move forward. 
Because once we get those numbers, and I want to emphasize this 
again, on Appropriations, the bipartisan work of our 12 
subcommittees was so impressive. We got the numbers, we went to 
work, we got the job done, and then some other policy issues 
came up that would extend the process.
    But how do we move it forward so that Democrats and 
Republicans can do their work? And that is what I see as a 
major challenge here.
    But I think it is time for us to close this hearing. So let 
me thank you both for your excellent testimony and say it is a 
pleasure for me to work with my co-chair.
    Thank you.
    Co-Chair Womack. Always a pleasure and a privilege.
    Thank you, Dr. Holtz-Eakin and Ms. Coven, for appearing 
before us today.
    I want to advise our members that they can submit written 
questions to be answered later in writing. Those questions and 
your answers will be made part of the formal hearing record. 
And any member that wishes to submit a question or any 
extraneous material may do so within 7 days.
    And with that, let's go eat. The committee stands 
adjourned.
    [Whereupon, at 12:44 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    

                      BIPARTISANSHIP IN BUDGETING

                              ----------                              


                         WEDNESDAY, MAY 9, 2018

                          House of Representatives,
                      Joint Select Committee on Budget and 
                             Appropriations Process Reform,
                                                   Washington, D.C.
    The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:00 a.m., in room 
HVC-210, Capitol Visitor Center, Hon. Steve Womack and Hon. 
Nita M. Lowey [co-chairs of the committee] presiding.
    Present: Representatives Womack, Sessions, Woodall, 
Arrington, Lowey, Yarmuth, Roybal-Allard, and Kilmer.
    Senators Perdue, Lankford, Ernst, Whitehouse, Bennet, and 
Hirono.
    Co-Chair Womack. The committee will come to order.
    We have a little bit different seating arrangement than we 
did before. I am up here in a different ZIP Code, you know. And 
we will see how this goes.
    Good morning, and welcome to the second public hearing of 
the Joint Select Committee on Budget and Appropriations Process 
Reform.
    The most important role given to Congress under the 
Constitution is the power of the purse. Our panel is charged 
with ensuring we can fulfill this essential duty.
    Today's hearing is appropriately titled ``Bipartisanship in 
Budgeting'' and reflects the consensus regarding our mission 
and the goal for any potential recommendations. To be clear, we 
are not in the business of prescribing specific budget outcomes 
to benefit Republicans or Democrats. We want to ensure a budget 
process that works for either party, regardless of who holds 
the majority.
    As we continue talking through possible improvements in 
this committee, it is a pleasure to welcome other perspectives 
to the ongoing conversation. Today, we are joined by a group 
who have extensively studied the current process, observed some 
of the problems with it, and developed their own solutions for 
making it work.
    From the Bipartisan Policy Center, we have Bill Hoagland 
and Don Wolfensberger, both of whom have extensive backgrounds 
in congressional procedure and history. And representing the 
findings of the Convergence Building a Better Budget Process 
Project, we have Emily Holubowich--I hope I have that name 
correct--and Matt Adams--or Matt Owens. I am sorry.
    Thank you.
    And, with that, I yield to my co-chair, Mrs. Lowey, for her 
brief opening remarks.
    [The prepared statement of Steve Womack follows:]
    [GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Lowey. And I do want to thank Co-Chair Womack for 
his collaboration in arranging this hearing.
    I welcome our witnesses here today to discuss 
bipartisanship as it relates to the budget process. Our 
witnesses include Bill Hoagland and Don Wolfensberger, two very 
experienced former senior congressional staff who are now 
affiliated with the Bipartisan Policy Center.
    And I am pleased that we have Emily Holubowich and Matt 
Owens, two participants from the Building a Better Budget 
Process Project of the Convergence Center for Policy 
Resolution. They will talk about the Convergence Center 
process, which convenes groups of disparate stakeholders to try 
to arrive at consensus recommendations, as well as the 
substantive proposals that emerged from their dialogue on the 
budget process.
    Thank you all for coming. I look forward to an interesting 
hearing.
    [The prepared statement of Nita M. Lowey follows:]
    [GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. In my introductions, I said ``Matt 
Adams.'' I want the record to reflect that the first baseman of 
the Washington Nationals is not with us today; it is Matt 
Owens. I am a big baseball fan, so I don't know how I just came 
up with that, but thank you.
    I would now like to welcome our witnesses. Thank you for 
your time today. The committee has received your written 
statements, and they will be made part of the formal hearing 
record. You will each have 5 minutes to deliver your oral 
remarks.
    Mr. Hoagland, you can begin when you are ready. The floor 
is yours, sir.

   STATEMENTS OF G. WILLIAM HOAGLAND, SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, 
BIPARTISAN POLICY CENTER, U.S. SENATE STAFF, 1982-2007; DONALD 
  R. WOLFENSBERGER, FELLOW, BIPARTISAN POLICY CENTER, FELLOW, 
    WOODROW WILSON INTERNATIONAL CENTER FOR SCHOLARS, STAFF 
 DIRECTOR, HOUSE RULES COMMITTEE, 1991-1997; EMILY HOLUBOWICH, 
    PARTICIPANT, BUILDING A BETTER BUDGET PROCESS PROJECT, 
 CONVERGENCE CENTER FOR POLICY RESOLUTION; AND MATTHEW OWENS, 
    PARTICIPANT, BUILDING A BETTER BUDGET PROCESS PROJECT, 
            CONVERGENCE CENTER FOR POLICY RESOLUTION

                STATEMENT OF G. WILLIAM HOAGLAND

    Mr. Hoagland. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
    Co-Chairmen Womack and Lowey and members of the committee, 
thank you for the opportunity to appear before you.
    I have my list of favorite reform options, but today I will 
focus just on one, and that is the often-discussed-but-never-
agreed-to biennial budgeting and appropriation process.
    The written testimony provides the long history of the 
congressional efforts in this regard. There are various 
approaches to biennial budgeting and appropriations. But my own 
thinking on this has evolved from initially not supporting it 
to, today, supporting it from a split biennial budget and 
appropriation process.
    As early as 1987, a bipartisan agreement between the 
Congress and President Reagan was reached, setting 2-year caps 
on discretionary spending. This was followed with similar 
bipartisan agreements in 1990 and 1997.
    And the Budget Control Act, as you know, of 2011 set 
appropriation caps for 10 years, through 2021. But those caps 
were adjusted by the Bipartisan Budget Acts of 2013, 2015, and, 
of course, most recently, 2018. And I predict that you will 
adjust those final 2-year caps again in 2019.
    In other words, 2-year caps over time periods seem to be 
what Congress has abided to, and, therefore, institutionalizing 
what has become standard practice seems like a recommendation 
this committee could find consensus around.
    Most recently, in 2016, both the House and Senate Budget 
Committee chairmen, Mr. Price and Mr. Enzi, advanced biennial 
budget proposals. Like previous proposals, they proposed that 
the budget resolution be adopted in the first session, setting 
forth appropriation allocations for the next 2 fiscal years.
    But, unlike previous versions, they proposed splitting the 
12 appropriation bills into half, 6 appropriations being 
considered in the first year of the biennium and 6 in the 
second. Mr. Price's legislation even specified what those six 
bills would be, and they included Defense and Labor-HHS, so 
that 75 percent of all appropriations would have been done in 
that first biennium.
    The Bipartisan Policy Center issued a brief report in 2015 
entitled ``Proposals to Improve the Process,'' authored by two 
of my former bosses, the late Senator Pete Domenici and Dr. 
Alice Rivlin. Among other reform items, it recommended that we 
move to a biennial budget cycle to address the goal of 
transparency and timeliness.
    A couple of quick comments addressing the skeptics of 
biennial budgeting process.
    Incentives are important for Congress to do its work.
    On the stick side of the incentives, in the private sector, 
nonperformance of a contract results in nonpayment. The 
Domenici-Rivlin biennial budget recommendation concluded that 
garnishing your pay would not pass constitutional muster, but 
legislation to prevent all planned congressional recesses until 
a biennial budget resolution was adopted could.
    This is consistent with existing statute that makes it out 
of order to consider any adjournment resolution in the House of 
Representatives in the month of July that provides for an 
adjournment of more than three days unless you have completed 
annual appropriations or a reconciliation bill if ordered. A 
similar prohibition for all months could apply to both the 
Senate and House for failure to adopt a conference agreement on 
a biennial budget.
    I would make it mandatory, also, that the last 
appropriation bill considered in a biennium is the legislative 
branch bill, your funding bill.
    On the carrot side, once a biennial budget agreement is 
reached, setting the 2-year appropriation allocations, if it 
does that, Senate rules could be adopted to eliminate the 
filibuster on the motion to proceed the consideration of the 
appropriation bill. This would not jeopardize in any way 
senators' right to filibuster the underlying legislation but 
would guarantee at least a debate moving forward on 
appropriation bills themselves.
    Finally, one of the reoccurring criticisms of biennial 
budget has been the argument that making accurate projections 
two years in advance is difficult. Nothing in a biennial budget 
process precludes funding of supplemental appropriations if 
needed for unanticipated and therefore unplanned emergencies. I 
would argue that 1 off-year supplemental, however, is better 
than having to do 12 appropriation bills every year.
    Let me conclude with what so many others have stated 
before. No process changes will make your decisions any easier. 
Budgeting is governing, and governing is challenging. But the 
failure of this committee I don't think is an option. Failing 
to reach some consensus would once again telegraph to the 
American public that the Congress was not willing to address 
its most obvious, fundamental Article I responsibility, and the 
result would be a further erosion of the confidence in this 
critical institution.
    But if this committee could reach agreement, if even on 
limited changes to the process, it could set the stage for even 
more fundamental comprehensive changes in the next Congress.
    Your time is short, and the litany of reform options is 
long. But I believe one of those bipartisan reform options' 
time has come, and that is biennial budgeting.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    [The prepared statement of G. William Hoagland follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you very much, Mr. Hoagland.
    Mr. Wolfensberger.

              STATEMENT OF DONALD R. WOLFENSBERGER

    Mr. Wolfensberger. Thank you very much. And congratulations 
to you all----
    Co-Chair Womack. Just make sure that mic is on.
    Mr. Wolfensberger. Got it.
    Co-Chair Womack. There we go.
    Mr. Wolfensberger. Yeah. I just wanted to congratulate you 
all on being appointed to this important committee and wish you 
well in coming to some solution by your November 30th deadline.
    I have been asked by the staff to give some background on 
previous bipartisan efforts to reform the Congress. And so, I 
have not confined mine simply to budgeting, but there is a lot 
of that in this.
    And what I have done in my testimony is look at six 
examples of things that I was involved in through the Rules 
Committee, through my leaders, Trent Lott and later Jerry 
Solomon, and, prior to that, John Anderson, my first boss, to 
try and improve things in the Congress.
    So I am just briefly going to go through those six examples 
and talk about briefly what prompted the formation of these 
bipartisan panels to begin with, how they did, did they succeed 
or fail, and then what lessons have we learned from previous 
bipartisan efforts.
    The first thing that I was involved in, 1969, was--or 1965, 
I am sorry. I was an intern up here, and my boss, John 
Anderson--I am from his home district in Illinois--sent me to 
the Joint Committee on the Organization of Congress. It was 
having hearings on congressional reform. So I monitored those 
hearings, reported back to him, helped prepare his testimony 
before the panel. He, at the time, wanted a joint committee on 
government research, as I recall, and that was what my work was 
on.
    But the joint committee went through a long litany of 
hearings that summer of 1965. They finally reported something 
in 1966, but then it laid dormant for about four years. Why? 
Well, it seems that the Congress no longer was broken, so there 
was no need to fix it. Why? A guy name Lyndon Johnson was 
President, and he was putting through his juggernaut of Great 
Society legislation. And so things sort of laid dormant there 
for about 4 years.
    I returned to the Hill full-time in 1969. And, lo and 
behold, it came back to life; the recommendations of the joint 
committee came back to life. Why? Well, there was another guy 
in town called Dick Nixon, who had some other ideas about how 
to run government. And so Congress thought it might be a good 
thing to address the ``imperial presidency'' now. So the 
recommendations came to life. They were passed.
    I think you could say that the whole idea behind that joint 
committee was to modernize Congress, yes, improve its 
resources, staffing, and so on. But, also, the Democratic study 
committee was behind a lot of this, and they wanted to really 
address the problem of conservative committee chairmen there 
through the seniority system who were blocking a lot of 
progressive legislation.
    So one of the things done in that law that was enacted in 
1970, the Legislative Reorganization Act, was a committee bill 
of rights. And the Democrats addressed other issues through 
their caucus rules changes, such as electing of committee 
chairmen for the first time. I think that was in 1971 or 1972.
    So that was my first experience. The next thing, though, 
came about in 1972 when President Nixon started impounding 
funds, withholding funds that had been appropriated by 
Congress. Congress was furious. They appointed a joint study 
committee, similar to this, to come up with some ideas as to 
how to address that. What they came up with: a suggestion for a 
congressional budget process and also an impoundment control 
regime.
    So those two things were recommended, but the Democratic 
leadership decided, first of all, to go with impoundment 
control. So they put that through the House and the Senate, and 
then they became stalled in conference committee because one 
side wanted a two-house approval of impoundments, the other 
wanted a one-house veto of any Presidential impoundments.
    When that stalled, they finally came around to what the 
Republicans had been urging them, which is put the two 
together, have some balance, have a congressional budget 
process, impoundment control. That was done, and it went 
through. And that became, of course, the Congressional Budget 
and Impoundment Control Act of 1974.
    The next thing that I was involved with in the 1973-1974 
was a select committee, bipartisan, a select committee on 
committees in the House. And they were tasked with realigning 
committee jurisdictions. They came up with a proposal. It was 
very sweeping, comprehensive, but unfortunately it got stalled 
in the Democratic Caucus. Finally, the Democratic Caucus 
brought out their own substitute, which left the jurisdictions 
intact. And, as a result, the Bolling recommendations were 
doused in favor of, basically, status quo.
    The next thing that I was involved with, the Beilenson 
bipartisan task force on budget reform in 1982. That basically 
went on for about 3 years. Actually, it was renewed in the next 
Congress. They came up with a set of recommendations. The Rules 
Committee reported them, but it never came up on the floor. But 
then, lo and behold, in 1985, we had a debt limit bill that 
went to conference, and the opportunity was there, and the 
Beilenson proposals were finally brought in together with the 
Gramm-Rudman-Hollings deficit control measure, which had 
sequestration.
    Well, my time has run out. I did want to talk about the 
other things. There was a leadership task force on ethics in 
1989--Vic Fazio and Lynn Martin. I worked for Lynn Martin at 
the time. Came up with some recommendations. The big thing that 
you all may have heard of was they gave up honorary in favor of 
a congressional pay raise. So that was sort of the carrot with 
that one.
    And the other thing was the Joint Committee on the 
Organization of Congress, 1993-1994. Their recommendations 
didn't go anywhere because the leadership, Democratic 
leadership, in the House pulled the plug. They were not behind 
it.
    But we can talk a little bit later about what lessons were 
learned from these various things. It is a mixed bag, 
obviously, but leadership has a lot to do with--making sure 
they are behind whatever recommendations do come out.
    Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Donald R. Wolfensberger 
follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, sir.
    Ms. Holubowich.

                 STATEMENT OF EMILY HOLUBOWICH

    Ms. Holubowich. Co-Chair Womack, Co-Chair Lowey, and other 
members of the Joint Select Committee, I thank you for the 
opportunity to testify before you today as a member of the 
Convergence Building a Better Budget Process Project. It is a 
distinct honor to be invited to represent my Convergence 
colleagues.
    As a senior vice president at CRD Associates, I have 
advocated on behalf of several health groups through several 
appropriations cycles. I participated in the Convergence 
project in my role as executive director of the Coalition for 
Health Funding, an alliance of 95 national health organizations 
representing more than 100 million patients and consumers, 
health professionals, and researchers.
    In both the Convergence budget project and in my testimony 
before you today, I am representing the views of myself and not 
those of the Coalition for Health Funding, my employer, or the 
health groups I represent.
    I am not an expert in budget rules and procedure like my 
colleagues from the Bipartisan Policy Center, but I am an 
expert in what the Federal budget means to Americans and what 
happens when the process goes off the rails.
    As you know, the vast majority of Federal funding for 
discretionary public health and health research flows from 
Federal agencies to State and local governments, academic 
institutions, and nongovernmental organizations in communities 
across the nation. These entities rely on predictable, stable 
funding to pursue their missions of protecting and promoting 
Americans' health.
    When the Federal budget process breaks down, dysfunction 
disrupts their operations. New initiatives and new hires are 
put on hold, procurement cycles lapse, opportunities are lost, 
and the American people are ultimately hurt.
    In the Convergence project dialogue, I saw an opportunity 
to work with others who, despite our differing perspectives, 
share an interest in making the process work. None of us are 
naive enough to believe we can perfect the process or that 
changes can work without the political will to make them work. 
But even marginal improvements that bring about greater 
predictability and stability would be welcomed by the 
communities we represent.
    So how did our group of strange budget bedfellows find 
consensus?
    In 2015, Convergence was funded by the Hewlett Foundation's 
Madison Initiative, with additional support from the Stuart 
Family Foundation, to elevate the voice of stakeholders who 
represent those directly affected by Federal revenue and 
spending decisions.
    Convergence staff first conducted more than 100 interviews 
with myriad stakeholders across sectors, constituencies, and 
ideologies to solicit their perspectives on the budget process 
and ultimately invited 24 stakeholders, including my colleague 
Matt Owens and myself, to participate in the project.
    For the next 16 months, we met under the guidance of the 
Convergence staff and a professional facilitator to find common 
ground and reach consensus. After our first meeting to identify 
pain points in the current budget process and build camaraderie 
and trust in sharing our misery, we focused on developing 
principles that would serve as our true north in guiding our 
discussions and evaluating our proposals.
    After several meetings and iterations, we ultimately agreed 
on nine principles to which a budget process should adhere and 
that we have submitted to the record.
    For me, the principle that resonated most is that the 
process should be neutral or unbiased. As several of you noted 
during your first hearing and as you noted this morning, Mr. 
Womack, the process should not be designed to favor a 
particular policy or outcome or ideology. This principle is 
essential to any successful process reform and was key to 
reaching consensus on our proposal.
    If we had allowed our discussions to veer away from process 
toward outcomes, I don't believe we would have reached 
consensus. Without this principle and others, we don't believe 
your attempts to reform the process will succeed either.
    During the development of our nine principles for process 
reform, four themes emerged that informed our thinking and may 
inform yours.
    The first theme is that elections drive outcomes. The 
ultimate incentive for lawmakers to address any issue, 
including the Federal budget, is whether or not their 
constituents care about it and the extent to which it 
influences their vote.
    The second and third themes are that credible information 
provided at the right time matters and that effective budget 
institutions like CBO are crucial to the production of trusted 
information.
    The final theme and what I believe the group thinks is most 
important is that new norms are needed to break bad habits. For 
any budget process to work, you and your colleagues have to 
want it to work and see the value in it doing so. As someone 
who works in public health, I appreciate that behavioral change 
is hard. If changing people's behaviors was easy, we wouldn't 
be in the midst of an opioid crisis and an obesity epidemic. It 
will take concerted effort on the part of you and your 
colleagues to make lasting changes.
    I hope my testimony has helped frame the Convergence Budget 
Process Project and has provided additional context for our 
proposals. My colleague Matt Owens will now review our five 
consensus proposals for you.
    Thank you again for this opportunity to be here today. I 
look forward to your questions.
    [The prepared statement of Emily Holubowich follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, ma'am.
    Mr. Owens.

                   STATEMENT OF MATTHEW OWENS

    Mr. Owens. Thank you to the co-chairs and members of this 
important panel for the opportunity to testify.
    I have worked on behalf of research universities for over 
20 years, and I have seen the consequences of Federal budget 
process dysfunction. Student financial aid decisions are held 
up, important medical research is delayed, and long-term 
planning is made more complex and time-consuming because 
Congress does not complete the budget in a timely or 
predictable manner. This is highly inefficient. It wastes time 
and institutional and taxpayer resources that would otherwise 
be used to achieve the teaching, research, and service missions 
of universities.
    I chose to participate in the Convergence project for this 
reason and in the spirit of what people at research 
universities do every day; they seek to address and solve 
difficult problems facing the Nation. My employer, the 
Association of American Universities, supports the Convergence 
group proposals for these same reasons.
    Understanding that you have copies of the report, I will 
briefly highlight our five consensus proposals.
    The first proposal is what we call the Budget Action Plan. 
It synchronizes the budget process with the electoral and 
governing cycles, and it calls on each new Congress to adopt a 
2-year budget that is signed into law by the President.
    The Budget Action Plan has three required elements and one 
optional provision. First, it sets discretionary spending 
levels for 2 years. Second, it lifts the debt limit by any 
shortfall agreed to in the legislation. And, third, it 
authorizes a lookback report to analyze the impact that 
enactment of the budget would have on the long-term fiscal 
outlook. Additionally, the plan allows Congress the option to 
consider one reconciliation bill per fiscal year.
    Our second proposal requires the CBO to produce a report 
that we entitled ``The Fiscal State of the Nation.'' It would 
be issued during the Presidential election cycle and would 
outline key information about our Nation's finances, including 
but not limited to: long-term projections for debt, deficits, 
interest payments, revenues, and spending; a breakdown of all 
major revenue sources and tax expenditures; and any estimated 
shortfalls in long-term spending programs.
    This report would be widely distributed and provide 
information in reader-friendly ways to allow non-Washington-
insiders to better understand the budget. We believe this 
report would provide a full picture of the Nation's finances, 
elevate public discussions about the budget, and help voters 
make more informed choices at the polls.
    Our third proposal seeks to reinforce the importance of the 
long-term effects of budget decisions. We propose that every 4 
years the GAO review portfolios of programs that involve long-
term or intergenerational commitments. The reviews would cover 
programs grouped by topics such as retirement security, health 
coverage, or national security. This information would also be 
included in the ``Fiscal State of the Nation'' report.
    Our fourth proposal is to strengthen the Budget Committees. 
It was irresistible for some in our group to suggest 
eliminating the committees; however, we agreed that the stature 
of the committees needs to be restored to help improve their 
ability to lead the process. We propose that the chairs and 
ranking members of key fiscal and authorizing committees, or 
their designees, serve on the Budget Committees. We believe 
this proposal would ensure that those who are responsible for 
carrying out the budget would be vested in the process to 
develop it.
    Our last proposal calls on Congress to give budget support 
agencies, such as the CBO and the GAO, the resources necessary 
to provide credible, high-quality, and independent information. 
Our proposal includes new responsibilities for these agencies, 
so it is important that they have adequate resources.
    These five proposals will not yield a perfect budget 
process; however, we believe they contain practical and 
achievable measures that can be developed further to implement 
a process that facilitates informed, unbiased, and sound 
decision-making.
    In closing, I will offer a shared view among our group: 
namely, no single budget process reform or package of reforms 
can by themselves remedy the prevailing dysfunction. Process 
reforms alone cannot force Congress to reach budget deals. 
Political will is needed.
    But process matters, and small or large changes can create 
ownership and buy-in for new expectations and norms for 
budgeting. Right now, expectations are low and norms are 
broken. It has been more than 20 years since all appropriations 
bills were passed prior to the start of the fiscal year. Just 
27 percent of Senators have seen the process work, and for 
House Members it is only 16 percent.
    As such, we believe our proposals are a strong starting 
point for your consideration. On behalf of all the Convergence 
project participants, we wish you success. Your work is 
critical not only to effective Federal budgeting but also the 
governance of our Nation.
    Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Matthew Owens follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. We appreciate the opening comments by our 
witnesses here this morning. We are now going to begin our 
question-and-answer period. I will begin first.
    Mr. Hoagland, do you believe the debate over 2-year 
budgeting has evolved? Is it time?
    Mr. Hoagland. Absolutely. I go back a long way. When I 
first arrived to the Congressional Budget Office in 1976, there 
was discussion about this. In my written testimony, you will 
see that even this young House Whip called Trent Lott was 
recommending it back in 1981-1982. Leon Panetta, chairman, all 
the way through, including his final job at Department of 
Defense, was recommending it. It has evolved, and I think it--
as I said, it is a direction that is necessary.
    As I also said, Mr. Chairman, in my opening comments, I 
originally did not support it, but I see that we basically have 
gone to the 2-year system, so let's go ahead and 
institutionalize it through a biennial budget.
    Co-Chair Womack. What do you think is different, in your 
view, as we think about both the structure of the budget 
resolution and the ability of the modern Congress--and I stress 
the word ``modern'' Congress, ``modern Congress,'' meaning this 
isn't your grandfather's Congress; I mean, this is a much 
different time--our ability to handle all of the appropriation 
bills in one cycle?
    Mr. Hoagland. Absolutely. Part of my evolution over that 
period of time when I was staff director of the Senate Budget 
Committee was that I felt it was the responsibility of the 
Budget Committee to produce a budget every year. As I watched 
the evolution of an inability to get appropriation bills done 
within the timeframe, it was a basis that gave me the thought 
process to revise my thinking that maybe it is better to do a--
with the time that is limited to all of you, the issue of 
transparency, the ability to have authorizations work their 
will, I think it is--you just--your time is just limited more, 
it seems to me, than in the days when I was up here back 
working here.
    I am not here, I am not watching you as closely as when I 
was here on the Hill, but it does seem to me like your time is 
much more restrictive than it was when I was working as staff 
director of the Senate Budget Committee. And that time 
limitation is what you are really working with.
    Also, let me just say there is redundancy. It seems to me 
like you vote on things an awful lot in a redundant way. Let me 
give you a best example. I have a number of other 
recommendations besides the biennial budgeting, but one of them 
is that, if you pass a budget resolution, even a biennial or 
even an annual, you have voted on increasing the debt limit. In 
the budget resolution that you adopted earlier last fall, you 
have a debt limit figure. You have already voted on it. And it 
does seem to me like you ought to somehow institutionalize the 
fact that you have voted once, that is enough.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Wolfensberger, your testimony 
references congressional turf, ``turf'' with a capital ``T,'' 
relating to the congressional-executive branch relationship.
    As you think about episodes of bipartisanship in budgeting, 
how have Presidents and Congress been involved in either 
promoting or inhibiting bipartisanship?
    Mr. Wolfensberger. Yeah, that is a very good question. I 
think Bill remembers better than I, because he was involved in 
some of these things. But back in the old days, when you had 
split control of the White House and the Congress, there were a 
lot of budget summits, where they would convene the President's 
top advisers and top leaders and committee folks from Congress 
would convene out at Andrews Air Force Base and try and, at the 
last minute, come up with some kind of a resolution.
    You know, since then, I think that there has been more of a 
low-key type of negotiation going on, on an ongoing basis, 
between the executive and the Congress through each 
appropriations bill, starting with the subcommittee levels. I 
noticed that Mulvaney, the OMB Director, just sent a letter to 
Chairman Frelinghuysen flagging some increases in the 
legislative branch budget that is being looked at for this 
coming year. And so I think that is kind of interesting to see, 
you know, how much in advance he is keeping an eye on it. But 
he is a former chairman of this committee and has a pretty good 
idea of what goes on in that process.
    But, you know, I think that the best that we can hope for 
is that we have more agreements where they come together 
earlier. And that is the main thing for me, is coming together 
earlier. Waiting until you are into the new fiscal year 
already, and you are still kicking the can down the road. So I 
think that is the key challenge that this committee will face, 
is how do you go about that, and I think biennial budgeting 
would help in that regard.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you.
    Mrs. Lowey.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Thank you.
    Mr. Hoagland, you note in your statement that Congress 
failed to adopt what you would consider to be real budget 
resolutions in 7 of the last 10 years. You compare that to the 
previous 34 years, when Congress failed to adopt a budget 
resolution only 4 times.
    What do you think accounts for the difference, and why has 
the budget resolution process apparently fallen apart in the 
last 10 years or so?
    Mr. Hoagland. I wish I could answer that question directly.
    I work for the Bipartisan Policy Center. It was founded by 
Senator Dole, Senator Howard Baker, Senator George Mitchell, 
and Senator Tom Daschle. We worked together to find common 
ground. I don't mean to be critical. I just want to highlight 
that the partisanship that exists here, I think, complicates 
our ability.
    The second thing is, I believe deficits matter. I think we 
should reduce the deficit. But the tradeoffs here are so great 
and so difficult that I think that has complicated the 
decision-making process and forced the delays in making the 
very, very hard decisions you have to make.
    Let me also say, Madam Co-Chair, I was careful in what I 
said. I don't want to offend anybody. But I don't consider the 
last two budget resolutions to have been real budget 
resolutions. They were adopted well after they were supposed to 
be done, and they also were done with one purpose in mind, and 
that was simply to create the fast-track reconciliation process 
for consideration of legislation. That is not what--when I 
began here, that was not what the budget resolution was meant 
to do.
    Co-Chair Lowey. I would like to follow up, Mr. Hoagland. I 
see the benefit of setting budget targets every two years. But 
as for appropriations, doing annual bills is one of the most 
powerful oversight tools available to Congress, in my judgment.
    The main source of delays, from my experience in recent 
years, has been political disagreements about top-line totals, 
not the time needed to actually write appropriation bills once 
those disagreements were settled.
    And I understand that a substantial majority of States and 
almost all of the larger States now practice annual budgeting. 
Should we see that as a caution against moving in the opposite 
direction at the Federal level?
    Mr. Hoagland. I think it is 19 States that have biennial 
budgeting. I think it varies in terms of how they operate.
    I do not see that the annual appropriation process is 
working here. I am just simply suggesting, why not look at the 
two-year process? You will be able to set those caps for two 
years. And I think there is some efficiency to be gained in, 
first of all, your ability then to have that second year be the 
authorization and oversight year. That would take away some of 
the pressure that is placed upon you.
    And, in fairness, Madam Co-Chair, it is authorizations 
first and then appropriations. And I am not suggesting the 
appropriation process doesn't do a lot of oversight, but it is 
really the authorization process, to me, that has failed under 
this system. And this would strengthen--from my perspective, it 
would strengthen the authorization process.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Well, I am not sure we can resolve that in 
the minute I have left. So I disagree on that. But----
    Mr. Hoagland. Fine.
    Co-Chair Lowey.----you are saying in your statement that 
Congress failed to adopt what you would consider to be real 
budget resolutions in 7 of the last 10 years. You compare that 
to the previous 34 years, when Congress failed to adopt a 
budget resolution only 4 times.
    What do you think accounts for the difference, and why has 
the budget resolution process apparently fallen apart in the 
last 10 years or so?
    Mr. Hoagland. Because of the increased degree of 
partisanship up here and the very difficult decisions you have 
to make as it relates to spending and revenues.
    Co-Chair Lowey. I thank you for that answer. And I won't 
have any time to go on, but it seems to me that that is the 
real problem. And I am not sure that changing the system is 
going to address the partisanship that, to me, is the core and 
the base of the system.
    Mr. Hoagland. Yes, ma'am.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Thank you.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Perdue.
    Senator Perdue. I couldn't disagree more. We have been 
trying to do it with kumbaya and all of that for 44 years. It 
hadn't worked. We have only funded the government on time 4 
times in 44 years since the 1974 budget act. And I have talked 
to all the people who signed that bill who are still living; we 
have looked at best practices. This is not something that we 
are going to tweak around the edges and think that we are going 
to all of a sudden eliminate partisanship and make this budget 
process work.
    First of all, it is not a budget process; it is a funding 
process. And I want to echo what Senator Hirono has said every 
time she has spoken in this committee, and that is: Whatever we 
do in here, we have to, I believe, have a goal of never having 
another CR, okay, that leads to an omnibus situation.
    The problem in the Senate is different than the problem in 
the House. The problem in the Senate--and I want to get to two 
questions, because you four people have brought up now three 
recommendations in here that I think are very salient.
    Number one, I think the biennial budgeting has merit. I 
think we need to talk about it. I don't think it is a panacea. 
If we do nothing but that, everything else will fail, period.
    Number two, I believe that there have to be consequences. 
Mr. Hoagland, you talked about consequences, and I would like 
to come back and ask you about that.
    But I want to emphasize what Senator Hirono was forcing us 
to think about, and that is this is about funding the Federal 
Government, not just creating a budget resolution. We created a 
budget resolution. We did one in 2015. It only lived four 
months, and it was a way to do the grand bargain.
    I agree with you, Mr. Hoagland, that we have not done a 
real budget since I have been in here in three years in the 
Senate. Senator Enzi, the chairman of the Budget Committee, 
actually has said publicly he would do away with the Budget 
Committee unless we make some substantial structural changes.
    And he has also said publicly that, in the Senate, we 
probably have produced the last budget that can be done under 
the current law, and that is that you cannot provide, unless 
you do all the gimmicks that are out there and the fraudulent 
things that if somebody in the private domain did they would go 
to jail, like delaying expenses and accelerating revenue--
without doing all of those things, we will never be able to 
comply with the balanced budget that we are talking about.
    I want to talk about over here, though, Ms. Holubowich and 
Mr. Owens, you mentioned the makeup of the Budget Committee, 
and I would like to dwell on that just a second.
    For three years, we have looked at the makeup of Budget 
Committees and the process. The problem in the Senate is we 
have a resolution--and it is not a law--that says 51 percent 
can pass it. That is nothing but a political statement crammed 
down the throat of the minority. Both sides have done it 
repeatedly for 44 years.
    Then you go to an authorization process that is a law. It 
is 60 votes, has to be signed.
    And so here is the problem. The minority party gets ignored 
in the budget, now they come over and are asked to participate 
in the authorization, they never do, neither side. Then you go 
to appropriations, same thing. We have only averaged 2\1/2\ 
appropriation bills being voted on over 44 years, 2\1/2\ out of 
12.
    In the Senate, this thing is broken. Going to biennial 
alone will not fix that. I believe that consequences have to be 
considered.
    The question I have for you is: The makeup of the Budget 
Committee--we looked at best practices in other countries and 
States. States have consequences. Nobody goes home until they 
get a budget done. Other countries have gone away from a three-
step process to combining the budget work and the authorization 
work into one, and the way they do that is what you are 
suggesting.
    So would you talk about how you would combine the--totally 
change the makeup of the Budget Committee to include a 
representation of ranking members and chairmen of the policy or 
authorizing committees.
    Until 2 years ago, we hadn't authorized the State 
Department in 15 years. The authorizing thing is a fraud. We 
have not done that for 20 years, maybe, in the way that we 
should.
    So if we could combine it, is there a way to address that?
    I wish we had time to get more into consequences and all 
that, because I would love to get you to comment on that, Mr. 
Hoagland. But please be brief, and maybe we will get time to do 
that.
    Mr. Owens. Thank you for the question.
    Our group discussed this in depth multiple times. And, 
again, where we came out, through a consensus proposal, was to 
get that buy-in, to have the chair and ranking members of these 
committees come in representing those priorities, understanding 
in some cases that may not always be possible in the Senate 
because you have so many committee assignments, but bring in 
their designees, and that the bringing those issues, to know an 
authorization bill is coming forward in that calendar year, to 
make sure that is reflected in what is developed in that 
budget.
    There were all sorts of discussions. We said at one point 
maybe we ought to eliminate the Budget Committee. We talked 
about reorganizing all of Congress and decided that was way 
beyond our scope because of the issues you just identified, 
Senator.
    Senator Perdue. Well, we have changed committee 
jurisdictions repeatedly over the last 100 years. That doesn't 
scare me. And one of the problems we have, we have 16 
authorizing committees in the Senate and 12 appropriating 
committees, and it looks like a jigsaw puzzle, really, the way 
the jurisdictions cross, and it is counterproductive.
    So the question is, how would you deal with things like an 
NDAA, for example--which is about the only thing we try to 
really authorize every year? How would you deal with that if 
you didn't have a formal authorization process but it was done 
actually at the oversight level, in the Budget Committee, made 
up of--if you made up the committee of ranking members and 
chairs of these policy committees?
    Mr. Owens. You know, I don't believe we went to that level 
of depth to where you would be----
    Senator Perdue. Okay. So you didn't get into those details.
    I want to go back. Mr. Hoagland, you wanted to make a 
comment----
    Co-Chair Womack. The gentleman's time is up.
    Senator Perdue. Oh, I am sorry.
    Mr. Hoagland. The original Budget Committee in the Senate 
was made up of exactly what you are talking about, which was 
leadership. Senator Tower was defense. We had Senator Byrd on 
the appropriation. We had the chairman and the ranking member--
early on. You had buy-in early on.
    And I would also suggest that you could rotate--say, we 
have the ag bill coming up for reauthorization. You could 
rotate in the chairman and ranking member of those committees. 
If get buy-in early, it seems to me, on the budget resolution, 
that makes a difference.
    Senator Perdue. Yeah. I would like to engage--in some of 
our working groups; I would like to engage with you guys more 
on those four topics you brought.
    Mr. Chairman, I apologize for going over.
    Co-Chair Womack. Let me remind our members up here to leave 
these distinguished witnesses some opportunity to explain their 
answers. They do deserve the time to give a good, articulate 
response to our questions.
    Mr. Yarmuth.
    Representative Yarmuth. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    I want to go back to biennial budgeting for just a second. 
And one of the thoughts I had--I was a co-sponsor of 
Congressman Ribble's proposal I guess in the last Congress. It 
may have been two Congresses ago. I have lost track. And one of 
the things that I was thinking about was that possibly, because 
the exercise had become, in my experience, pretty much a 
rhetorical exercise and it was a messaging exercise more so 
than any serious budgeting operation, that by taking it to a 
biennial basis you would actually begin to think more seriously 
about longer-term consequences and longer-term spending.
    Is that something that you think is an advantage of it 
possibly, Mr. Hoagland?
    Mr. Hoagland. I have always listed timeliness, long-term 
planning, simplification, and transparency. And I consider 
long-term planning to be an element of the biennial budgeting, 
yes.
    Representative Yarmuth. And a corollary, I guess, of that 
of that question is that--some of the opposition to biennial 
budgeting is that it is harder to project in a fast-moving 
world and so forth and it is harder to project income and 
occurrences. How would you respond to that argument?
    Mr. Hoagland. I would respond that you are at least 
setting--right now, you have already started the process of 
setting along the discretionary side 2 years, so that is a 
given.
    Also, I would respond that, as I said in my oral testimony 
and written testimony, there is nothing to preclude Congress 
from having a supplemental for emergencies and unexpected in 
that second year. So I still think it is possible to adjust.
    Representative Yarmuth. Okay. Thank you.
    The Convergence recommendations didn't deal with biennial 
budgeting. You obviously had to have talked about it at one 
point. What was, I guess, the deliberation there, and why did 
you decide not to?
    Ms. Holubowich. Sure. Thank you for that.
    I think, for us, as we looked--one of our first exercises 
was to map out the budget process and, with sticky notes, 
identify what we saw as the pain points, and we realized that 
they were really front-loaded, that when you have a top line 
established and there is buy-in and agreement, the 
appropriations process tends to really flow.
    So I think, on our part, and part of our discussions, we 
weren't convinced that the appropriations process was the 
problem. It was the bottleneck created at the front as you saw, 
sort of, political documents coming out that just, frankly, 
weren't really based on reality and then the breakdown of 
trying to operationalize that by the appropriators and trying 
to make, for example, really deep cuts in nondefense 
discretionary spending a reality. And that is where you see 
bills like Transportation-HUD fall apart on the floor.
    From my own perspective, I think, from a public health 
standpoint, as we look at public health preparedness, biennial 
appropriations, for me, is a problem. You know, we have 
microbes evolving every day. Just this week, we have 17 new 
cases of Ebola in the Congo. We have a new Australian virus 
that is 1,500 years old that is making a resurgence.
    So setting numbers at the top line for 2 years, I think, 
makes sense. What we need, though, is that appropriations 
process to make those course corrections on an annual basis, at 
least from a public health perspective, to respond to these new 
threats.
    And, certainly, emergency supplementals are an option, but, 
to be honest, you know, in my view, an emergency supplemental 
should support acute, sort of time-limited, discrete events--an 
infectious disease, a natural disaster.
    There are lots of things that are happening that are more 
systemic and chronic, like, for example, we now have babies 
born from Zika moms who, as they now become toddlers of moms 
who were infected with Zika and become school age, they are 
going to have developmental disabilities, so now do we need to 
reinvest in those areas. Or with the opioid crisis, we now are 
seeing resurgence in cocaine-related and meth-related deaths. 
And so those don't necessarily warrant an emergency 
supplemental.
    I think the emergency supplementals, as we know with Zika, 
are not exactly predictable and stable and they sometimes take 
way too long. And that whack-a-mole approach to, sort of, 
supporting public health readiness is not ideal. We would 
prefer to see those midcourse corrections sort of through an 
annual review of really what is needed and where we need to 
reprioritize.
    Representative Yarmuth. But you could, even under your 
argument, you could set top-line numbers for 2 years and then 
appropriate on an annual basis.
    Ms. Holubowich. Absolutely. And that is where we came out 
in the Budget Action Plan----
    Representative Yarmuth. Right.
    Ms. Holubowich.--which is, again, reflective of sort of our 
current reality. Our view would just be, let's try the best we 
can to move that to the front end of the process at the 
beginning of a new Congress, so we set that plan in that stage 
at the outset and allow the appropriations process to flow 
annually from----
    Representative Yarmuth. Thank you.
    A quick question for Mr. Owens. On a debt ceiling, is there 
any difference between your proposal, which is to increase the 
debt ceiling by whatever the budget prescribes, or just 
eliminating the debt ceiling?
    Mr. Owens. The way our group discussed it, we sort of left 
that to the Congress to decide. But it is important that, when 
you are making the spending decisions, and if it is going to 
mean there is going to be a shortfall, that that should be 
acknowledged in the same piece of legislation.
    Representative Yarmuth. Thank you.
    I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Ernst.
    Senator Ernst. Thank you, Mr. Co-Chairman.
    And thank you, for the witnesses that are here today.
    Mr. Hoagland, in your testimony, you mentioned the 
importance of incentives for Congress to get their work done on 
time. And, as you know, since 1974, Congress has passed all of 
its appropriations bills just four times, and that is pretty 
paltry. And in the past 20 years, Congress has passed a budget 
resolution only 11 times.
    And, unfortunately, this hasn't stopped Congress from 
taking a month-long recess right before the start of each 
fiscal year. And if Congress hasn't passed a budget and regular 
appropriation bills by August, they shouldn't be able to go on 
vacation. That is what I think.
    And can you discuss the impact that this type of reform 
would have on ensuring that we get our work done on time?
    Mr. Hoagland. Yes, Senator. Thank you.
    The bottom line here is that we have looked at exactly what 
you are talking about, a way that penalizes you for not getting 
your work done. Senator Domenici and Dr. Rivlin looked at the 
issue of pay. There may be a way to dock your pay for not 
getting your work done, as it happens in the private sector.
    But there are provisions within the existing law that says 
the House cannot go on recess until you have completed your 
appropriation bills through the month of July. You cannot take 
recess. So I see no reason why you can't change the Budget Act 
to make it apply across the board: no recess unless you have 
passed either a biennial budget or a budget resolution on time.
    Now, you waive this, obviously. I don't know how to prevent 
Congress from waiving the points of order that lie against you 
for going on recess. But it is easy--it seems to me you have it 
already in the law that you are not supposed to go on recess.
    Senator Ernst. Yeah. And I do think that is a great point. 
And it circles back something I brought up, I believe, in our 
last meeting as well, but that we have processes in place and 
we don't follow them. We can put new processes in place----
    Mr. Hoagland.----and not follow them.
    Senator Ernst.----and not follow them.
    So we have got to get this figured out and find a way for 
us to get our work done. Because we have a lot of folks that 
just truly don't have the intestinal fortitude to get it done, 
and we are failing the American people.
    Second question. Mr. Hoagland and Mr. Wolfensberger, as 
congressional staffers, you both witnessed something as rare as 
a unicorn here in Washington, D.C., which was a budget surplus. 
And over the past 50 years, the United States has only had a 
balanced budget four times, 1969, and then from 1998 to 2001, I 
believe.
    So, as our deficit approaches $1 trillion, what can we 
learn from those past Congresses?
    Mr. Hoagland. Very briefly, and then I would turn it to 
Don.
    The bottom line there again was that--I was involved in the 
1997 balanced budget agreement that we reached. That was 
reached in a bipartisan manner, including President Clinton and 
a Republican-controlled Congress. It meant giving up on 
revenues, that Republicans had to agree to some revenues. And 
it also meant that Democrats had to agree to reductions in some 
entitlement spending.
    It has to achieve the bipartisan--we also--let's be honest 
about it. We had a lucky economy that was also helping us reach 
that balance during that period of time. But it was bipartisan.
    Senator Ernst. Uh-huh. Thank you.
    Mr. Wolfensberger. Yeah, I retired in February of 1997, so 
I missed being on that glory road that Bill was talking about.
    But, interestingly, I think the balanced budget agreement 
that you had was in 5 years, and actually it was achieved in 2 
years because of a little thing going on out in Silicon Valley. 
I don't know what it was about, but----
    Mr. Hoagland. Yes.
    Senator Ernst. Very good. Well, I appreciate it very much. 
I appreciate the input. And just bottom line, we need to figure 
out what is going to get us to actually do our jobs. So I 
appreciate it. Thank you to the witnesses today.
    Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Senator Ernst.
    Before we go to Senator Bennet, there has been some 
discussion recently about a previously scheduled Joint Select 
Committee hearing on May 18. I just wanted to say for the 
record today, because we have members that are coming and going 
and staffs that are coming and going, the co-chair and I talked 
about this last week, and we both have agreed that, due to the 
funeral of Senator Daniel Akaka and the fact that our Hawaiian 
members are not going to be here that day, and there are others 
that have indicated they may not be here that day, that that 
May 18th hearing is going to be rescheduled.
    So, for planning purposes, let's go ahead and make sure 
everybody is on the same page there. Date to be determined, but 
the Member day will, of course, be rescheduled.
    Senator Bennet.
    Senator Bennet. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for 
this hearing.
    Mr. Hoagland, I wanted to start where Senator Ernst ended 
with you, which was in the 1997 agreement. And you mentioned 
you got lucky because you had a strong economy. We have a 
strong economy right now, and we are going to have a trillion-
dollar deficit next year.
    And I wonder whether you could share with the committee 
what the common elements were that made it possible to reach 
the kind of agreement that you participated in in 1997 and what 
is missing today.
    I mean, you mentioned that Democrats gave on revenue, 
Republicans gave on entitlements. I don't actually think about 
it that way, really. I think about the responsibility that 
people seemed to have--or the consideration that people seemed 
to give to the next generation of Americans, which we seem not 
to give to the next generation of Americans.
    Mr. Hoagland. Yes, thank you, Senator.
    I will simply say that a critical element of that 1997 
agreement--you have to remember, we came off a very tough time. 
In 1994 and 1995, we had government shutdowns, we had clashes 
here, we had a long period of discontinuity in all that we were 
doing. But it turned out that we finally had leadership, and 
leadership out of the White House, particularly. And I am sure 
I am getting myself in trouble here by saying this as a 
Republican. But you need leadership to say that debt does 
matter, that deficits do matter, and that we should be focusing 
on those issues.
    There was consensus up here that deficits mattered. I am 
not convinced today that, with all due respect to all of you 
members here, that you consider deficits to be really a 
situation that is going to impact our future generation.
    Senator Bennet. I heard testimony earlier today about the 
importance of having the annual budget so that we could respond 
to health situations. And it made me think about an opioid 
crisis which we have barely responded to. We claim that we have 
responded to it, but we have barely responded to it, and I 
think because the deficit has robbed us of our imagination to 
do that. I mean, for the first time since John Glenn went to 
space, America can't send anybody into space. And I think that 
is a consequence, also, of our deficit.
    Mr. Hoagland, I also wondered--I know this is an issue that 
you care a lot about and have for a long time as a Republican--
whether you could talk about your view of the debt limit, the 
debt ceiling, and its use as a device for claiming fiscal 
responsibility. Whether the threat to the sovereign debt of the 
United States is something that we should appropriately do, or 
is there some other way that we should--what good could this 
committee do on that question, Mr. Hoagland?
    Mr. Hoagland. First of all, I think Congress should find an 
alternative to the periodic threat of a government shutdown or 
the brinkmanship over the debt limit to force action. Because 
my impression is that it really hasn't. Maybe back in 1985, 
1986, when we went through Gramm-Rudman-Hollings. That was a 
debt limit issue. We got Gramm-Rudman-Hollings because it was 
tacked on to a debt limit increase. Senator Gramm was worried 
about the debt going up to $2 trillion, and so that--and now we 
are at $22 trillion or so.
    So, first of all, in fairness, the Bipartisan Policy Center 
has a group of six bipartisan individuals, former Members and 
former executive officials, and we have been working on a 
proposal. It is no surprise here, it builds upon the old 
Gephardt rule that, once you pass a budget resolution, it is 
automatic. In fact, that was something the House used to do. 
The Senate did not have that Gephardt rule. Or in combination 
with the McConnell rule, which is that if you do not pass a 
budget resolution, then the President should submit a 
suspension request, and then Congress should vote on a 
possibility of a resolution to approve or disapprove of that 
suspension.
    I think it is critical that you try to get this thing out 
of being the brinkmanship. It has not solved the issues of debt 
and deficits going forward, and I think it jeopardizes the 
country's economic future when you have to go through this.
    Senator Bennet. Well, I appreciate that answer. And I am 
sure there are other members who feel this way too, that when 
you develop that proposal we would be very interested to see 
it.
    Mr. Hoagland. I would be happy to.
    Senator Bennet. Thank you, Mr. Hoagland.
    Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Arrington.
    Representative Arrington. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    And I want to thank the panelists for your input, insight, 
and counsel as we deliberate on how we can put some sanity and 
responsibility into this process.
    I am a new Member, so don't blame me. No, I am kidding. But 
my conclusion that I have come to very quickly and I think is 
painfully obvious to everyone else on the outside: The 
political will collectively does not exist on the budget 
outcome piece of this.
    Now, I do think we can find ways to have a more timely 
process and add certainty--which I think there are good, 
fiscally responsible aspects to having certainty and stability 
and continuity.
    But I am just very concerned about how in the world--and to 
my colleague Senator Ernst's comments about incentives. We are 
looking so desperately for ways to force us to do things that 
this body politic will not do, that the dynamics just don't 
exist. And they don't exist with Republicans any more than 
Democrats, I learned this year.
    We sent a budget to the Senate, and it was a 
reconciliation, got it mandatory spending, which is driving the 
debt--we all know that too--and we couldn't get it out of the 
Senate.
    Representative Arrington. So give me a suite of--or us--a 
list of incentives or accountability measures that we should 
consider that maybe have not been considered so that we can 
just take those and begin to noodle on them and debate them 
among ourselves. And that is for timeliness, efficiency, 
process-oriented and for the, sort of, responsible outcome 
orientation. What are those?
    And if you don't mind, we will start with Mr. Hoagland and 
just kind of work our way down. Just rattle them off.
    Mr. Hoagland. Real quickly, I have already stated, I think 
no budget resolution, no pay, no recess. I think those are the 
strongest ones. That is on the stick side.
    On the carrot side, I still believe that if you could pass 
a budget resolution, a conference agreement, that we should 
eliminate the filibuster on the motion to proceed on 
appropriation bills in the Senate.
    Representative Arrington. Mr. Wolfensberger.
    Mr. Wolfensberger. Thank you.
    I am not quite as drastic as no budget, no pay, but I had a 
compromise that, for every day after October 1 where you have 
not completed action on your appropriations bills, you put in 
escrow $100 a day of Members' pay. You get about $400 a day, 
believe it or not. But that might drive some things.
    With respect to the comments Mrs. Lowey made about losing 
control of the process, I have been very sympathetic to the 
appropriators, even though I support biennial budgeting, but I 
have been thinking through a process whereby you might do four 
of the big bills annually and the rest biennially.
    And I am looking at the four that you would do annually--
because all but one requires an annual authorization--defense, 
MILCON, vets, foreign ops, and homeland security. Homeland 
security does not yet require an annual authorization. But 
those four I think might be worth doing on an annual basis as 
sort of a compromise.
    But I know that, in the past, the appropriators have been 
very successful in defeating biennial budget proposals when 
they get to the floor. Mr. Dreier had 245 cosponsors for his 
measure to have biennial budgeting, and when he got to the 
floor on an amendment that he offered to do that, he only got 
201 votes. Some people went south. So it is a very difficult 
nut to crack, and----
    Representative Arrington. Let me keep it moving----
    Mr. Wolfensberger. Yeah.
    Representative Arrington.----if you would.
    And the question is, what carrots and sticks should we 
consider to motivate the House and Senate to do the job that 
everyone in the country does but us?
    Ms. Holubowich. Well, thank you. We spent a lot of time 
discussing this. You will notice we did not make 
recommendations around incentives. In part, we didn't feel like 
that was our role, and, also, I think we couldn't come to 
agreement. You know, it wasn't clear that, to Senator Ernst's 
point, you could do much of anything to force yourselves to 
make these choices.
    Ultimately, again, to our theme that elections drive 
outcomes, I think where we get at this is through the proposal 
for ``Fiscal State of the Nation,'' in the same way that my 
organization presents my financials to my members, as 
corporations share with their shareholders. There is a real 
disconnect, and it is not their fault, but Americans just 
simply don't understand what the government is doing or what it 
is paying for. And they say they want a smaller government, but 
when you propose cuts, they don't want you to cut anything, and 
definitely don't raise my taxes.
    So, I mean, you are in a box where it is hard to make these 
choices because, I think, the American people just simply don't 
know what you are doing. So the hope is that the ``Fiscal State 
of the Nation'' can help elevate the conversation about our 
Federal Government's budget and sort of bridge that disconnect.
    Mr. Owens. I would just add briefly, as Emily said, we 
didn't reach any consensus on this, but we did talk about no 
budget, no pay. We talked about no budget, no recess. We even 
talked about no budget, no fundraising. We talked about a lot 
of different things, that, again, what drives outcomes are 
elections ultimately.
    So we couldn't reach consensus, but if there is something 
this body can adopt that you think will propel you towards 
action, then you should most certainly consider it.
    Representative Arrington. Mr. Chairman, I have gone over my 
time. I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Woodall.
    Representative Woodall. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    And thank you all for being here. I value your expertise.
    I want to pick up where my friend from Texas left off. Lots 
of ``no budgets, no something'' in the tool of incentives, and 
yet my Budget Committee chairman in the Senate says we might as 
well just abolish the Budget Committee because it is not a 
functional process anyway. My friend Mr. Hoagland says, you 
know, we have gotten two budgets passed the last two cycles, 
but I don't consider those real budgets anyway, though they 
would have met the standard for any ``no budget, no anything.''
    I want to explore the notion that maybe it is not that 
folks aren't doing their jobs, but maybe folks are doing their 
job. And some folks are sent here to slow a process down as 
opposed to speed a process up. I think it was Coolidge who said 
his most important job was vetoing bad legislation, not signing 
good legislation. A lot of Members of Congress feel the same 
way.
    Mr. Hoagland, you talked about the debt ceiling. And 
everybody has had a similar conversation, of course. I have 
been here since the big freshman class of 2010. Every single 
measure that has moved spending and deficits in the right 
direction--and, for me, the right direction is down--came in 
the context of a debt ceiling debate--no other measure, only 
debt ceiling debates.
    And so I want you to reconcile for me your real desire to 
see real progress made and my real experience that the only way 
that progress has been made has been through debt ceiling 
discussions and your position that we should eliminate those 
debt ceiling discussions, moving them into the budget 
discussions.
    Mr. Hoagland. Congressman, I understand where you are 
coming from on this.
    I do not think that Gramm-Rudman-Hollings, which was 
designed to bring the deficit down--when we look back on the 
history of that, it turned out that that was not successful in 
that regard.
    The last exercise you went through in increasing the 
statutory debt limit had no effect whatsoever on spending, from 
my perspective. Your adjustment to the caps came later.
    So I just respectfully disagree. I have not seen where the 
debt limit has done nothing more than create a crisis, as it 
relates to the financial markets out there, that we are 
possibly going to default. And I don't think we ever--I don't 
think this country ever will default.
    Representative Woodall. The most constructive deficit 
reduction measure in my 7 years was the Budget Control Act, 
pushed by John Boehner and President Obama that set budget 
caps----
    Mr. Hoagland. In 2011.
    Representative Woodall.----reduced spending, came only in 
the context of a debt ceiling deal.
    Mr. Hoagland. But then you adjusted the caps every year 
thereafter.
    Representative Woodall. Well, not----
    Mr. Hoagland. Not the first year.
    Representative Woodall. But that is exactly right. And 
traded off with spending reductions up to or beyond the change 
in those caps, with the exception of this last cycle.
    Let me think about the work that you all are doing with 
reconciliation at Convergence. Part of the Budget Control Act--
again, I think it was the best vote I have taken since I have 
been here--was creating the joint select committee to bring 
deficit reduction measures to the floor or tax increase 
measures to the floor, whatever you wanted to bring to the 
floor. Thoughtful members, 16 thoughtful members, looking at 
literally hundreds of trillions of dollars in Federal outlays 
going out over decades, and found not one penny on which they 
could agree.
    I don't actually think our challenge is too many chances at 
reconciliation. I think our problem is not enough chances at 
reconciliation.
    Tell me how, knowing that we have shared concerns about the 
fiscal direction of the country, how limiting our ability to 
move a 50-plus-1 deficit reduction measure, limiting those 
opportunities to once a year, as opposed to currently under 
Senate rules three times a year, moves us in the right 
direction.
    Mr. Owens. I think it was the view of our group that 
reconciliation, in some ways, has become used basically just to 
get around and move other types of legislation.
    And so, as we thought about it and deliberated, we thought 
the reality is, if you had one per year and it was authorized 
in that Budget Action Plan, as we call it, it really would 
focus the discussion up front so everybody knew what they would 
be debating and what they would be discussing, and you would 
have two opportunities within a Congress to accomplish what you 
want to accomplish.
    Representative Woodall. I credit Reid Ribble on biennial 
budgeting. Much of his success was because folks knew who he 
was as an individual, and he would vote for anything that he 
thought would save his children and his grandchildren some pain 
and frustration in the future.
    I would just put on your thought list reconstituting that 
Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, a bipartisan, 
bicameral committee much like this one. Anytime we have an idea 
that may move us in the right direction, I would like to see 
that come to the floor for that 50-percent-plus-1 to see if we 
can make a difference.
    I thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Lankford.
    Senator Lankford. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Thank you all for being here as well.
    Let me click through a couple of things.
    There has been some good conversation about finishing 
elements, as far as how to get Congress to be able to act and 
move on things. What about things like automatic CRs to try to 
have something in place so we don't have a government shutdown 
while Congress is negotiating and finishing things out? Let's 
just pretend for a moment Congress doesn't get their work done 
on time. How do we actually get that to move and hold the 
American people harmless in the process?
    Mr. Wolfensberger. Let me just dive in first.
    I think that would be an incentive for inaction. Once you 
have things on automatic pilot, there is no reason for Members 
to go forward then on finishing the appropriations.
    Senator Lankford. Is there a way to be able to design that 
so that the pressure is put on Congress to be able to finish 
the task so the American people are held harmless?
    Mr. Wolfensberger. I commend your imagination to that 
project, but, you know, I haven't thought of one.
    Senator Lankford. Yeah. Okay.
    Mr. Hoagland. Of course, there have been proposals in the 
past to have an automatic CR, and the Domenici-Rivlin proposal 
had an automatic CR. But we also talked about it in terms of 
the context that that CR would start to--the amount of funding 
would start to come down every month by a certain percentage if 
you continued to enter that CR. That would create some 
pressure, it seems to me, to address the issue that there 
wouldn't be action on doing appropriation bills.
    Senator Lankford. If we combine that with things like the--
let's say, in the Senate, you have mandatory quorum calls three 
times a day, so you can't leave; you are there over a weekend. 
So, while we are in that period, you are here----
    Mr. Hoagland. Yes.
    Senator Lankford.----and you have to be able to work 
through it, so they are intended to be short-term.
    Mr. Hoagland. Yes.
    Senator Lankford. Okay.
    Ms. Holubowich. Our group spent a lot of time talking about 
automatic CRs or, you know, a CR-plus-inflation, or we even 
talked about the idea of a super-sequester, again, as one of 
those penalties, those sticks.
    You know, I think, ultimately, we couldn't come to 
agreement that this would be an effective tool. And I think the 
fear, certainly on my part, again, as I spoke about public 
health, is that the default becomes we just don't do it, and we 
end up in sort of perpetual CR mode.
    You know, I think we had hoped that, you know, through the 
Budget Action Plan, again, getting that difficult decision 
making up front would, you know, minimize the need for CRs 
further down the road.
    Senator Lankford. Which I would certainly hope for, by the 
way. By the way, we are in a mode of perpetual CRs right now. 
And so, to say that----
    Ms. Holubowich. And it is not helpful.
    Senator Lankford.----if we put some mechanism in place to 
keep us from having a government shutdown, that is the target 
for me, is how do we not have government shutdowns, because 
that is detrimental to the entire Nation.
    And when you try to weigh a government shutdown versus an 
automatic short-term CR, I am going to go with an automatic 
short-term CR every time rather than have a shutdown. But the 
goal is those are very short and those are very temporary and 
we stay here until things actually get done.
    Tell me a little bit about the President's budget. Has that 
been a useful document or non-useful document for us? It is 
millions of dollars to create it every year.
    Ms. Holubowich. Well, we talked about that. One of our 
exercises was to actually take a step back and pretend we don't 
have a budget process, we have a Constitution; how would you 
design it? Matt and I were in the same group, and I was very 
much, at the time, in a camp that the President's budget is not 
helpful at all.
    It is, though. I think if you think about it as a reporting 
tool, you know, those congressional justifications really get 
into the weeds. And that is your oversight tool, and that is 
the reporting back to you on how they are spending the money. 
Those are critically important. So, again, I think we thought--
--
    Senator Lankford. So the information is important but not 
necessarily the proactive look.
    Ms. Holubowich. Correct. And I think, again, as part of 
that Budget Action Plan, bringing the President in on those 
conversations around the top lines and reconciliation and get 
agreement up front really helps. That President's budget can 
then be a symbolic policy document, in the same way our Budget 
Action Plan would not preclude Congress from doing budget 
resolutions if they similarly felt they needed to put out a 
policy statement.
    Senator Lankford. By the way, I would have no issue with 
that, bringing the President on board. And so if we do a budget 
document with leadership, with key members of Senate and House 
committees, with the leadership of the House and the Senate, 
creating a document that goes into law, that sets those top-
line numbers, gets that established early, gets the President 
involved early. The President can still make recommendations 
through the appropriations process to get it, but the 
President's budget seems to be a distracting document more than 
it does anything else. It has never, ever become law. But it is 
a set of ideas. I am glad to be able to have the President and 
agencies submit ideas, if nothing else.
    Let me ask you one last question about authorizing and 
appropriating. What about an idea like--we always get in to 
this fight of we never authorize in appropriation bills, which 
is a myth that goes back to 1974, because there has been 
authorizing in every single one of them on some level.
    What about combining the work and saying, if something is 
going to be authorized in an appropriation bill, the 
authorizing committee has to pass it first? So there is a 
mechanism to say the authorizing committee, as a committee--it 
may not go to the whole floor, but it goes to the committee. 
They pass it as a committee. Then it could be inserted, and the 
whole body would vote on it then in an appropriation bill to be 
able to add it.
    What about a blending of the two to be able to get those 
committees working together?
    Mr. Wolfensberger. I think that is more realistic than the 
present rule, which says you have to have the authorization 
signed into law before you can appropriate for them. So I think 
putting the action in the particular house, authorize, at least 
pass your authorization before you take up the appropriation, 
that makes good sense to me.
    Senator Lankford. Okay.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Kilmer.
    Representative Kilmer. Thank you, Chairman. And my 
apologies. I was actually in an Appropriations subcommittee, 
hearing from some constituents.
    I want to start by asking the Convergence duo, your 
proposal had us looking at some of the long-term drivers of 
debt and deficits once every 4 years. We had bit of a 
discussion in a committee markup yesterday about the notion of 
having a fiscal state of the nation address, having the 
Comptroller General come in. That is a proposal that Mr. 
Renacci and I have introduced, which would really try to have a 
joint session that is focused specifically on these long-term 
fiscal issues.
    I would love to get your sense of that, if you think that 
having that type of mechanism in place would create more 
transparency and maybe put a little political pressure on both 
houses to try to get something cooking.
    Mr. Owens. I would just say I think that proposal is very 
consonant with what our group came up with, this notion of 
having a deliberate way to look back and look ahead, where we 
are going with our spending and revenues.
    Ms. Holubowich. And, importantly, in a way that is 
accessible to the American public. There is a wealth of 
information out there that is available through CBO, GAO, Joint 
Committee on Taxation. It is not accessible to the average 
American.
    So our idea was that, through this fiscal state of the 
nation, CBO is combining and culling all that information and 
synthesizing it, probably working with a communications firm to 
help, but to translate that for the American public and to 
really actively disseminate that. Our goal is not to produce 
another report that just sits on the shelf and nobody looks at; 
that it really becomes a part of the electoral process, it is 
elevated in the debates, it is a part of the conversation, you 
are referring to it on the stump.
    And so whoever is delivering that message--I used to work 
at GAO, so I would be happy to see the Comptroller General do 
that. But it is certainly consistent with our recommendation.
    Representative Kilmer. Thank you.
    You touched on CBO, and I know that part of the report also 
looks at the independence and maintaining the independence of 
the CBO. I think that is really important. You want to make 
sure there is an umpire who is calling legit balls and strikes.
    Can you talk about some specific measures you think our 
committee should look at that would maintain that independence 
of the CBO?
    Ms. Holubowich. We focused principally on resources for the 
CBO and the other congressional support agencies, in part 
because we have expanded their scope of work, so that is very 
reflective of our proposals.
    I can also tell you from my experience at GAO--and this was 
a long time ago, but I worked on the healthcare team. At any 
one time, we had 200 requests in the queue. It was at least a 
year until we got to start on a project. That was more than 10 
years ago and before the Affordable Care Act, so you can 
imagine now what the backlog looks like, you know. So I think 
it is extremely important to make sure you are investing in 
those institutions.
    We did not get into the issues around, you know, protecting 
their credibility. That was not something, I think, we really 
discussed, but certainly something we think is important.
    Representative Kilmer. Do any of you have suggestions in 
that regard?
    Mr. Hoagland. I have one suggestion, Congressman. That is 
that we had a major commission that you established; it was the 
Ryan-Murray Commission on Evidence-Based Policymaking. It seems 
to me that there ought to be a way to formalize the Evidence-
Based Policy Commission within the Congressional Budget Office, 
establishing an organization that really looks at evidence-
based in terms of making policy.
    Representative Kilmer. Thank you for that.
    I know there has been some conversation already about how 
do you ensure Congress doesn't just ignore whatever process we 
come up with.
    You know, I think some of the conversation has been around, 
sort of, negative disincentives. Unfortunately, by and large, 
when Congress has done that, the negative hit has been to the 
American public. I think sequestration is a good example of 
that.
    We have been trying to noodle on whether there is some sort 
of positive incentives that could push Congress to act, whether 
that be expediting processes here or something else. I would 
like to get your impressions, maybe collectively, if you have 
suggestions on what that might look like.
    Mr. Owens. Our group did discuss some of those carrots, so 
to speak. And expediting processes was one of the attractive 
features.
    We didn't reach consensus, time and time again, on this 
one. Because, at the end of the day, what someone saw as a 
positive someone could easily construe a way that that could be 
used against them as a negative for their interests. And so 
that is why we just couldn't reach agreement on this one.
    Other ideas that we surfaced on more of the carrot or 
positive side dealt with setting aside, sort of, a pot of 
money, that if Congress met its deadlines, then they would have 
a way to expedite expenditures for certain things that they 
considered a priority.
    Again, that led to other people saying, eh, that is a 
disincentive for me, because I would like to see spending go on 
the down side, not the up side. So, hence, we couldn't reach an 
agreement.
    Representative Kilmer. Thanks.
    Thank you, Chairman.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you.
    That completes our round. I understand that Senator 
Whitehouse is on his way back, and so I do want to give him an 
opportunity to ask questions. So, for the good of the order, is 
there anybody else here that has a follow-up question that they 
would like to ask of the panel while we wait on Senator 
Whitehouse?
    Mr. Woodall.
    Representative Woodall. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Several folks have made reference to that we are kind of 
existing in a biannual budgeting world today. But the truth is 
we are existing in a biennial 302(a) allocation world today, 
but we are doing none of the other work.
    Candidly--Mrs. Lowey and I talk about it all the time--the 
Appropriations Committee is working just fine. They do good 
work every single year. They are successful every single year 
once they get a 302(a) number. I don't actually consider that 
to be the problem.
    The problem is looking out, whether it is making a national 
conversation out of a fiscal order of the United States--you 
tell me which Presidential candidate in the last debate was 
pressed on his or her plan for deficit reduction. Right? It 
just wasn't a topic for the American people.
    So help me to distinguish between where we are, which is a 
302(a) world, and where we would all like to be, which is a 
forward-looking glide path towards deficits going down, fiscal 
sustainability of entitlement programs, et cetera.
    Because I don't want to define what we are doing as 
success. It seems to me to just be enabling the one group that 
is getting its work done but doing nothing to empower all of 
the other groups of government that need to begin to get their 
work done.
    Can anybody help me with that?
    Mr. Hoagland?
    Mr. Hoagland. The establishment of the 302(a)s before we 
get to the 302(b)s is predicated upon there being a budget 
resolution. So that is why I keep coming back to at least 
having a budget resolution that establishes that or doing it, 
as you had been doing it, external to the budget resolution, 
passing a law that essentially sets those caps.
    So I think that you are getting your work done because 
there is a 302(a). You are getting your work done because there 
has been an agreement to set that, either through the budget 
resolution or through statutory legislation.
    So I agree. I am looking at--I guess you have six markups 
here in the House this morning, most of those in 
Appropriations. The difficulty is, of course, you have to deal 
with my old stomping ground across over here called the United 
States Senate, and they have 302(a)s too. But if you can't get 
those bills to the floor in the Senate, you will never get to 
conference.
    And so that is why I keep coming back to, if you could pass 
a budget resolution and then you eliminate and get an agreement 
on that, what those 302(a)s are, then you eliminate the need 
for the filibuster on the motion to proceed.
    Representative Woodall. Though, as you point out, when we 
have been successful at that, it has not been with real 
budgets, it has been with faux budgets that have gotten that 
done, at least over the last couple years.
    Don, you were working on trying to reorganize committees 
and making them work better.
    Mr. Wolfensberger. Well, you know, what the House has that 
the Senate doesn't is the Rules Committee, which you sit on as 
well as the Budget Committee. But what they have done there 
when a budget resolution has not gone through the House and 
Senate, the same one, is the Rules Committee puts out a special 
rule saying that the amounts recommended by the Budget 
Committee shall serve for the 302(a) purposes.
    But then, if the Budget Committee doesn't report, well, 
then you go back to something else. I guess we had it once 
where the leadership decided what they would be. So it is very 
tricky. But, you know, when you get to the Senate, you don't 
have those same mechanisms that the House does.
    Mr. Hoagland. That is right.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Perdue.
    Senator Perdue. Well, thank you.
    Just a quick question for anyone who would like to respond 
on this.
    In 1965, our mandatory spending was about 34 percent of 
what we spend as a Federal Government. Last year, it was almost 
78 percent. And yet all of this hoopla that we have around the 
budget and appropriations is around discretionary spending, 
which is $1.2 trillion, $1.3 trillion. We are going to spend 
$4.3 trillion this year.
    I understand we have two trust funds, and they get income, 
Medicare and Social Security. But, today, out of the $2.2 
trillion of tax revenue we get in, we spend almost a trillion 
dollars of that in mandatory--subsidizing Social Security, 
subsidizing mandatory, and paying for Medicaid.
    The question is, how can we really ever get control, long 
term, of our debt situation unless we deal with the total 
spending?
    This is the only entity I have found in the world where the 
budget process and the funding process only deals with 25 
percent of what we spend.
    Does anybody want to take that on?
    Mr. Wolfensberger. Well, let me----
    Senator Perdue. The question is----
    Mr. Wolfensberger. Yeah.
    Senator Perdue.----should we being looking at all of the 
expenses, the subsidy expenses, not the parts of Social 
Security and Medicare that are paid by the trust fund, but the 
other parts that we are subsidizing into those?
    Ms. Holubowich. So, if I may, this was one of the issues 
that we discussed. I think, for Matt and I, we live on the 
discretionary side, and, in some ways, we thought this is 
unfair. We have to be reviewed every single year, and there is 
no commensurate review on the other side of the ledger.
    So I think part of our recommendation here around the 
proposal to have the GAO conduct these long-term reviews for 
multigenerational commitments would set up an opportunity to 
have that conversation.
    We spent a lot of time talking through, well, you know, 
should we be sunsetting these programs? I think there were 
those in our group who felt very strongly, and I know some of 
the groups that I work with in my coalition--people rely on 
these programs. You know, the idea that you could yank out the 
safety net from under them, you know, because we let a program 
sunset was very concerning.
    So the idea here was, have these 4-year reviews by GAO, 
have them be incorporated in the fiscal state of the nation to 
elevate that conversation. And that deliverable provides an 
opportunity for Congress to have that conversation around those 
issues.
    Did I capture that?
    Mr. Owens. Yeah.
    And if I can just add, respectfully, Senator, I don't think 
most Americans understand exactly what you put forth. That is 
not top of mind, understanding the Federal budget. And so that 
is what is behind our recommendation, especially the fiscal 
state of the nation.
    And the reviews that Emily spoke to is, if more Americans 
are better informed and it is discussed during a Presidential 
election cycle and Members of Congress are forced to talk about 
and take questions for that, that political will that is the 
undercurrent of this entire discussion will become stronger, 
because more Americans want to see action on this. But, 
frankly, they don't have the information they need to help 
encourage you to take certain actions.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Whitehouse.
    Senator Whitehouse. Thank you, Chairman.
    And thank you all for being here.
    As a member of the Senate Budget Committee, my 
recommendations are focused mostly on the budget side and on 
the Senate side, not on the appropriations side or the House 
side.
    And I would like to ask to put into the record of the 
proceeding a letter that I have written to the chairs, making 
some of those recommendations in writing for the Senate Budget 
Committee.
    Co-Chair Womack. Without objection.
    [The information follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Senator Whitehouse. Thank you.
    I also want to acknowledge the good work and advice of my 
colleague Senator Perdue in some of the conversations we have 
had leading up to that.
    It seems to me that there are some very baseline facts that 
need to inform any conversation about our long-term debt. And I 
would like to ask all the witnesses just to kind of go through 
this like a checklist, because I don't think there is much 
debate about them.
    It is commonly accepted, is it not, that the metric by 
which a sustainable amount of debt would be measured is the 
debt-to-GDP ratio? Whatever the disagreement might be about 
what that ratio should be, the metric of debt to GDP is the 
commonly accepted metric, correct?
    Mr. Hoagland. Debt held by the public.
    Senator Whitehouse. Correct.
    Mr. Hoagland. Not the total debt.
    Senator Whitehouse. Any further dispute with that?
    Okay. We got all yeses with that adjustment?
    The second observation I have is that we are highly 
unlikely to achieve that debt-to-GDP ratio, whatever we should 
determine it to be, instantly, which, to me, suggests that 
there needs to be a glide slope of some period of years that 
will put us on the path to that.
    Is there any disagreement that that is simply a necessary 
part of the analysis of getting to a sustainable debt-to-GDP 
ratio?
    Mr. Hoagland. I agree.
    Senator Whitehouse. All agreed.
    Mr. Hoagland. I agree completely.
    But to Senator Perdue's comment, two-thirds of that budget 
is on automatic pilot, so to speak, that being the Social 
Security, Medicare, the entitlement programs. The only----
    Senator Whitehouse. Well, that is a good lead-in to my next 
point, which is that, if you are going to calculate deficit in 
any particular period, you won't mathematically get it right if 
you don't look at appropriated spending, plus healthcare 
spending, plus tax spending--and when I say tax spending, I 
mean the more than we actually collect that goes out the 
backdoor of the Tax Code in various tax provisions--and then 
revenues.
    From a point of view of the mathematics, are those not the 
four key elements without which you can't actually get to a 
correct answer?
    Mr. Hoagland. Correct.
    Ms. Holubowich. Correct.
    Senator Whitehouse. Correct. Okay. Good.
    So the reason I ask what I think are these basic 
foundational questions is because the present Budget Committee 
process does not require us to do any of those things. It does 
not require us to sit down and consider and vote on a 
sustainable debt-to-GDP ratio. It does not require us to sit 
down and discuss and vote on a glide slope that gives us a 
reasonable period of time to get there. And it does not require 
us to look at those four elements.
    So, from a process point of view, that is part of the focus 
of this letter.
    Another piece of our problem is that, as has been 
repeatedly pointed out, the budget reconciliation process has 
been more or less hijacked to provide a fast lane around 
traditional Senate regular order for particular political 
priorities of the majority and, indeed, in some cases, deficit-
increasing priorities of that present majority.
    Could I ask each of you to provide for the record your 
recommendations as to what language we might consider to cabin 
the budget reconciliation process so that it is redirected back 
to its original goal, which is to keep our deficits and debt 
under control?
    That is going to take too long in my remaining 39 seconds, 
but would you send that to us in writing so we have your views 
on that?
    Ms. Holubowich. Absolutely.
    Senator Whitehouse. The last thing that I will mention, and 
it is a corollary of this, is that presently there is no 
procedural path in the Senate Budget Committee for bipartisan 
work. I don't think we are going to get this done if we don't 
have an avenue that encourages us to work in bipartisan 
fashion. We can trade blows back and forth with majority-
driven, jammed-through-with-simple-majorities budgets and 
reconciliation measures, but ultimately we are going to have to 
look at this in a bipartisan fashion.
    And so my urgent concern is that we create a parallel 
bipartisan budget bypass just in case that bipartisanship can 
be achieved. You can't mandate bipartisanship, but, by God, you 
ought to make a way for it if it can happen.
    Mr. Hoagland, you are energetically signaling.
    Mr. Hoagland. I don't know if this rule still exists, but 
under the earlier timeframe, if the budget resolution had not 
been reported out of the Budget Committee in the Senate by 
April the 1st, budget resolutions that had been introduced--if 
you and Senator Perdue had introduced a budget resolution 
yourself, it would have been automatically discharged and put 
on the calendar.
    That is one way of creating a--if the chairman and the 
ranking member are not getting their work done, that doesn't 
preclude the two of you from putting together your own 
resolution and putting it out there.
    Now, getting it off the calendar is a different issue. But 
you could still do that under existing rules, as I understand.
    Senator Whitehouse. There is an opportunity for 
considerable mischief there, as well as considerable 
bipartisanship.
    Co-Chair Womack. Last question. Mr. Arrington, bring us 
home.
    Representative Arrington. Well, I want to associate myself 
with Senator Whitehouse and the whole concept, notion of a 
glide path and debt-to-GDP targets. We are looking for a 
bipartisan way to move forward. I don't see any policy 
orientation, Republican or Democrat, in that. It is just the 
reality is we have to walk back that ratio to a healthy, 
responsible level, and then it can be determined what dials to 
use to get there.
    I think, ultimately, though, you are going to have to have 
some consequence if you don't get there. I just don't know 
that--but it would be a great start, and I support that 100 
percent. We have been talking about that.
    So my question is this super-sequestration, because I would 
have an idea--I don't know that it would be supported, but--and 
I ran against sequestration, but I have to tell you, since I 
have been here, I just think it was wrongly applied. I thought 
that the idea was good in concept, but it missed 70 percent of 
the spending.
    So what is this idea of super-sequestration that you all 
kicked around? And some of your thoughts around--I just was 
intrigued, and that was my follow-up.
    Ms. Holubowich. Sure.
    You know, so I think where we came out is that ultimately, 
again, that stick is a failure. And as I have known--full 
disclosure, I am the founder and co-chair of NDD United 
campaign. We advocated to raise the caps; we advocated to stop 
sequestration. We are three for three. Thank you for that.
    This is more than dollars on a ledger. This funding is 
impacting people's lives every day. We have spent the last 6 
years documenting the impact of this. It is too blunt a tool--I 
am speaking for myself----
    Representative Arrington. Yeah.
    Ms. Holubowich.----too blunt a tool. It is too dramatic. 
And it is not the glide path that I think you seek.
    I would just say, you know, a word of advice, I think, from 
our process, again, is to focus on process. We had these 
conversations, and policy and process blur, but when you get 
toward the outcomes, the energy in the room would shift, the 
body language would change, and we would bump up against 
impasse.
    So I think for you all, focus on the true process, build 
that foundation that will allow you through proposals like 
ours--the Budget Action Plan, the long-term reviews--to address 
the policies and the outcomes. I think you will be more 
successful. I think that is how we were successful. And if, 
again, we had focused on what is the appropriate debt-to-GDP 
ratio, we would not be here today with a set of proposals for 
you.
    Representative Arrington. My only concern is I think you 
make a smoother path right off the cliff. I mean, it won't be 
as bumpy, we will be able to enjoy the ride a little bit while 
we are, you know, still intact, and then we crash. And then it 
is forced upon us, ultimately.
    So, if you think the blunt instrument of having reasonable 
walking-back of whether it is the dial of tax on the revenue 
side or spending, wait until the sovereign debt crisis hits. 
And you think the blunt instrument of any of these dials being 
thrust upon us because of our lack of will--then I think that 
is a much worse scenario to avoid. And I think we have to think 
in pretty extreme terms to avoid that.
    And, again, I would put revenue, just to be fair, and the 
spending cuts, and then I would not negotiate away 70 percent 
of the budget that is really driving the debt. That is really 
my----
    Ms. Holubowich. Yeah. I think we would see that as outside 
of the process. I mean, that is the outcome that you are 
striving for. You know, your charge is really, how do we build 
a foundation and a framework to allow those conversations to 
happen? I fear that, if you go down that path in this body, you 
will not get to creating that foundation.
    Representative Arrington. You know, I am kind of revealing 
my--I want to get----
    Ms. Holubowich. I agree with you completely. Yeah.
    Representative Arrington. So, Mr. Chairman, I don't want to 
take any more of everybody's time, but thank you, panelists, 
and appreciate the feedback.
    I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Hoagland, Mr. Wolfensberger, Ms. 
Holubowich, Mr. Owens, thank you so much for being with us 
today.
    Be advised that members may submit written questions to be 
answered in writing. Those questions and your answers will be 
made part of the formal hearing record.
    Any members who wish to submit questions or any extraneous 
material for the record may do so within 7 days.
    And, with that, this committee stands adjourned.
    [Whereupon, at 11:35 a.m., the committee was adjourned.]
    
      THE BUDGET RESOLUTION--CONTENT, TIMELINESS, AND ENFORCEMENT

                              ----------                              


                         THURSDAY, MAY 24, 2018

                          House of Representatives,
                      Joint Select Committee on Budget and 
                             Appropriations Process Reform,
                                                   Washington, D.C.
    The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:45 a.m., in room 
HVC-210 Capitol Visitor Center, Hon. Steve Womack and Hon. Nita 
M. Lowey [co-chairs of the committee] presiding.
    Present: Representatives Womack, Sessions, Woodall, 
Arrington, Lowey, Yarmuth, Roybal-Allard, and Kilmer.
    Senators Ernst, Whitehouse, Schatz, and Hirono.
    Co-Chair Womack. Good morning. The Joint Select Committee 
will come to order.
    Welcome to the third public hearing of the Joint Select 
Committee on Budget and Appropriations Process Reform. The most 
important role given to Congress under Article I of the 
Constitution is the power of the purse. Our panel is charged 
with ensuring we can fulfill this fundamental and essential 
duty.
    Long before we began our work, there was bipartisan 
agreement that the current process for completing this basic 
function of government needs substantial improvement. And 
during our hearing so far, we have identified some of the main 
challenges with the current budget process.
    Today's discussion will be more focused on the opening 
piece in the process, the annual budget resolution. As 
designated by the 1974 Budget Act, the budget resolution was 
intended to help Congress govern effectively.
    Unfortunately, the budget resolution, as we know it today, 
is often associated with government dysfunction and 
consistently missed statutory deadlines.
    There even seems to be some confusion from Members in both 
Chambers on both sides of the aisle about the value of even 
doing a budget resolution each year. That is regrettable.
    This apathy was clearly exemplified just 2 weeks ago in the 
House Budget Committee during our Member's Day hearing, a 
required forum and formal opportunity for Members to present 
their budget ideas for fiscal 2019. Aside from members of the 
Budget Committee, that forum was utilized by one Member.
    While I was disappointed by the lack of participation, it 
was a sobering illustration of the budget's need for our select 
committee to succeed. During today's conversation, I am hopeful 
that we can start determining ways to make the budget more 
useful to Members of Congress and encourage engagement in the 
process. And I also look forward to talking about ways to make 
the budget resolution more realistic as a governing document, 
ensuring that it can be effectively enforced.
    Even though today is about the budget resolution, we cannot 
ignore the fact that the appropriations process is inextricably 
linked. The sooner that a budget resolution is passed in final 
form, the less likely Congress will have to rely on an omnibus 
or a continuing resolution.
    However, as both an appropriator and as chairman of the 
House Budget Committee, I recognize that we must be honest and 
ask ourselves whether the modern Congress will ever be able to 
successfully process 12 individual appropriation bills in a 
single year.
    This morning, to add to our conversations on this important 
topic, we welcome several experts who have studied the budget 
and appropriations process extensively.
    Joining us for today's discussion, we have the president of 
the Committee for Responsible Federal Budget, Maya MacGuineas.
    Jim Capretta is here from the American Enterprise 
Institute, where he serves as a resident fellow and the Milton 
Friedman Chair. Jim brings a wealth of experience from his time 
at OMB and as a Senate Budget Committee staffer.
    Bill Dauster also joins us today, bringing his unique 
perspective as a 30-year Senate staffer and the author of a 
book on budget process law.
    Finally, offering an outside academic's view, we have 
Joseph White, a political science professor from Case Western 
University.
    Thank you.
    And, with that, I would yield to the distinguished co-
chair, the gentlelady from New York, Mrs. Lowey for her opening 
remarks.
    [The prepared statement of Steve Womack follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Lowey. Well, thank you very much. And I would like 
to welcome everyone to this hearing on the subject of budget 
resolutions, their content, timeliness, and enforcement.
    Once again, we have a very good group of witnesses. We have 
Bill Dauster, who has formerly served as staff director and 
chief counsel of the Senate Budget Committee and in several 
other senior staff positions in the Senate and the White House.
    We have Professor Joe White from Case Western Reserve 
University, who, throughout his long career, has written, 
thought, and taught about Federal budget policy and politics, 
as well as about healthcare policy. And, further, the committee 
will hear from two other distinguished budget experts. Maya 
MacGuineas of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget 
and James Capretta of the American Enterprise Institute.
    I want to thank you all for coming. I look forward to an 
interesting hearing, and I am sure you will share with us some 
very important information on which perhaps we can come up with 
some suggestions for change.
    Thank you very much.
    [The prepared statement of Nita M. Lowey follows:]
    [GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Mrs. Lowey.
    I would like to now welcome our witnesses. Thank you for 
your time today, all of you. The committee has received your 
written statements. They will be made part of the formal 
hearing record, and each will have 5 minutes to deliver oral 
opening remarks.
    And, Ms. MacGuineas, we are going to begin with you. It is 
an honor to have you, and I am going to turn the floor over to 
you. Thank you so much.

   STATEMENTS OF MAYA MAcGUINEAS, PRESIDENT, COMMITTEE FOR A 
RESPONSIBLE FEDERAL BUDGET; JAMES C. CAPRETTA, RESIDENT FELLOW 
AND MILTON FRIEDMAN CHAIR, AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE; BILL 
 DAUSTER, FORMER DEMOCRATIC STAFF DIRECTOR AND CHIEF COUNSEL, 
SENATE BUDGET COMMITTEE; JOSEPH WHITE, PROFESSOR, DEPARTMENT OF 
 POLITICAL SCIENCE AND CENTER FOR POLICY STUDIES, CASE WESTERN 
                       RESERVE UNIVERSITY

                  STATEMENT OF MAYA MAcGUINEAS

    Ms. MacGuineas. Thank you so much. And thank you for 
inviting me here today. I am really honored to be talking with 
the committee and appreciate all of you serving on it. And what 
has been great is it seems like you are off to a very strong 
start, so that is very encouraging.
    In our written testimony, we offered 26 different 
recommendations which follow the five different budget areas 
for improvement. These things range from changing the budget 
calendar to standardizing baselines to making it more difficult 
to waive PAYGO.
    What I would like to do in my couple minutes of remarks 
here is focus on three areas, and I am happy to discuss any of 
the others we submitted as well. And those three include the 
importance of getting something done. The importance of this 
committee succeeding at getting something done.
    Number two, ending crisis-driven budgeting. And number 
three, developing a process, a neutral process that makes it 
easier to agree to sound, sustainable budgets.
    So, to start with it, it is clear that the budget is no 
longer a statement of the Nation's principles or reflection of 
a strategic national plan. When the budget even does exist, it 
tends to be political statements filled with wishful thinking, 
and it puts all of you as our leaders in the counterproductive 
position of getting sucked into the partisan battle instead of 
thoughtful policymaking.
    This committee is not going to be able to fix how broken 
our politics are right now or the extent of broken fiscal 
situation facing the country, but getting something done that 
both sides see as fair would be helpful as serving as a way to 
reboot the whole process and will start with a new commitment 
to actually following the reasonable budget rules.
    The types of changes could include things you have heard a 
lot about from other witnesses before from biennial budgeting; 
changing the fiscal year; using the Fiscal State of the Nation 
Report, which Congressmen Kilmer and Renacci and Convergence 
and others have all talked about; changing the makeup of the 
Budget Committees. But little steps can lead to bigger steps.
    Second, one of the main problems that I assume you want to 
solve is the threats of defaults and government shutdowns and 
how to create dangerous situations in crisis-driven budgeting.
    So, we encourage the committee to address these land mines 
by, one, reforming the debt ceiling. By requiring votes to lift 
the debt ceiling along with the votes for policies that would 
actually increase the debt.
    So, for instance, this would have required a debt ceiling 
vote along with the debt increases that went along with the 
recent tax cut and spending bills.
    If you have to recognize the effects of the debt directly, 
it would create at least more accountability and transparency, 
and perhaps it would give lawmakers pause before adding to the 
debt.
    Another one of the ideas that we support is auto CRs or an 
expedited procedures to adopt short-term CRs to avoid 
shutdowns, with the understanding that you don't actually want 
to be encouraging the use of CRs as a way to budget.
    Finally, we also encourage allowing more option for 
bipartisan deficit reducing bills to be considered, which would 
encourage alternative budgets and/or consideration of broadly 
supported legislation. I have been interested in what Senator 
Whitehouse have been talking about on this topic and others, 
but I think it is really important to create the incentives for 
the things that we want to get done, bipartisanship, and the 
things that are harder to get done, deficit reduction.
    So, finally, perhaps the most important thing you could do 
is improve the process to encourage consideration of serious 
fiscal plans to improve our debt situation. No amount of 
calendar changing, baseline improving, auto-CRing will be 
sufficient to accomplish a serious fiscal plan and the 
political will to enact that.
    So, while we all recognize that budgeting is about 
tradeoffs and hard choices, one merely needs to look at the 
current fiscal situation of upcoming trillion dollar deficits, 
projections of unprecedented debt levels, and interest being 
the fastest growing part of the debt of the budget to know that 
this isn't happening in our current budget. And the potential 
damage could harm our country for decades.
    So, to address this, we support the adoption of a system of 
establishing medium-term debt target along with new enforcement 
mechanisms. And in 2010, our board of experts came up with an 
idea called a Debt Stabilization Act, whereby there would be a 
medium-term debt-to-GDP target, annual targets to create a 
glide path to get there, and the budget resolution would comply 
with those targets, and both spending caps and PAYGO's would be 
in place.
    There would also be an additional trigger mechanism, and I 
emphasize that my board thought it was really important that 
trigger mechanism be half revenues, half broad-based spending 
cuts to really have both sides object to it, and it would be a 
mechanism that would help have budgets comply with those 
targets.
    There are a number of ways to structure these different 
targets. At the time, we were shooting for a debt-to-GDP ratio 
of 60 percent by 2018. So, we are going to have to wiggle room 
that a little bit, not quite on track for that. But there are a 
lot of different ways to make this mechanism work. We would be 
delighted to work with people figuring out that structure.
    But, frankly, just moving to a process that includes a 
fiscal goal as part of the budget process would be a 
significant improvement from what we currently have. And the 
time to do this is right because the economy is strong; at the 
same time, the fiscal situation is precarious. And 
bipartisanship, which we desperately need, is at a low, but you 
have the start of a really good working environment here.
    So, lastly, whatever you do, we encourage you to add to 
your new process stronger enforcement mechanisms because, right 
now, if you look at how we try to enforce the budget with 
spending caps and PAYGO, the holes in that are so large; it 
really results in them being meaningless. And a budget process 
that is meaningless undermines the entire faith in our system 
to do the most important thing that there is for the country, 
which is to set the thought-out plan for where we want to go.
    So, again, thank you so much for having me here today. We 
have a number of recommendations we are pleased to share with 
you.
    [The prepared statement of Maya MacGuineas follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Ms. MacGuineas.
    Mr. Capretta.

                 STATEMENT OF JAMES C. CAPRETTA

    Mr. Capretta. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Thank you, also, to Mrs. Lowey. I am very pleased to be 
here. Thank you for inviting me to participate.
    I agree that the work of this joint committee is very, very 
important. It is very timely. And so, I really am pleased that 
the Congress created this committee and asked you to take a 
look at these very difficult questions.
    The Federal Government is running very large annual 
deficits, and those deficits will grow in the future as the 
U.S. population ages and health spending continues to grow more 
rapidly than the economy.
    The current Federal budget process is not helping Congress 
grapple with this fundamental challenge. Also, it does not 
facilitate an orderly and timely decision-making process. 
Congress wastes too much time on small and irrelevant matters, 
even as it fails to focus much attention on the issues of real 
budgetary consequence.
    There are many aspects that need to change. Today, we are 
focused on the budget resolution. I am going to make just three 
recommendations here. Although, I agree that many more things 
need to be done beyond the three I am talking about today.
    First, I think the budget resolution should become the 
vehicle for establishing and amending the statutory caps on 
discretionary spending. Second, the budget resolution should 
become the vehicle by which an automatic increase in the debt 
limit occurs. And, third, and most importantly, the budget 
resolution should be modified so that it includes a medium- and 
long-term outlook.
    So, to the first recommendation on the caps. Obviously, 
under the Constitution, establishing budgetary policy is a 
shared responsibility between the executive and legislative 
branches. This is part of our constitutional structure, which 
is very important, of course, but one consequence is that we 
rarely have a budget that is enforced in total across the 
executive and legislative branches.
    Something of an exception to this is the caps, which have 
been in place since 1990, more or less, with a couple of 
exceptions. These caps, while very much a part of the process 
today, are not part of the regular budget process in the 
Congressional Budget Act. They have been enacted on an ad hoc 
basis. I think the Congressional Budget Resolution should 
become the vehicle for establishing and amending those caps. 
Allowing the budget resolution to become the vehicle for this 
would make the budget resolution a much more serious 
legislative vehicle than it is today. It would also bring the 
executive branch into budget negotiations with the Congress 
earlier in the year, which might help prevent the kind of end 
of year political standoffs that now regularly occur.
    There are a number of ways that this could be done. I think 
the most straightforward is that, as a final resolution made it 
both through the House and Senate, it would automatically 
trigger the sending of new legislation to the President for his 
signature or veto, changing the caps and statute to comply with 
whatever is in the budget resolution.
    The President, of course, could either veto or sign it. If 
he vetoed it, then the Congress could try to override or, and 
if not overridden, the caps would still apply, at least in a 
budget resolution sense, to the Congress.
    The second recommendation is to get rid of the debt limit. 
I think the debt limit has outlived its usefulness. Congress 
should get rid of it all together because it really is a self-
inflicted wound if we fail to pay our creditors. But if we 
can't do that, the budget resolution should become the vehicle 
for automatically raising the debt limit consistent with the 
budget levels in the budget resolution. This, too, would make 
the budget resolution a much more serious legislative vehicle. 
It would make it meaningful as a vote because this would be the 
vote that would trigger the debt limit being raised or not, and 
it would bring the executive branch also into the negotiations 
because of the legal questions associated with the debt limit.
    Lastly, and most importantly, again, bringing a long-term 
outlook to the budget resolution.
    You can see the importance of a long-term outlook by 
looking backwards. If we had, as a country, made changes in the 
mid-1990s, as was recommended by two bipartisan panels on 
budget outcomes and reforms, if we had made those changes 25 
years ago, we would be in much better shape than today we are.
    Similarly, we have to start making decisions now that 
affect the fiscal outlook of the country in 2030 and 2035. It 
takes that long to get some of these things right. And so, I 
know that is a difficult task to ask people who are here to 
represent the here and now and what is going on in the lives of 
their constituents now, but attending to that situation is 
absolutely critical. And the budget resolution really doesn't 
facilitate that today.
    So, my testimony covers this in more detail, but one simply 
way to do this is to bring into the budget resolution an 
agreed-upon measure of the Federal Government's fiscal outlook 
going out the next three decades, such as a present value 
calculation of expected revenue and expected spending, make 
that a target for reduction over time, and use something like 
the reconciliation process to bring progress on meeting that 
goal.
    Thank you. I will be happy to answer questions.
    [The prepared statement of James C. Capretta follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Representative Womack. Thank you, sir.
    Mr. Dauster.

                   STATEMENT OF BILL DAUSTER

    Mr. Dauster. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Chair Lowey, members 
of the committee, thanks for letting me be here today.
    Let me start by acknowledging the dirty little secret. 
Okay, maybe it is not so secret. A lot of members hate the 
budget process. I am here to tell you: It is okay to hate the 
budget process. It is frustrating. It gets you blamed for 
failure that you did not cause, and it is full of unnecessary 
drama. But there are five things, probably more than that, but 
I will talk about five things that you can do that will help us 
hate the budget process less.
    First, don't make it worse. Take the Hippocratic Oath of 
budget reform: First, do no harm. Don't set yourself up for 
more frustration and failure. Don't create a system that 
punishes you when leadership fails to do its job. A good budget 
process should be like your favorite car. It gets you where you 
want to go. It doesn't force you to go where you don't want to 
go.
    Chairman Womack was right when he said that a good process 
is not in the business of prescribing specific budget outcomes. 
A bad budget process is sort of like an overambitious New 
Year's resolution. You know, those promises that would be nice, 
but we just can't keep. By February, we are denying we ever 
made them. Gramm-Rudman was like that. And I would argue the 
unrealistic budget control caps were as well. So, I would say 
make changes that are like your favorite car and not like a New 
Year's resolution.
    Second, we should use Senator Bennet's term, de-weaponize 
the debt limit. Senator Whitehouse is exactly right when he 
said that it is like a bear trap in your bedroom. Many 
Republicans and Democrats alike agree that now may be a time to 
end this drama.
    The Gephardt rule, which automatically changed the debt 
limit when you adopted a budget resolution, should be applied 
in both Houses. And if that fails, there is the McConnell rule. 
That is the rule that you delegate power to the President to 
suspend the debt limit for a period of time subject to a fast-
track resolution of disapproval.
    Third, a lot of Senators hate the budget process and the 
budget resolution, in particular, because of vote-a-rama, the 
all-night vote marathon on amendments that no one has seen 
before. None of us have liked pulling all-nighters since 
college, and if we admit it, we didn't like it in college.
    One problem is that the vote-a-rama is one way that the 
minority can get its voice heard. But you can solve that by 
guaranteeing that the minority leader gets a vote on a certain 
number of amendments. You can haggle over the number, but it 
has got to be something less than 50. After a certain number, 
the press stops paying attention anyway, so why torture 
yourself?
    Fourth, I like the Convergence Center idea to facilitate a 
budget action plan at the beginning of a new Congress. The 
election cycle is the cycle that Congress pays attention to 
anyway, so you should recognize that reality in the process.
    I also agree with Chair Lowey, and I would not move to a 2-
year appropriations bill. Annual appropriations bills are one 
of the few ways you guys have to get the Secretary of such and 
such to answer your telephone call.
    Fifth, I like the Convergence Center's idea to make the 
chairs and ranking members of other committees, members of the 
Budget Committees and for many of the same reasons that Senator 
Perdue expressed here.
    As spots open up on the Budget Committees, give the other 
chairs and rankers a right of first refusal to join you on the 
Budget Committee. If enough do, it would become a place where 
deals get done. There are five suggestions. Good luck and 
Godspeed in your efforts.
    [The prepared statement of Bill Dauster follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, sir.
    Mr. White.

                   STATEMENT OF JOSEPH WHITE

    Mr. White. I hope I am doing this correctly. Distinguished 
co-chairs and members of the committee, thank you for the 
opportunity to share some analysis and ideas with you as you 
search for useful ways to reform the congressional budget 
process doing no harm along the way.
    Many of the sources of complaint about current budgeting 
and budget resolutions in particular, such as failure to meet 
deadlines or complete parts of the procedure at all, are due 
mainly to the intense political conflict of our time. And new 
processes can't fix that. But I think a bit of good can be 
done, and it is encouraging to see that there is some agreement 
among the participants on this panel, the careful statements by 
the committee leadership, and other efforts, such as the 
Convergence Project.
    On one issue I didn't address in my written testimony, I 
would just like to say that I agree with Mr. Capretta and Mr. 
Dauster and the Convergence Project that it is time to 
eliminate the ways that the debt ceiling encourages hostage-
taking and brinksmanship full stop.
    Any further reforms--or if you can do that one, that would 
be a huge one--but any reform that would be designed to 
accomplish some set of goals and sort of meet some standards, 
and these standards should not consist only of beliefs about 
effects on budget totals as the so much discussion seems to 
think.
    So, I would like to emphasize four others. First, budget 
should serve representative government with democratic 
accountability. They should make it easier for citizens to see 
what the government is planning and promising and delivering, 
and they should be affected by elections.
    Second, budget processes should help policymakers encourage 
efficient operation of government programs.
    Third, Federal budget decisions have some effects on the 
national economy so the process should encourage debate and 
attempts to influence those effects. Most important, the basic 
task of budgeting is to relate preferences about details to 
preferences about totals. Normal budgeting proceeds in 
iterations. Totals in details are proposed. If there are 
mismatches, those are identified, and negotiations search for a 
combination that is acceptable.
    The details, such as what is done for national security or 
who pays how much tax or what healthcare the government 
guarantees for what cost, are in aggregate at least as 
important as the economic effects of budget totals.
    Top-down approaches that set totals without considering the 
effects on details, therefore, are fundamentally bad budgeting. 
So, by these standards, I would say there should be budget 
resolutions because resolutions provide a public statement of 
the economic policy based on the governing group's beliefs 
about the effects of spending, revenues and their balance.
    Resolutions also can trigger reconciliations, significant 
changes in government priorities. But these kinds of broad 
policies, broad priorities, or basic economic approach 
basically reflect elections. They are unlikely to change 
between elections. And by that logic, resolutions should be 
biennial, functioning as the U.S. version of what OECD calls a 
medium-term budget framework. There is no need to do 
resolutions twice in a Congress.
    The annual appropriations process, however, provides a 
review of agency plans that is useful both for encouraging 
efficiency and making agencies accountable to Congress and the 
public.
    Agency activities involve details that can change from year 
to year, and there are good reasons why most organizations 
budget in this sense annually. So, I would like to see 
resolutions passed biennially but set 302a allocations for the 
appropriations for 2 years with the appropriations remaining 
annual. I think that fits the purposes of both processes.
    Now, other witnesses have agreed with some of these 
recommendations. And there will be a lot more disagreement over 
my third point. You are receiving today and will surely receive 
more recommendations that the budget process be focused on 
estimated consequences for budget totals, even further in the 
future than the current 10-year terms of resolutions.
    I tried to explain in my written testimony why that is not 
a great idea, but just a few points here. One, long-term 
discretionary spending targets fundamentally ignore details. 
That is why they eventually break down because you don't really 
belief in the details that would fit those targets.
    Two, procedures that claim to budget for the long run are 
just a subject of manipulation and gimmicks as any other 
procedures. As you must know from experience with evading the 
BCA, discretionary caps.
    Three, the dominant factor in projected long-term spending 
increases is healthcare programs, but there is no good way to 
estimate that cost. I provide a chart as an example of that in 
my testimony.
    In fact, focusing on long-term Medicare costs misses the 
point, that we have a national healthcare cost crisis now and 
not just in government programs.
    Much more could be said about this topic, but perhaps we 
can engage about that in the discussion period. Thank you very 
much for the opportunity to testify.
    [The prepared statement of Joseph White follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Mr. White.
    We appreciate the testimony of each of our witnesses here 
this morning.
    I will begin the Q&A with a question for Ms. MacGuineas. 
Your testimony contains a lot of solid suggestions for Congress 
to more effectively address long-term debt. In the current 
budget process, we definitely have, at best, some tension, if 
not an outright conflict, between budgeting for the short term 
that leads to an annual appropriations process and then doing 
something that addresses the long term without it becoming just 
some fictitious goal in mind that really doesn't carry a lot of 
merit. Which, if any, of the elements in our current budget 
process, Ms. MacGuineas, would you keep?
    Ms. MacGuineas. Well, that is an interesting question, so I 
think I would shift a lot of the focus on to thinking about the 
budget more comprehensively.
    One of the things I don't want to do is sacrifice the long 
term just to focus on the short term or vice versa. And so, I 
think I would go to the very root of what budgets are for, 
which is for tradeoffs, and they admit that they have 
constraints, and I would hold yourselves responsible for 
looking at what the glide path for the current projections are 
on a regular basis.
    Many times I have actually heard Members of the Congress 
say, you know, there is two-thirds of the budget that we can't 
even look at. And, of course, we can, it is not through the 
appropriations process, but you are responsible for overseeing 
the portion of mandatory spending and revenues. So, what I 
would do is I would add in a piece that requires reviews of 
that, and I would increase more transparency as you figure out 
how to do the really hard pieces of making changes so those 
have alignment, which they currently don't.
    Co-Chair Womack. We have had a lot of discussion in 
previous hearings about carrots and sticks. What can we do to 
motivate, incentivize, coerce, shame Congress into actually 
doing something?
    Ms. MacGuineas. So, I think there is a couple of things 
that you want to create the carrots and/or sticks for. One, of 
course, is getting a budget done. And the second is for 
improved fiscal outcomes.
    On getting the budget done, I do find myself kind of liking 
the simple idea of you shouldn't leave, you shouldn't have a 
recess until the budget is completed. I know people want 
carrots, so I figured we can just make that a carrot instead of 
a stick, which you get recess when you've done the budget. We 
can just flip it.
    But I do think in terms of the long term, there are lot of 
things you can do with the debt ceiling where you replace that 
with a different form of budget constraints, something that 
only comes into play when you are spending and revenue programs 
in the longer term are out of whack. So, you would not have to 
have debt targets, debt ceilings, other kinds of constraints, 
unless they are there to remind you that changes need to be 
made. And avoiding them, I assume, would be a carrot.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Capretta, some observers have noted 
the challenge of focusing on medium and long-term fiscal 
outlooks. At the same time, the unfunded liabilities of the 
Federal Government, depending on who you ask, are at least in 
the tens of trillions, if not into the hundreds of trillions of 
dollars.
    So, help me understand why in spite of the challenges, 
Congress should attempt to build in a longer term focus as part 
of the budget resolution and do so in a politically neutral 
way?
    Mr. Capretta. Well, it is quite true that projecting out 
Federal outcomes, 15, 20, 30, 40 years from now is very 
difficult to do, but there is little question that the 
population aging of this country, plus the commitments that 
have been made in programs relative to the revenue base has 
left the country with a very, very large gap.
    And, you know, we can argue about degrees and how much, but 
it is going to be very, very significant. I would also note 
that many other countries have adopted some kind of a long-term 
focus because they understand this problem. Many countries, 
frankly, advanced economies have taken much more proactive 
steps than we have to try to get this under control in advance 
of it occurring because it is, for them, maybe accelerated some 
because of their demographic questions.
    So, there is no question that we have a big unfunded 
liability problem. How are we going to deal with it? If we 
don't make some changes in the processes that are pushing the 
Congress to address it, and the President to address it, there 
is very little reason to do anything.
    The Congress could drift on for another 10 or 15 years 
without anybody even realizing how big the problem is and, you 
know, until it is almost on top of us. And so, I think much 
more focus needs to be brought to Congress on how big it is and 
what needs to be done now to try to affect outcomes in 10 and 
15 and 20 years.
    You cannot change this problem with a small, you know, 
adjustment, and, you know, turn around and expect it to, you 
know, be implemented right away. You are going to have to do 
big things, and that means, you know, things that are going to 
take a long time to phase in.
    Co-Chair Womack. I am about out of time. I was going to 
share some of my new Year's resolution with Mr. Dauster, but 
since I have broken all of them anyway, we will just save that 
for another day.
    Mr. Dauster. I broke mine as well.
    Co-Chair Womack. I do like the comparison, though, to our 
business and breaking New Year's resolution.
    Mr. Dauster. Thank you, sir.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mrs. Lowey.
    Co-Chair Lowey. For whoever cares to respond regarding 
budget resolutions. In the past, the budget resolution has been 
a powerful tool for creating, implementing, and enforcing 
budget plans, but that only works if there really is actual 
agreement on a plan. And recently, budget resolutions seem to 
be becoming more vague with little real purpose other than to 
launch reconciliation bills and sometimes attempt to show 
declining deficits on paper.
    Would any of you like to comment on how budget resolutions 
can be made more real again?
    Mr. Dauster. Well, I will start by saying that I do with 
the Convergence Center idea that it makes sense to set those 
overall appropriations levels early on in a Congress. And I try 
to encourage that to happen by making it sort of a disappearing 
fast track. You get the fast track if you can do that at the 
beginning of the Congress where it is useful to the 
appropriators, but you lose that, say, in April or May of the 
first year. If you don't do it by then, you don't get the fast 
track reward that you would have otherwise.
    Mr. Capretta. I would also just suggest that the 
recommendation I made in my testimony that said that you should 
tie the statutory caps on discretionary spending, on 
appropriated spending to the levels that go--that are in a 
budget resolution and send legislation to the President for 
signature or veto on those caps, it would make the budget 
resolution the vehicle by which the annual appropriation caps 
are set for both the Congress and the President. That would be 
a real legislative item, and it wouldn't be fictitious.
    If it was signed, you know, that would be, everybody would 
be signing on, you know, subject to loopholes and trying to get 
around it through some practices that need to be stopped. But, 
you know, caps on discretionary spending have generally, not 
always, but generally worked over the last 25 years.
    And if you put them into the budget resolution, the budget 
resolution becomes more real for both the Congress and the 
President.
    Ms. MacGuineas. I would point out that reconciliation is an 
incredibly powerful tool. And I think that it should be changed 
back to the original intent so reconciliation can be used for 
things that improve the deficit situation, not used in other 
ways. And I also think that budgets should be pushed back to 
where they are taken seriously, and they are meant to be 
serious, and not just political documents where the numbers 
don't add up.
    And ways to consider doing that is that if you have savings 
in your budget, you need to put them into reconciliations. You 
need to direct for them to have reconciliation to move those 
savings along so that they aren't just put there on paper and 
never used. And ending the amount of gimmicks that we have on 
these budgets, so there are heroic assumptions. There are 
timing changes. There are all sorts of spending that is assumed 
to bypass the caps, but plugging up those gimmicks would be one 
important tool in showing that budgets need to be taken 
seriously. And they are at the point now where they aren't at 
all.
    Mr. White. If I may, just a few points. One is that the 
original purpose of the reconciliation process in the original 
budget resolution was not simply to reduce deficits. There was 
disagreement about that. I am not saying that, at this point, 
given the current situation, I wouldn't support that, but 
sometimes, for example, you want an expansive fiscal policy, or 
you might want an expansive fiscal policy. And one of the 
original ideas was that reconciliation could be used for that. 
So we shouldn't talk about original intent here.
    I also think, I think the most ridiculous thing that is 
being done with reconciliations right now is the use of these 
$1 billion reconciliation instructions, which are ways to 
basically get around the Senate filibuster without actually 
having any fiscal policy or any policy involved. And so, if 
there is a way to ban these $1 billion reconciliations, I think 
that would be a good idea.
    The other thing I would like to emphasize is that it sounds 
nice to say that there should be agreement between--that the 
President should sign off on the budget resolution, but the 
budget resolution process was originally created in part 
because, you know, President Nixon and the Congress at the time 
did not agree on basic fiscal policy.
    And I have a hard time imagining what the budget resolution 
produced by Speaker Ryan would have been that President Obama 
would have signed. And so, I think it probably is better to 
view the budget resolution as something for Congress. Getting 
the House and Senate to agree is tough enough.
    Co-Chair Lowey. I misunderstood. I thought, in your last 
response, you were suggesting that the President get involved. 
I guess I misunderstood. I can't imagine bringing the President 
into the budget process now. We have enough trouble when we 
finish our work, but that is not here nor there. Did I 
misunderstand you? It seems your first----
    Mr. White. No, no, no. I think it is very optimistic to 
recommend, as the Convergence project does and as other people 
have, that the budget resolution be some sort of joint 
resolution that the President signs. I think that is going to 
be very, very tough.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Oh, we agree that it would be very, very, 
very, very tough.
    Mr. White. It would be great if you could get agreement, 
but I am not sure you can have a process that forces that.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Okay. I just wanted to be sure that I 
didn't misunderstand.
    Mr. White. Sorry.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Thank you very much.
    Co-Chair Womack. Representative Arrington.
    Representative Arrington. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    I must say, I find this panel, so far, the most helpful and 
most practical and most specific in getting at what I hope we 
can all agree to with specific strategies for a more timely, 
orderly process. And if we can be aspirational, I would like to 
get at some ways to improve getting to better outcomes, not 
necessarily--in a policy-neutral way.
    I think, let me start with the reconciliation process 
because it has come up. You say we shouldn't use the 
reconciliation for these $1 billion--and I agree, actually. I 
mean, I voted for the tax reform because I think we have got to 
grow the economy. And I think that is part of it. And I think 
we are going to more than cover the cost there, but, 
regardless, I don't think that that is necessarily the intent 
or a good pattern to enter in to.
    Why don't we use reconciliation for its intended purpose? 
And I will open that up to any of you. Why don't we use that 
for its intended purpose more often given that we are $21 
trillion and counting?
    Mr. Dauster. I think of the reconciliation bill from the 
Senate standpoint. And from a Senate perspective, 
reconciliation is a way to get a majority vote on something 
when the normal rule in the Senate is that you need 60 votes to 
go to the bathroom. So, it could be, it could be used for a lot 
more things than it is.
    But in the end, it ends, as you have said in earlier 
committee hearings, it often relies on the political will if it 
isn't there to put together the costly difficult things that 
you would have to put in the reconciliation.
    Representative Arrington. So, if that is the way to get at 
the 70 percent of the spend that we know is one part of the 
equation here to reduce deficit spending and debt and if we 
know that there are some really big programs within the 
mandatory side, why don't we use that reconciliation more 
often, Ms. MacGuineas?
    Ms. MacGuineas. Well, I think the problem is that what 
happens is to use that reconciliation usually means it is going 
to be one party that uses it, just by passing the 60 in the 
Senate. And for big fiscal improvements, you are going to need 
both parties to buy in. There is no way that we are going to 
get real deals, real progress, real improvements with one party 
owning all the hard choices.
    Representative Arrington. We couldn't even get the 
Republican Party on a simple majority to agree to $204 billion 
reduction using reconciliation during the tax reform. I don't 
know how in the world we are going to get--we have people in my 
party that won't even mention the word Social Security or 
Medicare when it comes to reconciliation.
    I mean, there are all kinds of ways to say it to avoid 
people thinking you are trying to take their Social Security; 
you know, making it more sustainable for my generation and all 
that. But I mean, isn't it always going to come back to, will 
we have the guts to actually take on some things that we know 
are going to send us into oblivion, into the debt crisis that 
will wreak havoc on generations to come, blah, blah, blah? I 
mean, please.
    Mr. Capretta. If I could just say one thing about 
reconciliation, which I think has been lost over the years, 
which is that it was quite true that it is used mainly to get a 
majority vote in the Senate these days. But in the eighties, 
because there was split government between--you had a 
Republican President and a Republican Senate and a Democratic 
House, it had to be bipartisan, and the theory of the Reagan 
Administration, why they pushed for reconciliation to be used 
frequently during that period, was you ended up with one vote 
where there was some positive thing a Member might be able to 
say about it as opposed to all the individual items. You could 
claim: Hey, if we pass this bill, it will reduce the deficit by 
$300 billion, $400 billion.
    And that was the impetus to try to put it all together into 
one package and say Congress was taking a very important step 
to reduce the deficit.
    You are never going to get deficit reduction of that 
magnitude if you try to pass a lot of little individual bills. 
They all get mired down in political controversy, and every 
committee wants to be budget-neutral. So that is really the 
main purpose of reconciliation.
    Representative Arrington. Each of you have mentioned the 
debt targets. I am all for that. I think it is policy-neutral, 
Mr. Chairman, as to how you get at the outcome. But I think 
having a glide path to something more responsible, how do we 
put teeth into that to make sure that whatever the strategy, we 
walk it back to a responsible level? And I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Whitehouse.
    Senator Whitehouse. Thank you, Chairman. I was struck by 
Chairman Womack's opening statement regarding the disinterest 
that we all see in the budget resolution. And I think one of 
the reasons for that is that the question, the budget 
resolution to what end, hasn't been answered.
    If the purpose is to create a reconciliation bill that is 
not even relevant to the fiscal task of the Budget Committee, 
which it has become recently--and it is hard to get too excited 
about that unless you are the proponent of the measure that is 
being driven through the reconciliation process--if you are 
doing budget resolution without a strategy or a timeline or a 
goal, it is hard to get excited about that as well. And I 
appreciate very much Mr. Capretta's focus on a target and 
getting there over time, because I think that is an important 
part of any serious budget fiscal process.
    It is also hard to get excited about a budget resolution 
where you don't even get the arithmetic right and add the 
elements that add to the deficit and the debt, which are 
revenue, appropriated spending, health spending, and tax 
spending. And if we are not looking at all of them, we are not 
even getting the arithmetic right.
    And, finally, if the budget resolution doesn't help the 
appropriators get their 302s and it doesn't help solve the debt 
limit problem, again, it is hard to get too excited about it.
    So, I think that gives us an array of tasks that can make 
the budget process meaningful again. And I want to particularly 
focus in my questioning on the debt ceiling because I think you 
have all been really excellent on that subject.
    As Bill Dauster was kind enough to point out, I view this 
as a zero-upside bear trap in the bedroom. Worst-case scenario, 
you step in the damn thing, and bam, now you have got a hell of 
a problem on your hands. Best-case scenario, you avoid it, and 
nothing good has been accomplished. That is not a really good 
equation.
    Bill, you have looked at this for some time. You have a lot 
of experience in the Senate. Can you think of one good thing in 
your experience that was accomplished in the Senate by virtue 
of the debt ceiling? Some people say it is an opportunity to, 
like, give the minority a chance to hold the majority's feet to 
the fire, demand something. Has that actually ever happened?
    Mr. Dauster. I am not going to be able to find that 
example. And, in fact, I think that you are right about, and 
many of you have expressed the concern with the debt ceiling. 
We carry around in our pockets little pieces of paper like this 
that are basically just promises based on the promise that the 
government is going to do what it says it is going to do in the 
budget process.
    Senator Whitehouse. Let the record reflect he is showing a 
dollar bill.
    Mr. Dauster. It could have been, though, a Treasury bill, a 
Treasury bond. If we have pieces of paper like that, we sell 
them for real money, real things of value in the world. But if 
we mess up the debt limit, then we have to pay people more in 
order to borrow from them by giving them little pieces of 
paper.
    So, whenever we do debt limit crises, we put in danger the 
whole system that relies on little pieces of paper like this.
    Senator Whitehouse. Let me ask you if you could get back to 
me in a response to a question for the record because I don't 
think we have the time to really drill into this now. But as I 
think my House colleagues will be first to recognize, the 
Senate is a peculiar place, and----
    Mr. Dauster. We will stipulate----
    Senator Whitehouse. And I think your idea about using the 
budget process to, quote, ``automatically change the debt 
limit,'' I think makes a lot of sense. But I think it would be 
helpful to us if you brought your experience in the Senate, 
with its procedures and with its parliamentary rules and so 
forth, to drill down through that automatically changed concept 
and see what kind of language you might, perhaps, even run by 
the Parliamentarian, and see how we would actually do that.
    I think that is a really good concept. And I think one of 
the things that makes the budget resolution relevant again is 
if it does move the debt limit so you don't have that bear trap 
waiting out there for you.
    But as you know, the Senate is a peculiar place, and if you 
could drill through to that, that would be, I think, very 
valuable for all of us.
    Mr. Dauster. I am happy to do so, sir.
    Senator Whitehouse. And to go back to Mr. Capretta's 
statement. You talked about setting a target for debt and 
deficit reduction over time. My observation has been that the 
current budget process, at least in the Senate, doesn't do 
that. There is no point in that process. We are asked to set 
what the target is. And I think every witness so far has agreed 
that the target is a debt-to-GDP ratio. Whatever the number is, 
that is the metric for it. And we are not asked that in the 
budget process at any point. And given that we are looking at 
$21 trillion, as Congressman Arrington said, we are not going 
to do that overnight. So there has to be a glide slope to get 
there, and presumably, there also has to be warning bells to 
let us know when we are off course.
    Is that the general concept that you had in mind about a 
target and over time?
    Mr. Capretta. It is generally. I would support that as a 
way of doing the business. I would also look at, potentially, 
present value calculation. That would be another way of 
bringing it down to one number that the public might be able to 
understand. Just have CBO----
    Senator Whitehouse. Or you do both.
    Mr. Capretta. You could do both.
    Senator Whitehouse. So, you can't game it so much.
    Mr. Capretta. Yeah. That is----
    Senator Whitehouse. Does everybody agree that debt-to-GDP 
is the metric that we should be looking at in terms of----
    Mr. Dauster. I would quibble on two grounds, if you will 
forgive me. One is----
    Senator Whitehouse. I am out of time, so keep it brief, 
Bill. I yield back.
    Mr. Dauster. You should be looking at the rate of change, 
not just the stock. So, deficits are just as important. Where 
you are going is important. And why you are going is important. 
If you had a high debt-to-GDP ratio and you are fighting 
Hitler, that is okay. But if you are not doing something 
important, then it is not.
    Senator Whitehouse. Got it.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Sessions, Texas.
    Representative Sessions. Thank you. I want to ask a 
different question. 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, we went 
through in this body and in the Senate, a process that 
essentially was CRs and essentially held discretionary spending 
flat. It produced a flat budget. It held government to making 
decisions, in my opinion, based on priorities. It refocused 
administration agencies, and it made them dig deep, in my 
opinion.
    It also caused, on the other side, some indecision about 
infrastructure decisions that we would make and deferred lots 
of decisions. So, some, I think, was good. Some, I think was 
deferred. What do you think?
    Ms. MacGuineas?
    Ms. MacGuineas. So, I thought the purpose of the spending 
caps would have been, would have been most effective if what it 
had done was pushed lawmakers to replace them with more 
thoughtful targeted changes to the budget that would have 
improved the fiscal situation. I thought the caps were the 
easiest thing to do because you don't have to specify what the 
savings are, and so it sounds like you are doing a lot work, 
but you are not picking the policies. There were some savings 
that were smart. There were some savings that were excessive.
    Now that we have gotten rid of the caps, and what we should 
have done is when we busted through those caps, replaced them 
with savings elsewhere, we no longer have that spending 
constraint. But we also have the problem where discretionary 
spending, which really hadn't been the driving problem in the 
budget before is about to be a big significant problem again.
    So, I would pick reasonable spending caps along with pay-
as-you go rules. Reasonable meaning they are built from 
policies that you can stick to and you plan to stick to. But 
this time I would include the full part of the budget, not the 
part of the budget which at the time was the least, the least 
of the drivers of the debt.
    Representative Sessions. A hungry person will gorge 
themselves. A person that eats consistently may be able to 
offer some bit of disciplined in their eating and sleeping
    Ms. MacGuineas. That is right. You want budgeting 
constraint that is realistic. We want budgets that are 
realistic, and we want enforcement mechanisms that are 
realistic. And once we have things that are on paper add up to 
huge aggressive claims that we are never going to get, the 
whole process becomes impossible to stick by, and then there is 
no credibility to it.
    Representative Sessions. Mr. Capretta.
    Mr. Capretta. I think that the discretionary caps were 
useful for trying to drive a lot of productivity improvement in 
certain ways. I think they became counterproductive to some 
degree with respect to the defense budget. I think that there 
is pretty clear evidence that, you know, if you just look at 
defense over the nineties and to where we are today, given the 
security questions going on, it seems like it is not going to 
work to have the levels that were there previously. And so, 
something was going to have to give. And when you gave on that, 
you ended up giving on the other side as well. So that, I 
think, was the basic equation.
    Discretionary spending isn't necessarily the fundamental 
problem. There is lots of waste in it. It is very hard to 
target the waste. I think one idea that should be given more 
consideration is delegating to the agencies that are running 
these programs some more incentives to drive productivity 
improvements in their agencies so that they make the decisions 
to cut spending so that they can then spend the savings on 
bigger investments that they can find.
    So, you know, new models of running the agencies is 
probably a better answer than just blunt across-the-board 
cutting.
    Representative Sessions. I am not trying to give the answer 
for you, but I was out in Hawaii several years ago and met 
General Brown, United States Army, who spent a good bit of time 
trying to convince us that sequester was a difficult issue for 
the military. And I took 1 minute to suggest to him that I 
thought that the levels were fine, and we needed to give it to 
them October the 1st instead of March the 20th. And he got his 
head around that.
    So, I am not saying the answer I expected from you, but I 
think timeliness is the most important aspect to run the 
government.
    Sir?
    Mr. Dauster. I agree with a lot of what you just said and 
what the other witnesses have said. Make it early so that the 
appropriators can react to it and the government can react to. 
Make it rational and achievable, or else people will blow 
through it. But setting a cap is one of the best ways to get 
the agency to focus on achieving at savings.
    Representative Sessions. I think, no matter what the level 
is, timeframe of efficiency, of giving the government time to 
effectively take whatever they are is important knowing we 
probably won't go back, but they have got--meaning how much 
money, we probably won't take back a lot of money, but giving 
them time to effectively do it.
    Sir?
    Mr. White. If I may, there is a lot that could be said 
here, but I just want to emphasize that we should not assume 
that there is a lot of productivity that can be pulled out of 
our programs. It is not clear to me, for example, that the 
effect on the Social Security Administration of the kind of 
budget constraints it has faced is something that could have 
been solved by greater productivity.
    So, I think we have to be very careful about making these 
assumptions in any part of the budget.
    Representative Sessions. Well, I think you could just look 
to the VA. That would be exhibit A, to me, with the size. Thank 
you very much.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Yarmuth of Kentucky.
    Representative Yarmuth. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
    Thanks to all the witnesses. I have found the discussions 
very interesting, as all our discussions have been interesting.
    I want to focus a little bit on the issue of long-term 
budgeting. It seems to me that three of the four witnesses have 
said we should be doing that, and Mr. White takes a contrary 
position. I remember several years ago when Tim Geithner was 
the Secretary of the Treasury, and he came before the 
committee. And Paul Ryan was then chairman and had all of these 
40-, 50-year projections of expenses and so forth and 
increasing the deficits.
    And I asked Secretary Geithner, you know, how realistic do 
you think 40- and 50-year projections in a world that is 
changing as rapidly as this one is?
    And he said: I don't think projections outside of 5 years 
are worth anything.
    So, would you elaborate, Mr. White, on what your opinion is 
on the perils of longer term budgeting, and what you think may 
be a realistic timeframe that is viable and meaningful?
    Mr. White. Sure. It varies somewhat with the program. And 
you can do a better long-term focus for a pension program than 
you can for a healthcare program.
    Healthcare cost control is simply a year to year problem 
because the entitlement to healthcare is not simply to the 
beneficiaries. The reason our care is so expensive is we pay so 
much for everything we get.
    In other words, the providers are getting much more money 
here than in any other country, or the overhead expenses are 
much more than in any other country.
    And these are powerful important people who, if you try to 
reduce their incomes, they will fight you. And you cannot 
budget in the long run to control the costs that the medical 
community will generate because there are just no policies that 
will do that. So, healthcare cost control is a short-term 
problem. And it is problem for the whole country, not just for 
the government. And we really need to do much better on that.
    And that is the most important thing we could do for the 
long run of the Federal budget. If we got our healthcare costs 
down to something resembling the most expensive other country 
in the world, our long-term forecast would look a lot better.
    So, one, some programs are different from other programs. 
Social Security is different from Medicare and Medicaid. Beyond 
that, I think anything more than 2 years is probably a bad idea 
for discretionary spending because there is no--first of all, 
there is no good way to do the baseline. What is the baseline 
from which you start?
    The CBO baseline is usually, well, increased with 
inflation, but for some programs, that may be too much, but for 
a lot, it is too little. The population grows. You are serving 
more people. And so, I don't think there is any really good way 
to do long term.
    And I think that the most important thing you could do 
about the long term is get better control of the American 
healthcare system now.
    Representative Yarmuth. You also, in your written 
testimony, talk about the point that budgeting should be more 
about just aggregate totals of spending and revenue, that it 
has to be more about the policies that are reflected. And I 
totally agree with that. The American people deserve to know 
what policies will underlie the allocations that we are making.
    And I remember so well, Mick Mulvaney coming before the 
committee earlier this year. And he said: I could have come up 
with a balanced budget, but we would have been making stuff up. 
We would have been basically fabricating policy.
    And in prior Congresses, they have done the same. You 
arrive at a number, and then you say: Well, details are to be 
determined.
    What kind of details in terms of policies in the budget 
resolution do you think are appropriate?
    Mr. White. Well, I think that this obviously raises the 
question of which committees are going to make decisions about 
details. I think in the past when reconciliation has been used 
to reduce the deficit, which hasn't happened for a while, but 
when it did, what actually happened is that the leaders of the 
committee, such as Senator Dole in particular, told the 
leadership of the Budget Committee and so on: Hey, I think we 
can do this much. We have ideas about how we will do this much.
    I think it is in practice that there should be consultation 
with the leaders of the authorizing committees about: What do 
you think you can do this year? How much can you do? No, we 
need more.
    And, again, it is iterative.
    I don't think the budget resolution should specify the 
policy details. I think that the budget resolution, however, 
should be based on careful consultation about what details 
might work, about what totals might work.
    Finance Committee, what can you do here? Ways and means, 
what can you do here?
    And the budget process can push, the Budget Committee can 
push, and say: Hey, how about some of this?
    But that is all before the resolutions are adopted.
    Representative Yarmuth. Thank you.
    I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Ernst.
    Senator Ernst. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    And thank you to our witnesses today. It has really--I 
agree with Congressman Arrington--this has been a very, very 
helpful discussion and debate this morning.
    I would like to start just by going back to having the 
budget as a joint resolution signed into law. And I know, Mr. 
White, you have expressed great concern there. It would be very 
difficult. But if the panel could go back and maybe, from your 
perspective, why would a--because a lot of our witnesses have 
brought this up in other meetings as well.
    But from your perspective, what would be a positive to 
having a joint resolution signed into law, and what might be 
the negatives of that same proposal?
    Jim, if you would like to start?
    Mr. Capretta. Yes. Back to the recommendation I made in my 
testimony. First of all, the recommendation I made was just to 
make the budget resolution the vehicle for spinning off a piece 
of legislation that would go to the President, that would amend 
the caps on discretionary spending.
    Mr. Capretta. So, it wouldn't be covering everything that 
would be going on in the budget resolution. I actually in the 
past have favored that. That may be a step too far for this 
committee to take, so let's just focus on the recommendation I 
had in my testimony today.
    If you put into the budget resolution the option that, at 
the end of it, if it was approved by Congress, a separate bill 
would go to the President, and he could sign or veto it, and it 
would change the caps on discretionary spending, this would get 
around the problem of a fake budget resolution, because the 
resolution would be setting caps that everybody would have to 
live with.
    And these would be the real caps. They wouldn't be the fake 
caps with $40 billion in reductions that nobody planned to 
actually enact.
    So that is one very big positive, I think, that this would 
become a real vehicle for really setting the caps, and it would 
be the caps that the President would also have to live with. He 
wouldn't be signing on to anything else.
    Now, some people have said, well, why do we want to bring 
the President into the budget. The President is in the budget 
process. The President, at the end of the day, is going to be 
in agreement or in disagreement around the total amount of 
discretionary spending. They will weigh in on that one way or 
another before the process is out. If you can get agreement on 
that earlier in the year, you are better off than later.
    Now, I am not guaranteeing this would lead to agreement 
right away. This could mean protracted negotiations like 
everything else. It could go on for months. But it would become 
a vehicle for trying to get that debate going.
    And by the way, if the President vetoed it, Congress would 
just go on like it already does. So, you wouldn't really lose 
anything by doing this.
    Senator Ernst. Yes, Joe.
    Mr. White. If I may, Senator, but that raises the question: 
What is the period of the caps?
    If the period of the caps is, say, 5 years, then next time 
it is time for a budget resolution, hey, we already have some 
caps. We don't need to enact a resolution to have caps because 
we already have caps.
    So, there might be an argument for, if you go to a biennial 
budget resolution, for having 2-year caps, and I think that 
would be responsible in terms of relating totals to details. 
But if the caps are for longer than that, then the argument 
that it is an incentive to pass a budget resolution no longer 
becomes true.
    Senator Ernst. Maya.
    Ms. MacGuineas. So, I think it is a perfect example of how 
there are pros and cons in all of these policies, instead of 
that it is just one simple answer. And I think Doug Holtz-Eakin 
testified before in a way that made it really clear and 
helpful.
    The benefit of is right now the budget doesn't have the 
force of law. It would be desirable if it did, it would be more 
meaningful, and it would strengthen the budget in guiding the 
entire process.
    The problem is how you feel about giving the President more 
power than he already has, because Congress should be able to 
take some of its power.
    And then I think the real issue is, where do you want those 
hard choices to come. Should they come at the beginning of the 
process, which they probably should, which is why I would, if I 
had to choose, go for a joint budget resolution, but it could 
make getting the process started much easier.
    And you want to have a backup plan so that if you can't 
come to agreement, you can still have revenue and spending 
levels that you can move forward with.
    Senator Ernst. Very good. I appreciate that.
    I have got less than a minute left, but I want to quick ask 
you, Ms. MacGuineas about, you mentioned mandatory versus the 
discretionary spending and greater transparency, having a look 
at mandatory spending at some point during that budgetary 
cycle. How would you envision that?
    Ms. MacGuineas. Yeah. Well, I absolutely think that you do 
need to budget in the longer term, you need to make projections 
and look at things in the longer term if you are going to make 
commitments for the longer term, which we do in programs like 
Social Security and Medicare. And there are a lot of important 
things that we need to be predicting going forward over the 
longer term, like things that are driven by demographics.
    So, the first key is absolutely increased transparency. We 
have very good work on this from the trustees of Social 
Security and Medicare, but having other ways that we really put 
forth the projections that these plans are on.
    Then the next step would be coming up with actual--if your 
programs are out of alignment, if we are making promises that 
we aren't able to keep, which we are doing right now, there 
would be some action-forcing mechanism where you would start to 
grapple with those.
    It would, as we have said throughout this hearing, be 
policy-neutral. It has nothing do with how you would fix these 
programs. It would be that we should no longer be able to 
abdicate the responsibility to look at programs where we are 
making promises without a plan for how to pay for them, and 
making changes to them sooner rather than later would 
beneficial.
    Senator Ernst. Thank you.
    I apologize, Chair. I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. Ms. Roybal-Allard.
    Representative Roybal-Allard. Thanks, Mr. Chairman.
    I want to ask a little bit different kind of question to 
see whether or not this fits into the equation as to what we 
are trying to do.
    You know, it is been mentioned that the congressional 
budgeting math doesn't match up with reality, that we should be 
looking at projecting outcomes further out to see what the 
impact is of our decisions, immediate decisions are, and how it 
impacts us in the future.
    And it was also mentioned that we had better get better 
control of our healthcare system, because that is something 
that is also contributing to our deficits now and in the 
future.
    The thing I am asking about is how we score things, for 
example, in terms of healthcare, the fact that we cannot score 
certain policies. And I will use healthcare as an example.
    For example, prevention, when the information we get says 
that if we invest in prevention, for every dollar that is 
saved, we eventually will save $12, sometimes $24. I don't 
remember the exact number. And so, because it is not scorable, 
at least that is what we are told all the time, we do more 
treatment policy rather than prevention policy.
    And so, I guess my question is, in terms of scoring, is 
there anything that you think could be done in terms of scoring 
so that the savings that we could realize, if we were able to 
invest more in prevention, would become a reality?
    Because right now every time we want to invest in 
prevention, we are told: No, we can't do this because it can't 
be scored and it breaks the budget caps or it goes beyond 
whatever restraints that we have.
    So, my question is about the scoring, if something can be 
done to include long-term savings.
    Mr. White. If I may, there are two issues here.
    One is the boundaries between discretionary and mandatory 
spending. So, if you increase discretionary spending this year, 
the question is, that runs up against the caps in discretionary 
spending. And yet, it is budgetarily sort of silly to let the 
caps stop you from doing that if it, in fact, will save you 
money on Medicare and Medicaid and so on down the road.
    And that would require some sort of changes in the rules so 
that mandatory savings, as scored by CBO, would be allowed as 
offsets against discretionary spending. You could do that by 
the rules within the caps.
    But there is a second issue, which is whether prevention 
actually saves money. And most of the time, CBO does not score 
prevention as saving money because most of the time it actually 
doesn't. The advocates will say it will, but finding data that 
actually supports that for most prevention measures turns out 
to be very difficult.
    And this goes back to Louise Russell's book 30 years ago 
on: Is prevention cheaper than cure? And prevention may, in 
fact, help, you may get healthier people from it, but most of 
the time CBO won't score it because they don't have the 
evidence to score it.
    So, there are those two different issues.
    Representative Roybal-Allard. Ms. MacGuineas, in your 
testimony you say that Social Security deserves a place in the 
budget process. And as you know, any time we mention doing 
anything with Social Security it raises a lot of red flags for 
a lot of different reasons.
    So, can you please elaborate a little bit on how you think 
Social Security should fit into the budget process? And how 
could we avoid some of the pitfalls that so many see whenever 
we even talk about Social Security in any way?
    Ms. MacGuineas. Yeah. Let me first agree and empathize that 
having a discussion, a national discussion about Social 
Security, is incredibly difficult because it becomes demagogued 
immediately, and you quickly move away from what the actuaries 
tell us to sort of threats of people trying to harm seniors or 
do this and that.
    That is about a national discussion. We are not having very 
good national discussions on a lot of things right now, and we 
need to change that tone and that tenor and the way that we 
talk about things. And that is why I do believe things like the 
trustees of Social Security, CBO, impartial arbiters, are 
really critical in all of these discussions.
    The reason I think Social Security needs to be a part of 
the budget, and, again, policy-neutral, we can fix Social 
Security all by revenue increases. We can fix it all by 
spending reductions. We can do it with a combination. It is not 
about how you fix it. It is that we have made promises that we 
are unable to pay right now. So, we do want to think about 
that.
    But it is also the point that budgets are about resources 
and how we are going to allocate them. And it is really 
important that, at some step, and that step should be the 
budget, we look at all of our resources in total, how they are 
allocated in the budget pie, and ask ourselves the question: 
Does that reflect our national priorities?
    And in most cases, I am sure it probably will, and that is 
a good thing. But we should not take pieces, big pieces of the 
budget off and say we are not going to look at them, because 
budgets can't look at the whole picture unless you understand 
all our tax dollars, where they are going, what the tradeoffs 
are.
    Everything with Social Security is controversial, but this 
shouldn't be. This is just a basic principle of how one should 
budget. And, again, it has nothing to do with outcomes. But we 
should fix the program. It has nothing to do with directing how 
we should.
    Representative Roybal-Allard. Okay. Thank you.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Woodall.
    Representative Woodall. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    I agree with Ms. MacGuineas, everything with Social 
Security is controversial. But I suspect, now that more than 
half of the Congress got here when I did in 2011, or more 
recently, not a one of us has been asked a question about the 
1983 Social Security amendments. Not a one of us has been 
grilled over the increase in payroll taxes. Not a one of us has 
been grilled about the reduction in benefits.
    To Mr. Capretta's point, we did something that was going to 
take place 30 years later. We phased it in over a large period 
of time. And we all knew that, born in 1970, I am not going to 
get my Social Security benefits until 67 instead of 65.
    And I am vexed about how, to Mr. Dauster's point, how we 
get folks to focus that far out on the horizon. But I know it 
would require a reconstitution of the budget committee process. 
So many State legislatures, the budget committee, the 
appropriations committee, same committee. And so, I understand 
some of the recommendations for getting the President involved.
    Today it actually is pretty clear to me that we are 
performing three separate functions. I am doing aspirational 
goals in a budget to tell my bosses back home what I would do 
if only I were king for a day, which I am not.
    Then I do an authorization process to say: Just so you 
know, we can all work together, and these are all the things we 
would do for you if we had the money to do it, which we don't.
    And then I come along once a year and say: This is actually 
what I am going to fund, but don't forget about the really good 
authorizations I did for you and the really good budget that I 
passed for you earlier.
    And so, I don't think we can reject that political reality 
that those things play a role.
    So, I want to focus on appropriations, because that is 
where the rubber meets the road every year. And I have a letter 
from the CBO where they talked about how the fiscal year 2017 
appropriations were being spent.
    And, Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask unanimous consent to 
put this in the record.
    Co-Chair Womack. Without objection.
    [The information follows:]
    
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    Representative Woodall. What the CBO was asked is: What is 
that spend rate? Because we really do want to hold folks 
accountable. I think it was Mr. Dauster who said this is the 
only way I can get the administration to come back and visit 
with Congress day in and day out.
    And what the CBO found in this report--and I apologize if 
my colleagues don't have a copy of it--is that about half the 
money did go out in year one, but the other half of the money 
went out in year two, or year three, or had absolutely no time 
limit on it whatsoever, just went out whenever.
    So, my question for each of you in the 2-1/2 minutes I have 
left is, knowing that the spend rate is different, that folks 
are spending annual appropriations over many years out into the 
future, and knowing that that number is actually 50 percent of 
the money that is going out not in year one, does it change 
your expectation of what keeps the administration coming back 
to Congress?
    I want to stipulate that Article I is who I want to 
protect. Could I really move to biennial or triennial or some 
different cycle, given the spend rates that we see in 
appropriations today?
    Mr. Dauster.
    Mr. Dauster. I think that is an argument for annually 
appropriating, because then you go back and you see are you 
spending it where it needs to go. And if you aren't, then you 
can grab some of it back and use it somewhere else.
    Mr. Woodall. Now, I can only grab it back if I have an 
appropriate President who is willing to work with me on a 
rescissions bill. And if I have a President who is willing to 
work with me on a rescissions bill, then I don't need the club 
of appropriations to get the agency to come back and visit with 
me, is my expectation. So, I am thinking this is an adversarial 
situation that comes up most often.
    Mr. White.
    Mr. White. Well, I think what we are talking about here at 
some level is the difference between budget authority and 
outlays. And so, when Gramm-Rudman was passed, which focused on 
outlays, they had to have this massive negotiation among CBO 
and OMB staff to come up with spend-out rates for every 
program, project, and activity.
    Because if you are going to buy an aircraft carrier, it is 
going to take a very long time to spend the money for an 
aircraft carrier. And if you are going to build a road, again, 
you don't spend all the money on the road that year.
    On the other hand, there are things for which you spend 
money immediately, or it is sent out this year for next year, 
like support for education.
    And so most of what is going on in this situation is just 
the natural differences among types of programs. And I don't 
think that that will really have much effect on what you are--
--
    Representative Woodall. Well, from an accountability 
perspective, my experience with the Department of the Navy is 
they are very interested in what I have to say when we are 
talking about buying that aircraft carrier. Once we have half 
an aircraft carrier, they are pretty sure we are going to get 
that second half down the road. The military contractors are 
pretty sure they are going to get that second half, too.
    So, I know we are all worried about what happens with the 
appropriations cycle. I am just not an appropriator, trying to 
understand how that mechanics work.
    Mr. White. Well, I think that they are worried about 
getting the budget authority in the first place. And if they 
get the budget authority for the aircraft carrier and they 
screw it up, then maybe there is a possibility you won't give 
them another aircraft carrier.
    Representative Woodall. I see my time has expired, Mr. 
Chairman. I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Kilmer.
    Representative Kilmer. Thank you, Chairman.
    And thanks to all of you for being with us.
    You know, there is a lot of conversation about carrots and 
sticks. And, Mr. Dauster, I wanted to get a sense from you 
regarding what sort of positive incentives could be put in 
place to encourage bipartisanship and sound budgeting. You 
raised the notion of a fast track, and I am not entirely clear 
what that looks like.
    I guess I can see how you could create an incentive in the 
Senate to act in a bipartisan way if it gets around vote-a-rama 
and filibusters and all that. But why would a majority in the 
House be incentivized to go that route when they can do 
whatever they want with 218 votes?
    Mr. Dauster. I should say that I pray every morning for 
humility and sometimes it takes. So, I should say that I am not 
an expert on House procedures and I shouldn't pretend to be.
    I want to agree, though, with what you said in an earlier 
hearing, that often when Congress puts a gun to its head it 
pulls the trigger. And so, if you are putting in sticks in the 
progress, you want to make sure that you are willing to accept 
those sticks. So, I am much more of a carrot person.
    And I think that from the Senate perspective, the 
particular carrot that works best is to create an opportunity 
for a fast track where you are able to move something quicker, 
with fewer amendments, and get it done.
    And the cost for that is often you need a supermajority in 
the committee or a deadline to produce it before X date in 
order to get the right to use that fast track.
    Representative Kilmer. If you or others have thoughts about 
how you could get the House to buy into that approach, I would 
value it, because we have been trying to think about what 
carrots might look like.
    Maya, you have spent a lot of time working on these issues. 
And I know one of the reasons that you are as vocal on this is 
that I don't think Congress is going to do anything on this 
issue unless the American public demands it. And to me, that is 
part of the appeal of the Fiscal State of the Nation idea, to 
try to drive some conversation around budget deficits and our 
Nation's debt.
    Can you talk about how you see that having some potential 
value?
    Ms. MacGuineas. Yeah, I really do. And one of the things 
that I really like about something like the Fiscal State of the 
Nation is that it is not hard to do, there is nothing that is 
hard about it, but it could start this positive process.
    Because, I agree with you, nothing is going to change 
unless you all go home and feel like your voters actually want 
you to make some of these hard choices. And that has to be a 
stronger sentiment, that they enjoy you giving away lots of 
things, not paying for them, and fighting with each other.
    But the public will not make that change on their own. That 
will ultimately only come from political leadership. And so, we 
have got a little bit of a catch-22.
    I think the best thing to do is give people information, 
give you all, the political leaders, and the President 
information, and insist that it be shared in a way that this is 
the effect of our budget.
    Another idea I was thinking about when I was listening to 
you all talk is, at the end of the budget cycle we should 
actually look back and see how much you stuck with your budget 
and how that played out.
    But the biggest piece of it is sharing the information in 
terms of the longer-term issues, what we are facing, what the 
effect it would have from our political leaders, and then that 
will create an understanding.
    CBO, all you have to do is read a CBO document and 
understand how real this is. But finding a way to share that 
with voters who are dealing with a lot of things that affect 
their lives personally will help them be able to support the 
hard choices that you know you need to make that are hard to 
make.
    Representative Kilmer. You also put in your testimony, you 
called out the value of establishing the discretionary spending 
allocations earlier in the process. I tend to agree with that 
because until there is agreement on the 302(a)'s, the 
appropriations processes kind of churn without real progress.
    So, can you talk about, maybe elaborate a little bit about 
why you think that can help reduce some of the friction in the 
budget process?
    Ms. MacGuineas. Well, I think one of the most important 
thing is to end crisis budgeting. Right now, things only get 
done when there are action-forcing moments, and those things 
are almost always suboptimal. So, you want to put a way in the 
process where we know that we are not going to have shutdowns, 
where these things will move more smoothly, but also they are 
attached to some of the bigger choices.
    So, what you want to do, I think, on the appropriations 
part, is find a way where you know you can set the numbers that 
appropriators will be able to start doing their work, but not 
as an excuse not to do the full budget.
    For instance, right now, when we have 2-year budgets in 
place, you hear people already saying: Well, we don't need to 
do a budget. We don't want that to be the outcome.
    So back to the tradeoffs, like there are with joint 
resolutions, you want to get those numbers on early and people 
can make their decisions so that we are not doing the last-
minute budgeting, which really leads to poor outcomes. We have 
many examples of that recently. But we don't want it to be an 
excuse to drop the rest of the budget process.
    Representative Kilmer. All right.
    Thanks, Chairman. It looks like I am out of time. I yield 
back.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Schatz.
    Senator Schatz. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Thank you to all the testifiers. Great conversation so far.
    First, a comment about the purpose of this committee on a 
bipartisan basis. The problem that we are here to try to solve 
is CRs, shutdowns, debt ceiling, a lack of the regular order on 
the budget and appropriations process.
    The problem we are not here to solve is long-term solvency 
of the Social Security Trust Fund, Medicare, and Medicaid. That 
is for another day, and that is sort of outside of our ability. 
I mean, remember that the statute that enables this committee 
is supposed to provide something to both houses for an up-or-
down vote by the end of the calendar year.
    And so, although all of those conversations are 
interesting, and I am tempted to engage with you, Ms. 
MacGuineas, about Social Security, I will resist that 
temptation.
    But actually, that illustrates my point, that we want to 
make sure that we calibrate our ambitions so that what we do is 
what is possible this year and we don't have an academic 
discussion that either goes completely sideways by the end of 
the year or ends up becoming a partisan conversation.
    If all this committee did was get us on a path towards the 
regular order, maybe by eliminating the debt ceiling as a 
weapon, maybe by rationalizing the budget process, that would 
be a tremendous accomplishment. We don't have to fix the 
country at this table in the next 6 months. We should just get 
ourselves on a path to do so.
    So, along those lines I am going to talk about some small 
things, what I think are small things. The 1974 Budget Act 
provides that the President is required to submit a budget by 
the first Monday in February, and then 6 weeks later the 
committees are requested to submit their views, and then the 
Budget Committee is supposed to act by April 15.
    I guess my question is, at least as long as I remember 
paying attention to politics in this town, we always ignore or 
reject the President's budget. And to the degree and extent 
that this committee is literally about asserting our Article I 
authorities, our constitutional prerogatives, I guess I am just 
wondering why we need a President's budget at all.
    So, it is in certainly direct contradiction from your 
proposal, which would actually elevate and make meaningful the 
President's budget, and then we have to make our own, and then 
it is subject to signature or veto.
    My view is, if what we really think is the executive 
proposes and the legislative disposes, why don't we just go 
ahead and move quicker and take out that one step, because I 
think from a timing standpoint, in addition to aligning the 
fiscal and the calendar year, those are just kind of some minor 
tweaks that would allow us to sort of get to business right 
away.
    And I will just go down the line.
    Ms. MacGuineas. Okay. So, I would say, by all means, the 
process should start earlier. There is nothing wrong with 
changing the calendar.
    There are some good things to be said for the President's 
budget. One is that it is important to understand from the 
executive branch the statement of values. And two, there is a 
lot of good policy work that goes into it. So, if you read the 
fine print, there are a lot of ideas you can pull out and use 
that are very helpful.
    But I think recognizing that the beginning of the real 
process is Congress' budget makes sense.
    Senator Schatz. Okay. That is fair. That is fair. So we can 
still have a process.
    Ms. MacGuineas. You don't need to wait.
    Senator Schatz. But there is no reason to start the clock 
upon receiving the Pres budg.
    Ms. MacGuineas. I would agree with that. Right.
    Senator Schatz. Okay. Mr. Capretta, go ahead and disagree 
with me.
    Mr. Capretta. Well, that is okay. First of all, a longer-
term perspective would show that Presidents' budgets have had, 
in past times, depending on the political circumstances, a lot 
of influence. So, 1981 was not 2018. Neither was 1993 or 1997.
    So sometimes in our history Presidents' budgets have been 
very consequential, so I would be careful about just saying we 
don't need this.
    I would also agree with the point that there is lots of 
detail that is very important. The appropriators would never 
agree to get rid of the President's budget, because it is 
chockfull of detailed information about what is really going on 
at the account level that they need to then write the 
appropriation bills.
    Senator Schatz. Right. But maybe we don't, I am serious, 
maybe we don't need to call it a budget if it is really not a 
budget and it is not the basis for our budget.
    Mr. Capretta. Well, a lot of people would disagree that it 
is not a budget. But, anyway, I think it depends on the 
circumstances.
    Senator Schatz. Mr. Dauster.
    Mr. Dauster. I am going to bring my recollection of working 
at the end of the Clinton administration in the White House, 
and the budget was a useful document to get the rest of the 
government to pay attention to what the President wanted to be 
done.
    The OMB has to organize the government to be reactive to 
the administration's priorities, and for that purpose alone it 
is a very useful thing.
    And I agree with what was said earlier as well.
    Mr. White. Well, I think, first of all, remember the basic 
problem is to relate details to totals. And so long as the 
President doesn't have too many magic asterisks, the 
President's budget does create a template that does sort of do 
that and that you can then work off of in other directions.
    I think that, again, so long as OMB actually has enough 
staff and isn't doing all sorts of other stuff, it provides a 
review, a scrubbing of the estimates, which is also useful to 
the appropriators.
    Somebody once told me that the National Cancer Institute 
direct pass-through budget is totally useless because it is too 
big and you don't know what to do with it. So, the Presidential 
scrub is useful on appropriations. The President's budget gives 
a template, if he doesn't lie too much, about fitting totals to 
details.
    And the last thing the President's budget does is it gives 
an ability to pass on blame. So, if the President proposes 
something and it is unpopular but you sort of want to do it 
anyway, you say: Hey, it is his idea.
    And if the President proposes something and it is unpopular 
and you don't want to do it, then you say: Okay, we are going 
to go cut something else, and the people we cut will be really 
angry at us, but then we have the people we saved from the mean 
old President's budget.
    So, the President's budget is partly about blame allocation 
and serves some useful purposes for Congress in that.
    Senator Schatz. I don't think we need another mechanism for 
blame allocation.
    Mr. White. Avoidance, blame avoidance.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Senator.
    Senator Hirono is on her way back from a vote, so we are 
going to hold this hearing open for a few more minutes waiting 
on her re-arrival.
    I do have a question, though. And while we are waiting on 
her, if anybody else has a question, we will take those as we 
can.
    There has been a lot of discussion about the appropriations 
piece of this whole process. I have a theory, and I am an 
appropriator, that once we do appropriations work, once we have 
302(a)'s and sub-allocations and we actually complete our 
appropriations process, the Appropriations Committees, 
certainly the subcommittees, are finished. They don't do a lot 
more. At least that has been my experience.
    Would an appropriations process that would scan longer than 
an annual process open up the opportunity for more and better 
oversight?
    Anybody.
    Mr. Dauster. I think some of your best oversight is when 
they have to come in and talk to you about the budget, though. 
If they don't have to worry about the budget or about being 
funded, they are going to be less concerned with the oversight.
    Mr. White. Yeah, I guess the question is, if they have some 
time to do more work--obviously, most of the work, sorry, is 
done by the staff, right? It is like being a student. There are 
these really heavy periods and then these slower periods. And 
they, unlike you, don't have to go back and talk to the public, 
and so they have some time which could be used studying and 
learning more about the agencies, in theory.
    I am not sure. Biennial appropriations would just get less 
attention, and I don't think it would give extra time that 
would really be helpful, my perception from the years I have 
spent looking at the Appropriations Committee. But really that 
is more sort of the Members' judgment as to what could be 
better accomplished.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Capretta.
    Mr. Capretta. Yeah. I think that it is possible that not 
spending so much time on appropriations could free up more time 
for the Congress to do other things in various ways, not just 
the appropriations subcommittee.
    I think the real question is that Congress, I think, needs 
to spend a lot more time doing oversight work of mandatory 
spending, too, frankly, that there is lots of detail going on 
in the mandatory spending side, where the money is going out 
the door without any annual appropriation, where a little more 
scrutiny would be helpful.
    Some of these programs have a big label on it and there are 
15 things going on below the surface, and not a lot of Members 
of Congress, I think, understand that.
    And so, looking at military pensions and all the things 
that go on with that, looking at the entitlements in the 
Veterans Affairs area, looking at even Social Security and, of 
course, Medicare and Medicaid, they are big programs. They are 
spending literally hundreds of billions of dollars. More and 
more oversight of what is really going on in those programs, I 
think, is most useful.
    Co-Chair Womack. Maya.
    Ms. MacGuineas. Yeah, I agree with Jim's point in terms of 
where the oversight is most lacking.
    There is actually a lot of good evaluation that goes on of 
a lot of our discretionary programs. It is not worked into the 
budget process probably as much as it should be.
    But where I think we need to be spending more time is both 
on oversight of the big mandatory programs, and also, 
thinking--and this is again why I think the long-term is so 
important--thinking about not just where our resources should 
be right now, but where they are going to need to be.
    And when I look at the world in the next 10, 15 years, one 
thing I am pretty certain of is we don't understand how our 
economy is going to look, with the future of work, with 
technology, with AI. These things are changing dramatically.
    And somewhere in the budget process you also want to be 
really working in the time and space and thought for evaluating 
how we want our budget to help the whole country move forward.
    So, there are a lot of things we need to use extra time for 
more of, and I would focus on some of these big, big, thorny 
issues and evaluation of the big programs.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Hirono, welcome back.
    Senator Hirono. Thank you very much for holding this 
meeting opening.
    And I want to thank all of you.
    As we sit here, be honest with me, all of you, whatever we 
come up with, unless there is the political will to do it, is 
for naught, right? So that is the thing.
    I mean, to me, I would like to lay out some parameters so 
that we have something to shoot for. It is sort of like the 
Constitution, there are ideals exemplified in the Constitution. 
One hopes that we can work toward those ideals.
    But I just don't know what it is going to take for the 
political will to actually abide by whatever we come up with. 
But that doesn't mean that we shouldn't make an attempt.
    So, I do have a question for you, Mr. Dauster. You have 
been around for quite a while, and you have been through myriad 
debates about drafting of and living with budget process reform 
legislation. And I think you said that you are more of a carrot 
person than a stick person.
    So, of all of the various processes and reforms that you 
have seen enacted during your time on the Hill, which were the 
most effective in your view, and what made them effective?
    Mr. Dauster. Thank you, Senator. I agree with your general 
introduction. You want to try and do the best possible, but no 
more.
    The one that I enjoyed the most or I thought was the best 
change was in 1990. We were coming out of a fixed deficit 
target regime under Gramm-Rudman, and we changed that to a cap 
and PAYGO system, where you make the people who do the deed 
responsible for what they do.
    And so, I think that was the direction of change that makes 
the most sense: Make your process punish the people who do the 
thing that went wrong. Don't punish everybody.
    Senator Hirono. I think that the PAYGO system--which we try 
to abide by. I mean, that is one that we usually try to come up 
with, how we are going to pay for whatever changes we are 
making.
    Now, I think, Ms. MacGuineas, and maybe some of the others 
of you, talked about how transparency is really important and 
that we don't really spend a lot of time especially educating 
the public, much less Members of Congress. But we do have many 
more opportunities to find out what the ramifications of our 
processes are and our appropriations, et cetera.
    But where does the public understanding of all of this come 
into play? And what role could conveying more information to 
the public play in informing the kinds of actions that Congress 
takes?
    Ms. MacGuineas. I do think it is critical--and we have 
talked a bit about the Fiscal State of the Nation or other 
approaches like that, which I am a big supporter of--I think it 
is more critical now than it is ever been. Because, frankly, 
when you talk about budget process and all the different terms 
that you all are familiar with, they are not just meaningless 
to the public, they are alienating.
    And it is just another example of kind of a language where 
Congress is using something where your constituents don't 
understand what you are talking about. And I think it leads to 
the frustration and just throwing your hands up with 
Washington: I don't even understand what they are talking about 
and it makes me feel not a part of the process.
    So, I think transparency is really important. I also think 
simplifying the process in ways that it can be conveyed to 
people is really important.
    And to your first point, I think everybody agrees, I know I 
certainly agree, that there are a lot of aspirational things 
that you want to do on this committee. But the best things that 
have worked in the past is when members of different parties 
and different bodies have gotten together and come up with 
something.
    So, again, I will kind of end with where I started, which 
is getting something done is one of the key things. And if you 
take a small step here it can really lead to something.
    Senator Hirono. I agree that getting members of both 
parties to buy in, maybe one of the ways structurally we can 
encourage that, is for the chairs and the ranking of the 
authorizing committees to be members of the Budget Committee, 
because that is not what happens now.
    Anybody want to respond to that?
    Mr. Dauster. I definitely think that makes sense. Senators 
Inouye and Kassebaum were advocates of that back in the day. 
And it would get more buy-in.
    The only problem is you have members of the Budget 
Committee right now who view their membership as a thing of 
value. That is why I would argue as openings come up----
    Senator Hirono. I don't know. Have you talked to Senator 
Whitehouse recently?
    Mr. Dauster. As openings come up, and there may be more 
openings, give the other chairs a first right of refusal to 
join in and sort of move to a place where you have the chairs 
and rankers, not all members.
    Mr. White. I think it is important not to--there are two 
different things being talked about here, right? One is, what 
would make the budget process itself get better attention and 
so on and more buy-in? And the other is what to do about the 
process of changing the budget process. And I think that quite 
possibly making up the Budget Committee from chairs of other 
committees might make sense.
    But I don't think anything is going to really get the 
public's attention in a positive way. I think people are always 
blaming public distrust of government on whatever it is about 
the government that they don't like. And whether the public 
actually cares about any of this stuff, or many members of the 
public, seems quite questionable to me.
    And for transparency to matter people have to be willing to 
look. And we can try to propagandize the public by coming up 
with a statement about our fiscal future, but somebody is going 
to write that statement. And whoever writes that statement, 
there might be some arguments about the way they write that 
statement.
    So, I would like to provide much more information. I am not 
sure I would disagree with CBO writing a statement maybe.
    But I really think that, at least for the current purposes, 
focusing on what could be done about the budget process would 
do a little bit of good. This year, sort of along Senator 
Schatz's lines, that would feel nice, to have something nice 
happen.
    Senator Hirono. Well, if we can automatically increase the 
debt ceiling, that would be a very positive thing as far as I 
am concerned. But this is why the Fiscal State of the Union may 
be a really good way to educate.
    You know, I don't expect the public to understand what is 
going on, et cetera, but at least you give them a tool that 
they could look at, not to mention all of us.
    And I think my time is up. So, thank you.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Senator.
    Ms. MacGuineas, Mr. Capretta, Mr. Dauster, Mr. White, thank 
you for appearing before this committee. Very interesting 
discussion that we have had today.
    I would like to advise members that they can submit written 
questions to be answered later in writing. Those questions and 
your answers will be made part of the formal hearing record. 
Any member who wishes to submit a question or any extraneous 
material for the record may do so within 7 days.
    I think it should be noted that our ability to sit in here 
today and have the conversations that we are having, those 
privileges are secured by the hardships and the sacrifices made 
by people that we will recognize on Monday, Memorial Day.
    It is my hope, as chairman of this committee, co-chair of 
this committee, that each and every one of you have a great 
Memorial Day weekend and reflect on the sacrifices made by the 
men and women who give us this outstanding privilege.
    And with that, this hearing is concluded.
    [Whereupon, at 12:25 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]


MEMBERS' DAY: HOW TO SIGNIFICANTLY REFORM THE BUDGET AND APPROPRIATIONS 
                                PROCESS

                              ----------                              


                        WEDNESDAY, JUNE 27, 2018

                          House of Representatives,
                      Joint Select Committee on Budget and 
                             Appropriations Process Reform,
                                                   Washington, D.C.
    The Committee met, pursuant to call, at 9:11 a.m., in room 
HVC-210, Capitol Visitor Center, Hon. Steve Womack and Hon. 
Nita M. Lowey [co-chairs of the Committee] presiding.
    Present: Representatives Womack, Woodall, Arrington, Lowey, 
Yarmuth, Roybal-Allard, and Kilmer.
    Senators Perdue, Ernst, Whitehouse, Bennet, and Hirono.
    Co-Chair Womack. The hearing will come to order.
    Good morning and welcome to the fourth public hearing of 
the Joint Select Committee on Budget and Appropriations Process 
Reform: Members' Day.
    This select Committee is focused on ensuring Congress can 
fulfill the most important and essential role described under 
Article I of the Constitution, the power of the purse. Long 
before our Committee was formed in February, there was 
bipartisan agreement throughout the Capitol and across the 
country that the current process for completing this basic 
function of government is in need of substantial improvement. 
That agreement led to bipartisan, bicameral support for the 
creation of this panel as part of the Bipartisan Budget Act of 
2018.
    This Committee of 16 members has already spent a lot of 
time building consensus on some of the problems and conducted 
three previous hearings to consider solutions. Today's hearing 
gives members who know that budget and appropriations reform is 
necessary the opportunity to participate in this essential 
work. This hearing is meant to engage all Members of Congress 
from both sides of the aisle and both ends of the Capitol and 
solicit their ideas for possible reforms to improve the current 
process. We believe doing so is key to our continued efforts 
and eventual success.
    I am encouraged by the level of interest and participation 
from those testifying in person and those submitting statements 
for the Committee's consideration. We are grateful for your 
input and your ideas.
    We are particularly excited to welcome some of the House 
leadership. Speaker Paul Ryan, Democrat Leader Nancy Pelosi, 
and House Democrat Whip Steny Hoyer. Thank all of you for being 
here.
    And thank you to everyone for joining us and offering your 
valuable perspective. We are eager to hear your ideas.
    And, with that, I want to yield to my friend and co-chair, 
the gentlelady from New York, Nita Lowey.
    [The prepared statement of Steve Womack follows:]
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]    

    Co-Chair Lowey. Well, thank you. And welcome to our 
Members' Day hearing where we will hear from Members of the 
House and Senate about what should be done to improve the way 
Congress handles budget and appropriation matters. There is no 
shortage of complaints about the budget process. Budget 
resolutions are often adopted late or not at all. Budget rules 
are routinely waived.
    All too often, appropriation bills don't get enacted until 
the fiscal year is well underway, creating major uncertainties 
and problems, and appropriation bills get encumbered with all 
sorts of extraneous legislative riders, which contributes to 
the controversies and delays.
    Changes to the budget process might help reduce some of 
these problems, and that is our task here. For example, we need 
to find a way to get agreement on appropriations top lines 
early in the year so that the appropriators can get to work 
filling in the details. We need to find a better way to deal 
with the debt ceiling, a law that serves no useful purpose but 
invites brinksmanship that threatens our Nation's credit rating 
and the health of our economy. And we need to find a way to 
make our budget resolutions more effective tools for 
formulating and carrying out budget decisions.
    But there are also limits on what can be accomplished with 
rules changes. Flawed rules and procedures aren't the root 
cause of much of what people complain about in budgeting. 
Rather, the root cause often lies in deep divisions over 
policy, combined with misplaced priorities, partisanship, and 
polarization. We need to find ways of alleviating those as 
well.
    It is gratifying and encouraging to see the number of 
Members participating in this hearing. And we are particularly 
honored to have with us the Speaker of the House as well as the 
Democratic leader and the Democratic whip. I look forward to 
everyone's testimony.
    Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Nita Lowey follows:]
    [GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Ms. Lowey.
    With several Members testifying today, we have a long 
morning ahead of us. Therefore, before we begin, I would like 
to inform Members that we plan to take a brief recess at about 
10:30 this morning so that you can check email, make phone 
calls, and take a comfort break.
    As a reminder, Members will have 5 minutes to give their 
oral testimony, and their written statements will be submitted 
for the record. Additionally, members of the Committee will be 
permitted to question the witnesses following their statements. 
But out of consideration for our colleagues' time and to 
expedite today's proceedings, I would ask that you keep your 
comments very brief.
    I would like now to recognize our first witness of the day, 
the Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan from Wisconsin. We 
appreciate your time today.
    It is no surprise to anybody on this panel or those 
watching that you have an interest in this process, that you, 
perhaps more than any person on Capitol Hill and, indeed, 
throughout the Nation, know more about this process and about 
the budget and appropriations process than virtually anybody. 
So, your testimony is critical to the outcome that this 
Committee will achieve sometime later this year.
    We have received your written statement. It will be part of 
the formal record. You have 5 minutes to deliver your oral 
remarks. And the floor is yours, Mr. Speaker, with our thanks 
for being here.

    STATEMENT OF THE HON. PAUL D. RYAN, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
              CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF WISCONSIN

    Speaker Ryan. Thank you very much, Chairman. I have never 
actually had my remarks ever time-limited since I have had this 
job. So, this is going to be a challenge here.
    Co-Chair Womack. Yeah. No magic minutes around here.
    Speaker Ryan. Exactly.
    So, first of all, it is a wonderful to be here. I can't 
tell you how excited I am about the fact that this Committee 
exists. Obviously, I had a big hand in making sure that this 
occurred. I want to thank you, Co-Chairs Lowey and Womack, for 
doing this work. I am going to stick with some of my written 
testimony. Then I am going to go off the cuff.
    As you know, I chaired the Budget Committee, chaired the 
Ways and Means Committee. I have spent basically my adult life 
working within the 1974 Budget Act and the budget process. So, 
I have a great deal of background in this area. And I think 
that this panel is so urgent at this time.
    As things stand, I think we are basically falling well 
short of our tasks. We continue to fail the taxpayer. Worse, we 
continue to set ourselves up for failure with the way the 
budget process works these days. And it is obviously clearly 
time for a new approach. And I think I can feel comfortable 
speaking on behalf of Republicans and Democrats in saying that. 
So, because I have this background, I just want to basically 
give you a sense of my perspective on this.
    Whenever, you know, there is a new Speaker, there is hope 
for a new process. Members clamor for more influence, more 
input. I experienced that. I came in, not running up the 
leadership ladder but up the Committee chair ladder, wanting to 
decentralize power in this place, empowering the Members. I 
have got to say the way this budget process works effectively 
is it centralizes power too much in this institution.
    We do not have a decentralized power structure here. We 
have a centralized power structure here that is not fair to 
Members of Congress, their constituents, and the taxpayers.
    So, the way I look at this, the budget and appropriations 
process, it starts with good intentions. It has a good 
foundation. You have a tight timeline. Even under the best 
circumstances, that tight timeline leaves no room for detours. 
Invariably what happens now is the process seizes up, and not 
long after, the whole thing falls apart. And as a clock ticks 
down, final decisions are kicked up to leadership, and that 
kicks back to final numbers--a final product that Members find 
unsatisfactory.
    And we sit in these rooms, the four corners, so to speak, 
and look over $1.3 trillion, for example, and make decisions 
that ought to be made by the Members who spend all of their 
time on the Committees doing the research, doing the oversight. 
They are the ones who should be making these decisions. So, we 
do not have a functional process, and it is--the power is too 
concentrated.
    So, I would even say calling this organized chaos is too 
generous a description. And so, to me, all of these omnibuses 
and these continuing resolutions, they are a little more than 
local anesthetics. It is like an anesthesia, but the pain goes 
away, but the problem doesn't go away. And it just feeds on 
itself, fueling pessimism on all sides. Members become less 
engaged. The public becomes more disenchanted. And with each of 
these stumbles, with each new year, we are handing over more 
spending decisions to the executive branch.
    So, I see this as a squandering of our institutional duties 
of oversight. I see this squandering the talent we have among 
our Members on the Committees or jurisdiction, like the 
Appropriations Committee. And more fundamentally, it is an 
abdication of our critical power of the purse for the 
legislative branch of government. So, I am one of those people 
who is--I see the glass of life as half full. I an unapologetic 
optimist. And I do believe we can solve tough problems, even 
this one. And that is why I am encouraged at what you are doing 
here.
    The reforms that we need I think are bold, but I think they 
are right in front of us. I think some of the ideas we have 
been talking about for years, they are ready; they are time to 
do it. And, you know, the way I look at this thing is we may 
not be able to change the deadlines, but we can change the 
calendar. Looking at what we are doing right now and look at 
the entire appropriations process. How many of you--and I ask 
Senators here. I see, you know, just a couple. How many of you 
think the Senate is ever going to again do 12 appropriation 
bills, separate appropriation bills, 12 conference reports, 
before the fiscal year? Not going to happen. Let's just get on 
with acknowledging that and come up with a process so we 
actually go back to regular order on appropriations.
    And this is why I ultimately think the best idea of all the 
ones that we have been looking at--and I have done hearing 
after hearing after hearing, 8 years at the Budget Committee as 
either ranking member or Chairman, Ways and Means chair. I 
think biennial budgeting is the smartest way to go. And I think 
biennial budgeting has great bipartisan roots. So, it, to me, 
offers a path to rewriting the process, not just reforming it. 
It makes budgeting an ongoing process instead of all these 
demoralizing fits and starts that we have. It brings renewed 
transparency and accountability, and it sets us up to be better 
stewards of taxpayer dollars.
    There are a lot of different proposals I have seen on 
biennial budgeting. I myself have introduced multiple 
congresses the Biennial Budgeting and Enhanced Oversight Act. I 
think the recent--and this really takes a lot of Senate 
involvement. The recent proposal by Chairman Enzi makes a lot 
of sense to me. Do six appropriation bills 1 year, six 
appropriation bills the next year. So, you are appropriating 
every year, and you are doing it in a workload that is doable. 
And you have biennial budgeting on top of that with 
reconciliation instructions. And I think it is not too much to 
ask for the way the Senate works to do six this year and then 
six the next year. That, to me, is probably one of the best 
ideas I have seen. I don't think this violates any partisan 
issue. This isn't an ideological thing. This is just, how can 
Congress work better?
    The way I look at this, if properly implemented, this will 
empower Members to do a deeper dive on the most troublesome 
issues, and it will enhance their ability to oversee the 
executive branch. I think it will reinvigorate Member 
participation. It will encourage actual conference Committees 
and actual conference reports on individual appropriation 
bills. And I think it will also enhance the importance of 
reconciliation.
    In 2013, Patty Murray and I got together as budget chair, 
and she was--as budget chairs, and we put together a 2-year 
deal. Then John Boehner and President Obama put together a 2-
year deal. And then we just recently put together a 2-year cap 
deal.
    So, we have sort of demonstrated that we can put together 
2-year deals, 2-year spending cap deals that work. But now we 
want to have, I think, an appropriations process that follows 
that kind of a track.
    So, the way I look at these things is take a look at the 
record we have. I am just going to read from my notes here. 
Last fall, the House passed all 12 appropriation bills on time. 
This is the first time the House has done that since 2009. The 
last time the House and the Senate passed all 12 appropriation 
bills on time was in 1994.
    So, 12 percent of the current Members were here for that. I 
was a think tank staffer at the time. Twelve percent of the 
people in the House were here the last time we passed all 12 
appropriation bills. So, we have an entire generation of 
people's Representatives have become accustomed to, if not 
acclimated to, a failed budget process. So, we have basically 
taken this failed budget process as just the way things work, 
and there is nothing you can do about it.
    Let's reject that kind of thinking. Let's reinvigorate a 
budget process. And I am just simply giving you a suggestion as 
a person who has observed this process for many, many years. 
And if this body comes together and presents a plan for 
reinvigorating the budget process, I really believe we will--we 
can get buy-in. And I would like to think that the Members of 
Congress who have known nothing but budget dysfunction would 
love and welcome the day and the opportunity to actually have a 
reinvigorated, workable, practical budget process where every 
Member of Congress has more franchise, more influence, more 
say-so. And that means the taxpayer is going to be more 
respected at the end of the day.
    So, I really believe, as a person who fought to create this 
Committee in the last omnibus appropriations bill, I think that 
you have a great opportunity in front of you. I think a lot of 
these ideas are bipartisan. In the old days, as in, like, 10 
years ago, it used to be appropriators against budgeteers or 
against authorizers. This doesn't have to be to the case. This 
does not have to be appropriators versus other Committees 
because the appropriators themselves are losing their ability 
to effect change.
    When we do these omnibus appropriation bills, we are taking 
the pen away from the appropriators and writing these bills 
with just a few people. By having a biennial process with six 
bills, the appropriators write those bills. The appropriators 
go to conference Committee. You have a budget process that is 
more likely to be adhered to. And so that to me seems like one 
of the sweet spots we could have with a bipartisan, bicameral 
compromise to make this budget process work. And I simply 
submit this for your consideration. And I hope you really come 
up with something that we can take and be proud of and restore 
this branch's power of the purse.
    And, with that, thank you very much.
    [The prepared statement of Paul Ryan follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. We appreciate your comments this morning, 
Mr. Speaker.
    To be respectful of your time, do you have a couple of 
minutes----
    Speaker Ryan. Sure.
    Co-Chair Womack.----in the event that any of our members 
would like to ask a question.
    The chair would recognize anyone that might have a question 
for the Speaker this morning.
    Anyone?
    Senator Bennet.
    Senator Bennet. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
    Thank you. I just would ask for your impression about how--
what has caused the centralization that you described? Why have 
so many Members of Congress yielded to so few the decisions 
that are made around here about budgeting and, you know, sort 
of made themselves props in somebody's else play?
    Speaker Ryan. Yeah. That is a good question.
    So, a House guy could easily go beat up the Senate for 
having cloture and motions to proceed and all of the rest of 
that. But I will resist the temptation.
    I think it is easier to push decisions elsewhere and not 
own the consequences. I think if we have a structure that has a 
chance of that--see, I think people gave up on thinking the 
appropriation process works. I think people gave up thinking we 
are going to do 12 bills.
    First of all, think of the calendar. You get the 
President's budget in March. Then you have a statutory deadline 
by April 15th to pass a budget resolution, which gives you the 
budget instructions, the 302(a)s, which then the Committee goes 
and writes the (b)s. And then you may start your appropriations 
process, hopefully as early as May but probably not until June. 
And you have got to get 12 appropriation bills done through the 
House and the Senate conference before September 30.
    So, the thing backs up, and it just doesn't work. And so 
most Members just don't think it is going to happen. So, they 
don't invest themselves into participating in a process that is 
going to yield results because they just know the calendar just 
doesn't work. So that is why I believe if you have a biennial 
budget with the caps already sort of preordained--you know, 
every 2 years you rewrite those caps; I would encourage annual 
reconciliation, but you have an appropriations process that can 
start earlier, and you have half as many bills to do--I believe 
Members will have more faith and confidence that they can 
actually get the work done. So, they will actually participate 
and get involved in actually getting a good product. Because 
what invariably happens is we do a CR to buy us a little more 
time. And then we have the appropriators kind of write their 
bills and move it up. And then it comes to, you know, the 
Speaker, the minority leader, the majority leader and the 
minority leader in the Senate. And then we put together some 
massive bill.
    That is not a good way to run government. The power is 
too--I am the person who gets the power. I don't want it. It is 
too concentrated. It is not how government should work because 
the person who is the Chairman and ranking member of the Energy 
and Water Committee are spending time after time in hearings 
reading GAO reports, listening to inspector generals. They know 
their jurisdiction better than anybody else. They know how 
these bills should be written. They know how taxpayer dollars 
are being guarded or not. And they should write the bills, not 
somebody who is, you know, juggling every other thing in 
Congress. That, to me, is the breakdown in the process.
    And by having the executive branch come to an 
Appropriations Committee where they know that that Committee is 
going to be writing their bill, I think the executive branch is 
going to be far more responsive to the legislative branch and 
the power of the purse because they know it is not going to be 
some omnibus. They know it is going to be that person I am 
looking at across the rostrum is going to be writing my 
Appropriations bill. I think they are going to make our 
government far more responsive and accountable if that is the 
case.
    Co-Chair Womack. Once again, Speaker, we appreciate you 
being here. And, again, to be respectful of your time, I know 
you have other appointments to deal with. Your insight is 
valuable, and we appreciate the fact that you led on getting 
this joint select Committee established and charging us with 
the responsibility of coming to a solution.
    Do you want to say something very quickly?
    Ms. Lowey.
    Co-Chair Lowey. I want to thank you also, Mr. Speaker, 
because I really think if we can talk through these issues, 
hopefully, we will make major changes in the process.
    But I want to emphasize one point again. And I mentioned in 
my opening statement. In my judgment, the root causes often lie 
in deep divisions over policy combined with misplaced 
priorities, partisanship, and polarization. And as an example, 
I just recently met with Senator Shelby, and it hasn't been 
completed, but they are working together, swimmingly. No poison 
pills. They are moving through the process, getting ready to 
bring the bills to the floor.
    Now, I agree the process isn't over. But compare that with 
the House and the process--we all work together, but each of 
our bills are loaded with poison pills.
    So, I just put that out there because there is a real 
contrast now on appropriations the way the Senate is operating, 
working together. And we all like each other. But our bills in 
the House are loaded with poison pills. So that is something 
that we really have to think about.
    Speaker Ryan. Well, I won't do much of a retort other than 
I am expecting a big bipartisan vote on the defense 
appropriation bill this week. We had bipartisan support, not as 
much as we would have liked on the three appropriation bills we 
already passed a couple of weeks ago.
    But you are right. We are going to have differences of 
opinions on these things. Labor-H is a perfect example. But 
let's have it on its own. Let's have those fights. Let's have 
those votes. Let's have those amendments. Let's have those 
conference Committees. That is the way the process should work.
    And, again, Ms. Lowey, you are constricting the process. If 
we just say, ``This isn't going to happen, let's just kick it 
all upstairs, let's just put it in a big omni and have a bill 
that is this big that spends this much,'' that is not good 
government no matter how we disagree on individual riders.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Perhaps we can talk again another time.
    Thank you for appearing before us.
    Speaker Ryan. Thank you.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
    I am now pleased to welcome our next witness, the 
distinguished leader of the House minority, gentlelady from 
California, Nancy Pelosi.
    Representative Pelosi. Good morning, Mr. Chairman.
    Co-Chair Womack. Welcome, Madam Leader. And we are going to 
give the floor to you. And then we will be respectful also of 
your time in potential Q&A.
    The floor is yours.

    STATEMENT OF THE HON. NANCY PELOSI, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
             CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

    Representative Pelosi. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, 
Madam Chair. Thank you to members of the Committee from both 
sides of the House. I am very encouraged by the fact that this 
discussion is taking place. I think it is very important and 
long overdue. I do believe that a budget should be a statement 
of our national values. What is important to us as a Nation 
should be how we allocate our resources and that that budget 
process that we are engaged in should be something that is 
respected as we go forward into the appropriations process.
    I have a different view on some of these subjects than the 
Speaker because I come here as a long-time appropriator. I 
heard the perspective of a Ways and Means Committee person, but 
I do believe that 2 years for the budget, 1 year for the 
appropriations legislation is the appropriate route to go.
    It was music to my ears to hear the Speaker say that he 
didn't think we should have legislation on appropriations 
bills. Of course, that is what upsets the apple cart and all 
the smooth workings of the Appropriations Committee. I have 
always said, left to their own devices, the appropriators, in a 
bipartisan way, know how to allocate resources, respect each 
other's points of view, and can come to a balance that is 
important for the Congress. It is when the legislating on 
appropriations bills that enters into it, which started in the 
late 1990s--I don't say that you never should have one piece of 
legislation on an appropriation bill. You shouldn't have it 
unless there is bipartisan agreement that, for whatever reason, 
this engine is leaving the station; in the national interest, 
we need to move something immediately by a must-pass, must-sign 
bill.
    But that is not what is happening in this case. And that, 
in my tenure on appropriations, which goes way back, was what 
made the difference between a smooth running of appropriations 
instituting the budget agreement or not.
    The Speaker said very eloquently that people on these 
Committees know their briefs, oversight responsibilities on the 
Appropriations Committee. And left again to its own devices, I 
think it could do a very good job.
    So, a few principles I want to put forth. First, I do 
believe that when we have sent Members to any of the 
discussions on budget, we just say go--be agnostic. Just go 
into that room, put growth in the middle of the table, and say, 
what will promote growth, create good-paying jobs, and reduce 
the deficit? Those are our standards. We don't give you any 
assignment to say do this, do that. Growth, good-paying jobs, 
reduce the deficit.
    I do think that we should return in that light to pay-as-
you-go budgeting, which Republicans abandoned in favor of 
creating huge deficits and then using those deficits for 
another purpose, cutting Medicare--Medicare and Social 
Security. I will get to that in a moment.
    Second, we should amend the reconciliation process so it 
never is used to increase the deficit. So, it is never to 
increase the deficit in the budget window.
    And, third, Republicans should do no harm. None of us 
should do harm to the process. We must pass constitutional 
amendment--not pass constitutional amendments or implement cap 
limits on mandatory spending. And they must stop using the 
budget resolution as a messaging document to call for 
unspecified and unrealistic spending cuts not included in the 
reconciliation instruction. I don't want to waste your time. I 
am being very direct in what I am recommending.
    We hear people blaming Medicare, Medicaid, and Social 
Security for the record deficits and debt levels, but the 
driver is simple demographics, not extravagant spending. For 
example, I think it is important as we go forward that we note 
the reality of the demographics. We reduce the replacement rate 
in Social Security when the average retiree benefit is only 
$1,400 a month. Medicare does not cover vision, dental, or 
hearing benefits; does not have an out-of-pocket limit. Most of 
the elderly has a form of supplemental coverage costing around 
$150 a month. So, it is not about extravagance on that end. 
Medicaid is by far the least generous initiative in terms of 
reimbursing providers.
    The elderly population--now, this is the demographic issue. 
The elderly population will double between 2010 and 2035. The 
elderly population increasing from 40 million to 80 million 
people, from 13 percent of the population to 20 percent of the 
population. In fact, demographics account for 80 percent of the 
increase in outlays for these initiatives from fiscal year 2018 
to 2028.
    I am sticking to my notes on some of this in the interest 
of time--because I could go on. In light of these demographic 
shifts, we need to work on a bipartisan basis to reduce health 
spending. We are proud of what we did in the Affordable Care 
Act, slowing annual Medicare spending program per capita from 
2.3 percent in the 5 years prior to the enactment of ACA to a 
negative 0.3 percent in the year since enactment. We must build 
on that progress through far stronger reform than those 
proposed by the Trump administration. We need to allow Medicare 
part D--we have been trying to do this for years. We need to 
allow Medicare part D to negotiate lower drug prices, push 
payments and delivery reform through Medicare and Medicaid 
innovation center, and work toward paying for value rather than 
volume of health services.
    This should not be a partisan debate. Hardworking families 
across the country cannot afford the skyrocketing cost of 
healthcare today. When we passed the Affordable Care Act, in 
terms of budgeting, if everybody loved their healthcare and 
their health insurance, we still had to do it because of cost: 
cost to the individual, cost to small business, cost to 
corporate America, cost to the public sector. We simply could 
not afford the escalating rate of increase. As I said before, 
reduce that, but the cost of prescription drug is still the 
biggest obstacle to levelling all of that.
    So, to return to responsible budgeting, I encourage 
Congress to move toward the 2-year budget agreement. I agree 
with the Speaker on that. Maintain annual appropriations. I 
agree with Congresswoman Lowey on that. And do not adopt 
automatic continuing resolutions. Imagine that we had five CRs 
between last year and when we passed our omnibus.
    We must make it easier to pass debt limit increases. That 
shouldn't be taking up time, debate, and leverage. Members have 
attempted to hold the country's credit hostage to individual 
demands, risking grave consequences for our economy and our 
country and our credit rating. Even when we didn't do it, just 
talking about it lowered our credit rating. We should urge the 
Senate to adopt the Gephardt rule. The Gephardt rule enabled 
that just to go through that, as the Constitution says. The 
full faith and credit of the United States is not in doubt; 
just have it go through. So, we take that off the table.
    While some pay lip service to the principle of fiscal 
responsibility, we have fought to put our fiscal house in 
order. I am very proud that, in the 1990s, President Clinton 
put us on a trajectory of job growth. We come back to that, job 
growth and smaller deficits, despite inheriting a massive 
deficit. The last four Clinton budgets were in surplus or in 
balance.
    President Clinton handed President Bush a projected $5.6 
trillion 10-year budget surplus. But when you do away with the 
pay-as-you-go, that surplus was squandered again with massive 
tax cuts for the wealthy that did not--two unpaid for wars, not 
negotiating for Medicare prescription drugs, all of that, 
according to the CBO, is what added to the deficit.
    The tax cuts and spending sprees exploded the deficit, plus 
a new $5 trillion--that is an $11 trillion turnaround. We went 
from $5 trillion plus on a path to reducing the debt to $5 
trillion additional debt. $11 trillion turnaround. We cannot--
this fiscal recklessness cannot continue.
    Passing a tax scam for the rich--I will express my 
disagreement with that--has increased the deficit. And it has 
not--it has increased the deficit, and it is going to be at the 
expense of Medicare, Medicaid, et cetera.
    When the President took office, he said the current 
services projection of deficit over the period for fiscal year 
2018 to 2027 was $9.4 trillion. Now, due to the Republican tax 
bill, the CBO's latest current services projection that they 
send here is over $2.3 trillion larger. It just can't continue 
with that to a staggering--the reckless giveaways have exploded 
the projections for the annual average deficit to 8.4 percent 
of GDP. The deficit, not the debt, the deficit to 8.4 percent 
of GDP.
    So, in this--where we find common ground: 2-year budgeting. 
What I would advocate as an appropriator, very important, to 
have 1-year--the annual appropriations bills. What I think is 
problematic to that is the massive legislation, sometimes in 
the form of poison pills, that are being placed on these bills. 
It almost makes us want to make everybody be a member of the 
Appropriations Committee. It is no use for other Committees to 
exist because we can just pile it on the Appropriations 
Committee and in a way, that is not bipartisan. I don't think 
either party should do it.
    So, Members of Congress must honor our responsibility to 
make smart investments, promote growth, create good-paying 
jobs, reduce the deficit, and do so in a way that keeps the 
deficit under 3 percent of GDP when the economy is healthy 
while driving strong, again, sustainable growth.
    I thank you for your attention to this important issue. I 
hope that--just looking at this Committee, I think that there 
is real opportunity for you to do something that will make more 
efficient, more predictable, more timely the process. But, 
again, it is all about our values, what is important to us as a 
Nation.
    We have sufficient time in our Committees of authorization 
to debate the policy. That shouldn't be something that is 
placed--you know, appropriating is policymaking in itself. 
There is enough going on there. But to use the appropriations 
process as a vehicle for poison pills and partisan 
policymaking, it just discredits the responsibility we all 
have.
    When I was a little girl, my father was a member of the 
Appropriations Committee. He would talk in his political 
speeches in Baltimore about the all-mighty powerful 
Appropriations Committee. As a very little girl, not even in 
grade school yet, it would, to me--all-mighty powerful, that 
was only identified in one way, in a heavenly way. And now it 
was attributing it to the Appropriations Committee.
    Let's have the Appropriations Committee retain its power, 
assume no more, and be responsive to a responsible bipartisan 
budget resolution.
    Thank you for the opportunity to share some thoughts with 
you. Again, it is no use wasting your time. I thought I would 
get right to some clarity of thinking on my part to propose.
    [The prepared statement of Nancy Pelosi follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. We truly appreciate your insight here this 
morning.
    Does the gentlelady have time for maybe a question or 
comment or two?
    Representative Pelosi. Sure.
    Co-Chair Womack. Does anybody----
    Representative Pelosi. If anybody has one.
    Co-Chair Womack.----on the Committee have a question or 
wish to make a comment?
    Hearing none.
    Representative Pelosi. Thank you.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you very much for your time.
    Representative Pelosi. Thank you for your good work. And 
good luck in your deliberations. Hopefully a nice bipartisan 
advance into the cause will spring from your good work.
    Thank you so much.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you so much.
    Representative Pelosi. Thank you.
    Co-Chair Womack. At this time, we will welcome our next 
witness. He is the Democrat whip in the House, the gentleman 
from Maryland, Steny Hoyer.
    Mr. Hoyer we appreciate the opportunity to hear from you 
this morning. We will hear your testimony. And then, if time 
permits, may have a question or two.
    The floor is yours, sir.

   STATEMENT OF THE HON. STENY H. HOYER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
              CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF MARYLAND

    Representative Hoyer. Thank you very much for welcoming me, 
Chairman Womack and Co-Chair Lowey. I appreciate very much this 
opportunity to share my thoughts with the Joint Select 
Committee on the Budget and Appropriations Process Reform. In 
context, I served actively on the Appropriations Committee for 
23 years. Obviously, I am on leave for some years now.
    In the few minutes I have, Mr. Chairman, I want to talk 
about three important areas where reform ought to occur. The 
first is congressionally directed spending. Now, this may not 
sound like some great reform issue to people. But as somebody 
who served on the Appropriations Committee, I see it as a 
critically important connection to my district, that I can 
respond to the needs of my district, which I believe I know as 
well as any other person and certainly any other person in the 
executive department.
    Members of Congress know their districts, as I said, better 
than anyone of the Federal agencies and better than the 
Appropriations Committee as a whole. When Republicans came into 
the House majority in 2011, they made a mistake by eliminating 
congressionally directed spending through changes in their 
conference rules. Unfortunately, they also changed the Gephardt 
rule.
    My own view, Mr. Chairman, is the debt limit ought to be 
eliminated. It is a phony issue. It lends itself to 
gamesmanship and brinksmanship which is harmful to our country 
and not honest with the American people. They both gave up 
Congress' constitutional power of the purse to the executive 
branch and made it more difficult to forge consensus in major 
legislation.
    It is true that some Members abused the process in the 
past. That is why, when Democrats came into the majority 2007, 
we reformed the process to make it transparent and to hold all 
Members accountable by showing the public which Member 
sponsored each item, requiring Members to certify they had no 
financial interest and published all requests on their websites 
and blocking for-profit entities from receiving them. This 
Committee should consider bringing back congressionally 
directed spending, at a minimum, with the Democrats' successful 
reforms and others to make it more transport if you thought 
that was necessary.
    The second area, Mr. Chairman, I want to address is paying 
for what Congress buys. The problem is not spending. The 
problem is not taxing. The problem is paying for what we buy. 
That is the discipline in the system. And to the extent that we 
allow ourselves to simply borrow to buy what we want to buy, 
that discipline disappears. I would suggest to you it also has 
disappeared in tax cuts. To give a $1.5 trillion headroom is 
simply to give additional debt credence. If you had to pay for 
that, if you had to offset it by spending cuts either to 
mandatory or to discretionary spending, that would be 
discipline in the system. But we have eliminated the discipline 
in the system.
    This Congress ignored the statutory paygo rule, law that 
Democrats enacted in 2010, and the current House majority 
replaced the effectively House paygo rule. I would suggest to 
you, when we were operating under paygo, we balanced the 
budget. We balanced the budget because, frankly, Republicans 
limited spending. Clinton wouldn't allow tax cuts, and the 
economy exploded. Those three things are why we balanced the 
budget four years in a row.
    The House Republican alternative to cut--of CutGo only 
deals with spending which left the door open for this majority 
to pass a tax law that raised deficits by $1.8 trillion last 
December and trillions more over the period it has been a House 
rule.
    Paygo deals with both spending and revenues in a balanced 
way. To pretend that it is only spending and not the cut in 
revenues that put you in the hole is dishonest. This allows 
Congress full flexibility to make our collective political 
decisions as to the best mix of policies to offset the cost of 
any new legislation.
    Third, any budget process will only be successful if there 
is the political will to follow it. Pretending the process will 
solve this problem is a delusion. The current process had been 
effective when Congress chose to pursue it. If the Budget 
Committee were allowed to do its job and did it honestly and 
responsibly and not simply as a political message--no party is 
immune from passing budgets that are simply and solely 
political messages without relevance to reality--it would be 
the legislative branch's loudest voice in setting overall long-
term fiscal policy if we would be honest.
    Too often, in recent years, the Budget Committee has been 
sidelined, only called upon when the majority decided 
reconciliation instructions were necessary to force through 
partisan legislation. Last year's tax law was a perfect example 
of abusing the budget process by using a tool intended for 
deficit reduction ironically to be one of the largest deficit 
increases that I have voted on in my 37 years in the Congress 
of the United States.
    Mr. Chairman and Madam Co-Chair, I should note that it is 
not my assessment of the fiscal impact of that legislation. It 
is the combined assessment of the Congressional Budget Office 
and Joint Committee on Taxation. Collectively, we must rely on 
their status as nonpartisan arbiters in order for any budget 
process to function as intended. Mr. Chairman, just yesterday, 
we heard from the CBO that our debt as a share of the economy 
is set to double over the next three decades.
    Mr. Chairman and Madam Co-Chair, I have three children. I 
have three grandchildren, and I have four great-grandchildren. 
The fiscal policies we have been pursuing are not only fiscally 
bankrupt; they are morally indefensible. I hope that this 
Committee will include in its recommendations a restoration of 
transparent accountable congressionally directed spending that 
restores Congress' constitutional role and a return to the 
proven enforcement of paygo.
    I also hope that, in making recommendations, you also 
recognize that, at the end of the day, regardless of what 
changes you make or propose, in order to be effective, Congress 
has to want to follow whatever process it creates for itself.
    We have biennial budgeting. We call it the fixes to our 
structure of saying that we are going to spend at a certain 
number. And then we say that doesn't work. That is unrealistic. 
It was good message. It was good pretense. And then we change 
it. We make a 2-year rule to suspend, sequester, which is a 
complicated word, which starts with S which stands for stupid. 
It is up to the majority to see that through, to set the tone, 
even when it is not convenient.
    The Speaker said he wanted to consider things one at a 
time. He thought the Committees had the advantage. Yes. Then 
bring those bills discretely to the floor, and let them be 
considered one by one. It is inconvenient, particularly when 
you don't want to vote on the Labor-Health bill; you don't want 
to vote on the Defense bill. You package them. You hide them. 
You dissemble.
    As you can tell, Mr. Chairman, I feel pretty passionately 
about this because I think neither side has come to grips with 
the real problem, and that is we don't follow fiscal 
discipline. We pretense. We talk. But then it becomes too 
difficult because life and budgeting is a series of tradeoffs, 
and we don't like to make tradeoffs because tradeoffs sometimes 
cost you political capital. You can do all the debate you want 
about process. But if we don't have the will to do what is 
right fiscally, our people will not be well served.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    [The prepared statement of Steny Hoyer follows:]
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

    Co-Chair Womack. I appreciate the comments of the Democrat 
whip in the House.
    Are there any members who have a question?
    I will throw one at the distinguished gentleman from 
Maryland, and that is, in your discussion, you talked about 
three things, the third topic, that being the political will. 
One of the things this Committee has discussed numerous times 
and is under consideration, the concept of carrots or sticks, 
whatever it is. What can we do to motivate, influence in a 
positive way the kind of outcomes that we are looking for 
versus holding Congress accountable with a series of 
consequences for failing to do its job?
    Where is the Democrat whip on the subject of positive 
reinforcement or some kind of consequence as a means of 
bringing us to the political will to make these changes?
    Representative Hoyer. You mean beyond ``atta boy, good job, 
that was the right thing to do,'' I presume.
    Co-Chair Womack. Beyond optics. It has got to be beyond 
optics.
    Representative Hoyer. I think the paygo is where you get to 
the rubber meets the road. It is where you--if you want to cut 
taxes, if you think, you know, we are spending too much and we 
ought to cut revenues, fine. Cut spending. Don't cut taxes and 
then never cut spending. We don't cut spending. It is that we 
have different views of what spending ought to be on.
    I noted to the majority leader: zero rescissions in 
defense. Zero. Raise your hand--and I am saying this 
rhetorically; I don't want to put you on the spot--if you think 
there is not zero rescissions in $700 billion dollars we give 
to the defense fund. Of course not. So, you spend--some parties 
spend it here; some parties spend it here. But we spend it.
    If you had paygo, if you really had to make choices, they 
would be tough choices. And we ought to make those tough 
choices. And the only way you make them is bipartisan way. And 
we don't do things bipartisan way.
    When I was, frankly, the majority leader, we passed all 12 
appropriation bills seriatim, one at a time, prior to the end 
of August--excuse me--the end of the July break, or might have 
been the first week in August.
    So, I am not sure what you mean the carrots and sticks. But 
what we ought to do is discipline ourselves and have the will 
to be honest with the American people, to tell them there is 
not a free lunch, to tell them: If you want a tax cut of $1.8 
trillion, then there is going to be a tradeoff. Something is 
going to give. It is not going to be we are going to grow the 
economy, and wonderful things are going to happen. CBO is 
saying that has not happened. The economy is showing that has 
not happened. It is not going to happen. It didn't happen in 
1981 when I came here. It didn't happen in 2001, in 2003. We 
were promised great things were going to happen. We had the 
deepest, worst economy that I have experienced, that anybody in 
this room has experienced starting in December of 2007.
    So, what I am saying, Mr. Chairman, is process is terrific. 
Will and courage are what is needed: to be honest with the 
American people and with ourselves and say there is no free 
lunch. We are not going to cut revenues, and all of a sudden, 
magically we will have the resources necessarily to defend our 
country, to grow our economy, to feed our people, to make sure 
that America is all that it can be. That is what I am saying, 
Mr. Chairman.
    Co-Chair Womack. I appreciate your comments.
    Any other questions?
    Representative Hoyer. Thank you very much.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, sir.
    Delighted to introduce our next witness, the gentleman from 
Tennessee, Senator Bob Corker. Sir, it is great to have you in 
front of the Joint Select Committee this morning.
    Again, as I said earlier, your written comments will be 
made part of the record. And we will give you the adequate 
amount of time to make your case this morning before this 
Committee, and we appreciate you being here.

STATEMENT OF THE HON. BOB CORKER, A UNITED STATES SENATOR FROM 
                     THE STATE OF TENNESSEE

    Senator Corker. Thank you. Thank you for holding these 
meetings. And I appreciate what you are doing. I will be very 
brief. I know we all are a little bit behind schedule.
    First of all, I came to Washington 11\1/2\ years ago. And 
one of the focuses was on fiscal issues. And what I have 
learned is that Democrats and Republicans both like to spend 
money. They just like to spend it on different things. I became 
a member of the Budget Committee a few years ago. It has been 
the biggest waste of time one can possibly imagine. It has 
nothing to do with the leadership of the Committee. It is that 
it is nothing but a political tool each side uses. There is no 
policy put behind the changes.
    And as I have said to Senator Perdue and others, Senator 
Whitehouse, we ought to actually do away with the Budget 
Committee because it performs no useful function as it relates 
to causing us to be fiscally sound.
    Secondly, we major in the minors. There is all this talk 
about appropriations. So, we spend the entire year focusing on 
30 percent of what we spend, which, again, is majoring in the 
minors; 70 percent of the money we spend is on mandatory 
spending. These are programs that people are counting on, 
especially during the latter years of their life, and we do 
nothing whatsoever to ensure that they are going to be fiscally 
sound.
    Everything ought to be, in my opinion, on budget, 
everything, including Social Security, which would cause us to 
focus on the fact that, in the not-too-distant future, it is 
going to be fiscally unsound.
    So, you know, again, there is a lot of talk and a lot of 
work that goes into appropriations and budgeting each year, but 
we major in the minors. The appropriations process is, you 
know, that we have authorizing Committees that have absolute--
almost nothing is authorized. And so, seriously, we ought to 
consider combining the authorizing functions and the 
appropriating functions together. It ought to be one.
    I talk to people on the foreign ops side. I am Chairman of 
the Foreign Relations Committee. And there may be a little of 
hyperbole here, but they tell me they spend about 5 hours 
putting together over $50 billion worth of spending whereas the 
authorizing Committee itself spends all year doing hearings. It 
is totally ridiculous.
    So, look, I think you have got a big task. I would say, 
first of all, put everything on budget--everything. Look at 
combining the operations of both authorizing and appropriating. 
Do away with the Budget Committee and let a few leaders decide 
what the caps are going to be over the next couple years and 
quit using the budget itself as a political tool.
    Beyond that, I really don't have many comments.
    [The prepared statement of Bob Corker follows:]
    [[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. We appreciate the gentleman for his 
appearance here this morning.
    Any questions?
    Senator Whitehouse. If I may.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Whitehouse. Welcome.
    Senator Whitehouse. Senator Corker joins me on the Budget 
Committee. So, he knows whereof he speaks. And I wanted to 
thank him for his work on the Budget Committee. He is one of 
the reform-minded folks.
    Before we entirely get rid of the Budget Committee, at 
least in the Senate, I think we should give it one last chance. 
And as I have said in my earlier comments and in the proposal 
that I have shared with the Committee, I think there is a 
chance to create a bipartisan path that would actually have to 
be bipartisan in order to be taken that would take into the 
account the mathematical elements of the budget, all of them, 
healthcare spending, tax spending, the whole bit, and see if 
the Budget Committee can work together to get a bipartisan 
agreement that picks a debt-to-GDP safe point out in the 
future, figures out how long it will take to get there, creates 
that glide slope, creates alarm bells for that glide slope, and 
then, in a bipartisan basis, you know, polices us towards a 
safe and sustainable landing.
    If we can do that, then I think we will have done the task 
that the Budget Committee was originally established to do. Now 
it is simply a support system for a reconciliation measure that 
allows a simple majority for a pet political project of the 
majority party, period, end of story.
    For that, it is not worth keeping it. But I do think that 
there is a step between getting rid of the damn thing and its 
current parlous state where we can give it one last chance to 
see if it can produce a sensible bipartisan result. And I would 
like to hear Senator Corker's response to----
    Senator Corker. Yeah. I think you may be putting off the 
inevitable. But I want to say that you and Senator Perdue have 
done great work together. You have very ideological--you all 
are vastly different in your view of the world, and yet you all 
have worked together to come up with some processes that I 
think could well work.
    With Senator McCaskill a few years ago, I introduced the 
CAP Act, which capped spending at a percentage of GDP. And I 
think you all are looking at something very similar as it 
relates to total indebtedness. So, I would encourage this 
Committee to look at the work the two of you are doing.
    But everything has to be on budget, I think we would have 
to agree. And the problem is, as you mentioned, we use 
reconciliation with 50 votes, but it takes 60 votes in the 
Senate to put policies in place. So, there is never policy 
follow up to the budget proposals. I mean, just to talk about 
my side of the aisle, when you do away with ACA but you keep 
the revenues that ACA is generating, obviously, it is a hoax. 
And the other side of the aisle does the same thing.
    So, I hope that you will be very successful in this. This 
is the greatest threat to our Nation. There has been a lot of 
talk about the tax issues. And, obviously, from my perspective, 
it could have been done a little bit better. Then we turned 
right around and passed a spending bill that raises deficits $2 
trillion over the next 10 years, and we don't even talk about 
it. So, both sides are guilty of huge deficits. Both sides like 
to spend money, just on different things. But the processes we 
have will never, as they are now constructed, do the things we 
want to do as a country.
    So, thank you all very much, and thank you for your work.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Senator Corker, for your 
testimony this morning.
    The next witness I would like to welcome, the ranking 
member on the Defense Subcommittee of the House, Appropriations 
Committee, distinguished gentleman from Indiana, Pete 
Visclosky. Welcome, sir. The floor is yours.
    Representative Visclosky. Chairman, thank you very much. 
And I understand my entire statement is entered into the 
record.
    Co-Chair Womack. That is correct.

 STATEMENT OF THE HON. PETER J. VISCLOSKY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
               CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF INDIANA

    Representative Visclosky. I will begin by taking a 
dangerous path in answering the question I have not been asked. 
You asked the minority whip about possible incentives, carrots 
and sticks, to have Members of Congress abide by some form of 
discipline. I will suggest to you our incentive is our 
responsibility to the next generation and have the discipline 
to make the hard decisions that my parents' generation made for 
me.
    The second point I would make is I came here 41 years ago 
and began my career as a staffer on the Appropriations 
Committee. At this moment in time, I absolutely agree with 
Senator Corker. If you would make one change tomorrow, I would 
get rid of the Budget Act of the 1970s. The fact is you have so 
few people--and think about your experience--on that Committee 
who are charged with making the hard decision of raising 
revenue, the hard decision of the expenditure of those revenues 
in an effective and an efficient manner that people make 
assumptions.
    I am the ranking Democrat on Defense Appropriations. DOD 
does not run on assumptions. It runs on hard decisions. There 
is nothing in any rule today in either body that prohibits us 
from getting our work done. And no rule or law we could create 
is going to imbue Members of Congress with the political will 
to act.
    I do not believe our budget and appropriations process is 
broken. Instead, it shows what happens when we avoid making 
decisions in a disciplined fashion. Some would point to the use 
of a 2-year deal, like multiple bipartisan budget acts of the 
past half-decade. However, I would argue that moving to a 
biennial budget does not fix the root cause of our 
unpredictable funding timelines but simply creates severe risk 
to good governance as it has become Congress' habit to only 
pass bipartisan legislation on the eve of a governmental 
crisis. Our problems do not lessen if we just drag out that 
process for 2 years instead of 1. Agencies already tell us how 
hard it is to execute funds when they receive appropriations 5 
months late. Let's give them 2 years to drag this process out, 
and it will simply give agencies more time to fill our request 
with out-of-cycle demands.
    Let us take the fiscal year 2018 Defense Appropriations 
bill as an example. The House of Representatives voted for that 
bill five times before it became law last March.
    Representative Visclosky. It was comparatively painless for 
Members of Congress. However, it wreaked havoc in the 
Department of Defense.
    Just one example. The National Guard exercises had to be 
canceled, which affected over 102,000 service personnel.
    There is nothing in the current rules that make this happen 
except an absence of intestinal fortitude.
    By potentially reducing the required interactions between 
Congress and the executive agencies by extending the process to 
2 years, we also sacrifice, I believe, the most up-to-date and 
accurate information about how American taxpayers' dollars are 
spent, relinquishing our specified constitutional 
responsibility.
    An example from this year. This year has brought several 
executive branch trade enforcement changes, including tariffs 
on steel and aluminum. These actions have resulted in 
unexpected workloads for agencies. Both the House and Senate 
Appropriations Committees have been in constant contact with 
those agencies regarding the resources that are now needed to 
effectively manage these immediate changes.
    Regardless of what any of your position is on the tariffs, 
I think we can all agree that effective management of policy 
changes is key to the daily functioning of our government.
    Let's change the rules and that is going to solve our 
problem. We did that in 2010 with the Budget Control Act, and 
we had sticks. Nobody in their right mind would allow us to 
shut down the government or have sequestration. And the fact 
is, on four different occasions since 2010 Congress has set 
aside that act for 7 out of the last 8 years, because it does 
not work.
    We have our defense appropriations bill on the House floor 
last night and today again. If we do not address that rule 
change of 2010 between now and October, we have $71 billion 
that are going to be taken off that budget for the Department 
next year, so they are writing two different budgets.
    The rule change certainly solved our problems.
    I would simply say that the intervening 8 years have proven 
that absent a commitment to governing in a sober, deliberative, 
and well-intentioned fashion, this problem is not going to be 
solved.
    I believe we can solve the so-called budget problem if we 
approach the appropriations process in a serious manner, if we 
finally come together to meaningfully address entitlements that 
now consume two-thirds of our budget and prevent investment in 
the future and finally recognize, as my home State of Indiana 
has done, that a reasonable amount of new revenue is necessary 
if we are truly going to invest in the future of our children.
    Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
    [The prepared statement of Peter J. Visclosky follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. I appreciate the gentleman from Indiana 
for his testimony here this morning.
    I am pleased to welcome our next witness. We had scheduled 
in tandem both Rob Bishop of Utah and Devin Nunes of 
California. I know Mr. Bishop has got other commitments this 
morning.
    So, we are pleased to welcome Representative Nunes from 
California.
    Sir, thank you for being here this morning.
    Representative Nunes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Co-Chair Womack. We will give you the floor for 5 minutes, 
sir.

STATEMENT OF THE HON. DEVIN NUNES, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS 
                  FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

    Representative Nunes. It is great to be here, and I will be 
brief, but I will make my points. But I want to also add that 
Mr. Bishop had a Committee hearing that he had to begin at 10 
o'clock and he had to be there. That is why he had to leave. 
But he is strongly in favor of this proposal that I am about to 
outline for the Committee here.
    This is something that I offered before the Republican 
Conference began in the beginning of this Congress, and it 
actually received 40 percent of the vote within our Conference. 
I think it failed largely because people get used to sitting on 
a Budget Committee, sitting on the Appropriations Committee, 
and they didn't want to make change.
    And, look, this is a big change that I am proposing here, 
because it would essentially abolish all the Committees and 
combine the authorizing Committees and the appropriations 
Committees.
    So, on the House side, which is what we would control, it 
would create 14 appropriating and authorizing Committees. There 
would be five select Committees. Every Member on the House side 
would be able to choose two of those Committees.
    And the Budget Committee would actually--you might like 
this, Mr. Chairman, being Chairman of the Budget Committee--the 
Budget Committee would become, I think, fairly powerful. It 
wouldn't meet very often, but it would be made up of the 
Committee chairmen and the ranking members, so that there was 
actually real authority pushing that power down to the 
authorizing and appropriating Committees.
    One of the concerns that was raised at the time by some of 
the Members when we lost that vote 60-40 in our Conference was 
that a lot of our Members, even though knowing they sit on 
three authorizing Committees with absolutely no power, some 
didn't vote for it, because they said: Well, I am in line to be 
Chairman of whatever authorizing Committee, even though I know 
you are doing the right thing.
    So, one of the things that we want to make sure of in this 
proposal is that, whether you are on the Appropriations 
Committee or their authorizing Committee, you would keep your 
seniority and you would fall in line with whatever Committees 
you fall under. So, there would have to be a fair process put 
in place for that.
    I will just close by another example just last night. I 
chair the Intelligence Committee, and last night in the Defense 
Appropriations Committee there are several provisions that 
allow authorizing on the defense appropriations bill that will 
be on the floor this week. And once again, that will happen, 
despite the objections from myself and the members of my 
Committee.
    So, this is never going to get fixed until we decide to 
pull it out by the roots and start anew. And I think that all 
Members, at least on the House side--I can't speak for the 
Senate side because I have never served in the Senate--but on 
the House side I think it would really allow Members to 
actually participate, hold the executive branch accountable, 
have real power.
    Because you guys may not admit this publicly, but I will 
tell you that nobody in the executive branch takes any of us 
seriously unless you are an appropriator and a senior 
appropriator. If not, all they do is feed you a line, they know 
they are going to wait you out, and nothing ever gets done.
    So sorry for those of you who only serve on authorizing 
Committees, but nobody really cares if you are here or not.
    And with that, I will yield back.
    [The prepared statement of Devin Nunes follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentleman from California for 
his testimony this morning. Thank you, Devin.
    Representative Nunes. Thank you.
    Co-Chair Womack. Our next witness, the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania, Representative Keith Rothfus.
    Good to have you here, sir. The Committee looks forward to 
your testimony. And the floor is yours.

  STATEMENT OF THE HON. KEITH J. ROTHFUS, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
            CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF PENNSYLVANIA

    Representative Rothfus. Mr. Chairman, thank you, Co-
Chairwoman, thank you for the opportunity to testify before 
this Committee, and thank the members of this Committee for 
this very challenging work that you have ahead of you.
    Here in Washington we hear so much about how our system is 
broken and Congress doesn't work, but I don't think we 
understand how profoundly broken it is. In the over four 
decades under our current budgeting process, Congress has only 
passed all 12 appropriation bills on time four times. Think 
about that. Failing to follow regular order isn't the 
exception, it is the norm.
    Due to this chronic failure, we in Congress are forced to 
vote on massive omnibus packages and continuing resolutions, 
often with very little time to read them. We are constantly 
presented a false choice between voting on these cumbersome 
bills or letting the government shut down. In effect, Members 
are given 1 vote instead of 12 votes or even hundreds of votes 
on the opportunity to offer amendments.
    When we are voting on legislation hundreds of pages long 
with very little notice, we cannot accurately represent what we 
see in our districts. This haphazard budgeting process also 
makes it virtually impossible to actually prioritize spending 
in any meaningful way while our national debt continues to 
explode.
    Further, it seems every time we pass one of these 
monstrosities, we hear about more provisions that seemingly 
nobody knew were included.
    This is absurd and needs to change. Issues should be 
debated on their merits one at a time. We should have ample 
time to dissect and read all bills considered. And we should 
allow for feedback from our districts before taking the vote.
    It is for these reasons in previous years that I introduced 
the Pay for Performance Act. This legislation would have 
withheld pay for either Chamber if they failed to complete all 
12 appropriation bills on time.
    There may be a better way to incentivize these bodies to 
get their work done. Perhaps no August recess until 
appropriation bills are done.
    We need an incentive like this to get our process back in 
order. Or maybe we need a new process entirely. Either way, a 
90 percent failure rate is unacceptable by any metric and we 
should demand better.
    Government is going to be funded, we know that. If it is 
not going to be funded on September 30, it is going to be 
funded by October 20 or November 18 or December 22 or February 
18. This is an act of the will.
    We know deadlines are coming. Every taxpayer in this 
country knows that April 15 they have to file something. Even 
if they have to file an extension, they have to pay taxes too.
    We know government is going to be funded. There is no 
reason why we can't get this done by September 30.
    I sincerely thank everybody for this work that you are 
undertaking. I encourage you to look at this from different 
angles. I was just listening to Chairman Nunes and his 
suggestions.
    We have 12 appropriations bills that lump different 
agencies together. Is that the best practice? You need to take 
a look at that.
    Should there be more types of bills? We can vote on these 
things.
    You take a bill, the one we considered last week where we 
did--or a couple weeks ago when we did the minibus, or even you 
look at something like the Labor-HHS, which combines three 
agencies. Should these be divided further?
    We also need a process where we can be having discussions 
about some binary choices and prioritizing. That is what 
families around this country do around the dinner table. If you 
have an emergency at home, you might have to put off resealing 
the driveway so that you know that the lights are going to stay 
on or the plumbing stays on.
    We need a mechanism of some sort where if we want to 
increase funding in one area, we should be able to ask that 
that could come from another area, and it shouldn't necessarily 
happen in the same appropriations bill. There may be something 
I want to propose for an increase in Labor-H, but I would want 
to pay for it out of another bill. There is no mechanism to do 
that.
    So, again, I applaud this Committee for the work that you 
are undertaking. I encourage you. And I look forward to further 
interaction with this Committee and I look forward to your 
reports.
    Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Keith J. Rothfus follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you very much, Representative 
Rothfus, for your testimony this morning.
    We are going to stay in Pennsylvania. Our next witness is 
Representative Lloyd Smucker from Pennsylvania 16.
    Representative Smucker, we appreciate the opportunity to 
hear from you this morning. The floor is yours.

   STATEMENT OF THE HON. LLOYD SMUCKER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
            CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF PENNSYLVANIA

    Representative Smucker. Thank you, Chairman Womack and 
Chairwoman Lowey, Members of the Joint Select Committee on 
Budget and Appropriations Reform. Thank you for the opportunity 
to testify before you today.
    First, I would like to begin by extending my sincere 
appreciation for the work of this select Committee. You all 
have been tasked with accomplishing an incredibly important 
job, fixing the broken Federal budget process.
    As a freshman member of the House Budget Committee, I have 
received quite an education over the last 18 months about how 
we conduct business here in Congress. We lurch from one CR to 
the next, an average of four per year. Since our budget process 
was last overhauled in 1974, the government has been shut down 
more than 20 times. In fact, the 12 required appropriations 
bills have passed on time just once in 43 years.
    Particularly when contrasted with my experience as a 
business owner and then as a State legislator in Pennsylvania, 
I think it is fair to say that the wheels have completely come 
off our annual budgeting process. But you already know that and 
you know the results: a crushing debt that threatens our 
security and our economic vitality, a system that is failing 
the American people, and a rather bleak outlook for our kids 
and grandkids if we can't change the trajectory.
    We come here to solve big problems, and it is not too late 
to place this country on a sound fiscal path. We can do it and 
we must.
    I have come to believe that it must start with reforming 
the process. We must reform the budget process and reform the 
way Congress works to achieve the results that we need. And I 
also happen to believe that this commission is our best 
opportunity in a long time to do so.
    My purpose today is to share the experience of a commission 
in the Pennsylvania Legislature that worked, that took on a 
similar systemic long-term problem and found solutions.
    In fact, it had worked so well that I thought it was a good 
model to tackle budget reform and before the establishment of 
this select Committee had introduced legislation that would 
have established a similar joint commission.
    My hope is that sharing how it worked in Pennsylvania will 
spark a few thoughts or ideas that could be useful to you in 
your work and your ultimate success.
    So just a little background. The Committee in Pennsylvania 
was the Basic Education Funding Commission and it was tasked 
with determining a new formula to distribute education dollars 
to 500 districts all across the state.
    Everyone agreed, similar to what we have here, that the 
current system was completely broken, but multiple attempts to 
fix it over a period of 30 years had produced absolutely no 
results.
    The Commission was formed, worked for about 16 months, then 
provided a unanimous recommendation, which was taken up by the 
legislature, then passed and signed into law by the Governor. 
As chair of the State Education Committee at that time, I was a 
member of the Commission and sponsored the final bill.
    Several things about the Commission were important and may 
be helpful. The makeup of the Committee was important. It was 
bipartisan and bicameral. It was an inside Committee like this, 
three members from each party and each house, including the 
chairs of the relevant Committees. It also included three 
members of the executive branch, including the Budget Secretary 
and the Education Secretary. All of the key decisionmakers were 
in the room and were included in the process.
    The process itself was equally important. All deliberations 
were open and were transparent. And in our case, we held 
multiple hearings across the State, inviting anyone who wanted 
to participate to testify and provide input, including experts 
from other States, educators, and even members of the general 
public. That not only provided the best thinking available, but 
also created a loud echo chamber across the State and by and 
from all stakeholders.
    Remarkably, the work of the Commission in Pennsylvania 
spanned two administrations, Republican and Democrat. Members 
from the executive branch changed midway through the process. 
Even so, the recommendation was unanimous and was fully 
endorsed by the new Governor.
    Sticking to the original purpose of the Commission was also 
critical. It was tasked with finding a formula, but during 
hearings received a lot of pressure to increase the scope of 
its work. We worked really hard to keep the goal narrowly 
focused on the specific problem that we wanted to fix.
    While your commission may not be designed in exactly the 
same way as ours in Pennsylvania, I know it can work and that 
you can make a difference. I applaud you for your work and 
believe this is the best opportunity we have to fix the broken 
Federal budget process and deliver real systemic and meaningful 
budget reforms.
    I look forward to the work that you are doing and to 
supporting you in the best way that we can in the legislature. 
We share a common goal of wanting to fix the troubled state of 
our Nation's fiscal health, and that starts with reforming the 
broken Federal budget process.
    Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Lloyd Smucker follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Representative Smucker, for 
your testimony this morning.
    Our next witness is the gentleman from Ohio, Representative 
Warren Davidson.
    Representative Davidson, the Committee appreciates the 
opportunity to hear from you this morning. And with that, the 
floor is yours. Please engage your microphone. And you have got 
5 minutes for testimony.

  STATEMENT OF THE HON. WARREN DAVIDSON, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
                CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF OHIO

    Representative Davidson. Thank you, Chairman, and thanks to 
the full Committee. I really appreciate your attention to this. 
And we are all in the same boat, but you guys are doing the 
work.
    I really could spend the whole time talking about how 
important it is to move past the broken Budget Control Act of 
1974 and to do just really basic things, like have a meaningful 
Gantt chart that shows what can happen in parallel and what can 
happen sequentially, so that we get our work done on time, as 
the country should expect us to do.
    I couldn't emphasize how important it is that we put 
everything on appropriations, not just some things, and the 
autopilot has got us headed for a crash.
    But one of the more meaningful things that I think we could 
do in reform is to understand how our accounting department 
works.
    Essentially, the Congressional Budget Office serves as our 
accounting department. Each of us doesn't have one of these 
functions in our office. And, unfortunately, most of the time 
we don't even, as individual Members, have access to real 
reports from accounting. They might give us the final summary, 
but they won't show us the details.
    And so, I think the Congressional Budget Office should 
fully embrace our Show Your Work Act, and I ask that you would.
    I have received some feedback about some concerns and would 
love to try to address a few of those. For background, the 
Joint Select Committee on Budget and Appropriations was 
established by this act. So, we have got a process to review 
things.
    The CBO has an incredibly important role in providing 
budget and cost analysis for legislation in Congress. Given the 
weight of these scores Members of Congress have to use for 
policy decisions, it should be a top priority that CBO 
standards are of the highest possible quality so that they may 
provide the best possible analysis for policymakers.
    When CBO fails to accurately predict the impact of 
policies, legislators lack the resources to make educated 
decisions.
    Examples include healthcare. Upon passage of the Affordable 
Care Act, CBO projected 21 million people would be enrolled in 
the exchanges in 2016. In reality, roughly 10 million people 
signed up, making for an overshot of 120 percent.
    In the healthcare debate in 2014, CBO predicted Medicaid 
expansion would cost $42 billion in 2015. The reality was $68 
billion, about 62 percent higher.
    And most recently on tax reform, projected that the economy 
would only grow by 0.4 percent extra because of tax reform. We 
see the results are meaningfully different than that.
    So, what the legislation does is it requires CBO to publish 
online all data, models, and processes utilized in their 
analysis and scoring. It specifies that data and information 
provided must be sufficient so that individuals outside of CBO 
can understand, replicate, and reproduce the results found 
within. Essentially, this is the same thing that academics 
expect and it would come with some of the same safeguards.
    CBO should not be allowed to disclose certain datasets. 
Instead, they would publish a complete list of data variables 
for that data, including descriptive statistics, averages, 
standard deviations and correlations, a reference to the 
statute or rule preventing them from disclosing, for example, 
personally identifiable information, and the contact 
information for the individual or entity that has unrestricted 
access to the data.
    So, for example, we wouldn't need to know the contents of 
everyone's tax return or, frankly, the detailed pricing of any 
one pharmaceutical. We would need to know aggregate data to be 
able to simulate the model. We might not need to know how an 
individual company priced their drugs to model prescription 
drugs, for example.
    The bill is very important because it would allow the same 
sorts of review that go on in normal companies. Accounting 
departments have healthy debates. They have accountability that 
comes from the board questioning the accounting department.
    If you ask a leader of a business unit how to steer the 
business unit, it is unfathomable that the leader of that 
business unit wouldn't be able to go to the accounting 
department and get a detailed answer as to why that was the 
cost model if you tried to apply this to the corporate world.
    I believe we are owed it, as Members of Congress, 
individual Members, and I certainly believe that the American 
people are owed it. And I hope that you can find a way to 
address the concerns that have been expressed that are valid 
about how to protect personally identifiable information or 
proprietary information.
    But the American people need to know how our accounting 
department derives their recommendations so that it can be 
truly respected as the nonpartisan entity that it is.
    Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Warren Davidson follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Representative Davidson, for 
your testimony this morning.
    Our next witness is Representative French Hill, my 
distinguished colleague from Arkansas, a member of the 
Financial Services Committee.
    The gentleman from Arkansas is recognized for 5 minutes.

   STATEMENT OF THE HON. J. FRENCH HILL, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
              CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF ARKANSAS

    Representative Hill. I thank the Chairman. I congratulate 
the Chairman on a great victory by Arkansas last night in his 
district. I know he stayed up late watching that game.
    Co-Chair Womack. Go Pig Sooie.
    Representative Hill. My best wishes to the ranking member, 
members of the Committee.
    Experiencing frustration and dissatisfaction with the 
actual functioning of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 is 
not new or remotely original. This Committee's shelves are 
stacked with binders of worthy and not-so-worthy suggestions 
from four decades of bipartisan complaining.
    My first exposure to concrete recommendations for wholesale 
change came from my former boss on Capitol Hill, Senator John 
Tower of Texas, an original member of the Senate Budget 
Committee and Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
    Senator Tower offered his restructuring proposals in his 
1991 memoir ``Consequences.'' He argued strongly for a 2-year 
budget cycle to get off the budgetary treadmill, and he argued 
that there be less executive branch testimony before 
authorizing, appropriating, and budget Committees by 
streamlining that witness approach.
    In the last two decades, Congress' budgetary muscles have 
atrophied, rarely completing a budget or passing appropriations 
measures prior to fiscal year ends. It is really sad how little 
that has happened since 1974. Gosh, not since 1996, and that is 
back when Vice President Gore was still inventing the internet.
    The results. The administrative state has grown unwieldy 
and more immune to oversight. In Article I, the Congress' 
appropriation oversight responsibilities are their most 
fundamental. The debt has grown unabated, with the burden of 
net interest that is expected to soon reach more than the 
entire appropriation for defense, and by 2027 reach 
approximately $1 trillion, the approximate size of today's 
entire discretionary budget.
    The government is run from one dysfunctional CR to another, 
periodically punctuated by an unaccountable omnibus 
appropriation that pleases no one.
    All the while, mandatory spending programs grow at three or 
four times the rate of macroeconomic growth, with little public 
discussion or oversight and rarely, if any, votes being held 
for restructuring in the Congress.
    So, what to do?
    Let me first endorse fully, Mr. Chairman, the 2-year budget 
cycle for annual budget resolutions and having a 2-year 
spending allocation under that resolution. Watching the House 
move all 12 appropriations bills last summer in a 120-day 
period made us all realize that our muscles can be strengthened 
and we can do that, and I commend Senator Shelby's work as well 
this year. So, I think the 2-year cycle is good.
    Unauthorized programs. You know, in business, where I spent 
three decades, this kind of thing just wouldn't even be 
considered in the real world. Establishing a budget procedure 
whereby spending is reduced by the amount of excess 
appropriations for unauthorized programs would be a worthy 
change. Thus, the Committees--the authorizing Committees would 
not fund--appropriations Committees would not fund unauthorized 
or expired programs.
    Likewise, all authorizing Committees would file their views 
and estimates, including a list of every program about to 
expire or that required reauthorization, and use a zero-based 
budget justification for every program so identified.
    I have a list of things that I entitle, Mr. Chairman, Stop 
Kidding Ourselves:
    Number one, prohibit budget gimmicks.
    Stop Committees from using one-time shifts in timing or 
asset sales to offset ongoing spending increases.
    Permit any Member to offer an amendment to strike emergency 
spending designation in any measure.
    Insist that the Congressional Budget Office and the Office 
of Management and Budget baseline budget eliminate their built-
in discretionary inflation, automatic extensions of expired 
programs, and that mandatory spending programs continue at 
current levels even when trust funds are insolvent.
    On better transparency, I think every fact sheet by the 
Budget Committee and the Appropriations Committee for all 
Members and Senators should propose plainly what the outlay is 
for the proposed fiscal year compared to the past 5 years of 
actual outlays, noting the percentage increase and decrease.
    All Federal insurance and retirement programs, excluding 
Social Security, ought to be put on accrual budgeting, 
requiring the Congress to fully budget all the costs in those 
programs.
    And finally, Mr. Chairman, I really think that Tom 
McClintock's Default Prevention Act, which requires the 
Department of Treasury to continue to borrow to pay the 
principal and interest on certain obligations if the debt 
exceeds its statutory limit, is a worthy change that this 
bicameral Committee ought to recommend. I think it will take 
off the table the periodic debt ceiling limit that causes our 
debate to not be as positive as it could be.
    And finally, a regulatory budget. I hope that you will 
consider a regulatory budget in addition to a budget 
resolution.
    And I thank you for the time to testify.
    [The prepared statement of J. French Hill follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentleman from Arkansas for 
his testimony.
    We are going to hear from one more witness, then we are 
going to take our promised break, albeit about 15 minutes late. 
The gentleman from Ohio, Mr. Jim Renacci.
    Representative Renacci, we are pleased to have you this 
morning. The floor is yours.

  STATEMENT OF THE HON. JAMES B. RENACCI, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
                CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF OHIO

    Representative Renacci. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to 
thank the co-chairs of the joint select Committee for holding 
this hearing and allowing Members of Congress to share their 
ideas and proposals.
    Look, I got here 7\1/2\ years ago as a business guy who 
balances budgets, who makes things work, and who continues to 
believe we need budgets. The problem is our budgetary system is 
broken.
    I have spent a lot of time since being elected here of 
looking at financial processes, everything from how we can 
develop a financial statement to how we can develop a process 
where we can start with a budget.
    But let's first say you can't even prepare a budget if you 
don't know where you are at. And one of the biggest problems I 
said in Washington is most Members of Congress don't really 
know financially where we are because we don't have a fiscal 
accounting, we don't have a fiscal financial statement, and we 
don't have a fiscal address.
    So, what I am proposing is two bills that actually I think 
fix the budget process.
    Number one, you first have to have awareness. I believe it 
is critical the American people and Congress are aware of the 
financial system that our country faces. So, I have introduced 
a bill that would just do that. It is pretty simple. All it 
does is require the Comptroller General of the General 
Accounting Office to provide a fiscal state of the Nation 
address to a joint session of Congress on an annual basis.
    The presentation would include an analysis of the condition 
of our country's fiscal status, including our budget deficits, 
long-term fiscal projections for our social insurance programs. 
It would be a presentation of our fiscal issues, and it would 
be public for all Americans.
    Right now, our country is on the cusp of a national debt 
crisis. By 2023, the CBO projects that we will spend more 
paying down our interest than we will on our national defense. 
By 2028, the debt held by the public as a share of GDP will 
increase to 96 percent, the largest since 1946.
    Most Members of Congress don't know that. By the way, I 
have also said that every Member of Congress should be on the 
Budget Committee at least one cycle. Most Members of Congress 
are not aware of that. And as lawmakers, we have a moral 
responsibility to address these changes and work together to 
find bipartisan solutions to stave off this pending crisis.
    A strong first step would be requiring Congress to come 
together once a year to hear from a nonpartisan Comptroller 
General what the fiscal state of the country is in order to 
highlight the crisis that we face and put Members on notice to 
the public that this is an issue that needs to be addressed.
    The best way to tackle a problem is to first shine light on 
the problem. At my request, the Comptroller General has 
testified before the House Budget Committee in recent years, 
and I believe that this issue is too important that the full 
Congress not be made aware of it.
    Some will say a joint session of Congress is not the right 
venue for this type of speech. I would highly disagree. I would 
counter by asking doubters why they believe this isn't an 
important enough issue to convene a joint session and why they 
are afraid to set the new precedent.
    I had almost 200 cosponsors on this bill the first time I 
dropped it last cycle. This cycle I am close to getting 200 
bipartisan Democrats and Republicans who agree to this. We 
shouldn't be afraid of doing it.
    Additionally, the legislation was included in the 2016 
Budget Committee budget reform white paper, has been endorsed 
by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, the AICPA, 
the Concord Coalition, and the National Taxpayers Union.
    It is something we should not be afraid of. It is something 
we should be looking forward to seeing every year so we know 
where we have to start before we do the budget process.
    Along with that awareness, I think we need to do a better 
job at holding ourselves accountable. The second bill I have 
introduced would make Congress actually abide by the budget 
that we pass. Since 1974, we waive our budgets. Every time we 
turn around, it gets waived in budget--in the Committee that--
anyway, it gets waived, and that is a problem. We can't waive 
the Committee.
    Too often, the Rules Committee waives budget-related 
issues, preventing Members of Congress to object to legislation 
that breaks the budget.
    If you want to break the budget, that is all well and good. 
In the business world, you break it all the time. But what you 
do is you come before management, which is the Congress, and 
you tell people why.
    This bill would allow Members of the House to call for a 
recorded vote on these waivers and put Members on the record 
whether they wish to waive the budget.
    As someone who has spent my career in the business world, I 
believe it is important that we pass a budget and follow the 
budget. This bipartisan legislation would hold Congress 
responsible to ourselves and ensure that we actually follow our 
budget.
    I commend the work that the Joint Committee is doing in 
reforming our broken budget process. I believe that these two 
measures that I discussed today should be considered as part of 
the broader reforms that are needed to fix the budget process.
    I want to thank you again for your time. And I yield back.
    [The prepared statement of James B. Renacci follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentleman from Ohio for his 
testimony this morning.
    Our next witness is here, but we have promised our 
Committee that we are going to take just a few-minute break for 
a comfort break, check email, make whatever phone calls you 
need to make.
    So, at this time, if it pleases the co-chair, I think we 
will take a break and resume our testimony at 5 till the hour. 
That would be in about 11 minutes.
    So, the chair declares this Joint Select Committee on 
Budget and Process Reform for Members' Day to be in recess for 
about 10 minutes.
    [Recess.]
    Co-Chair Womack. The Joint Select Committee on Budget and 
Process Reform Members' Day will resume.
    The co-chair and I do appreciate the cooperation and the 
participation of our Members of the Committee and those Members 
that are making presentations here today.
    We are running just a few minutes late. We do appreciate 
the patience of our next witness, Ms. Jayapal. And we will 
proceed now with her testimony and then go straight toward the 
end, in hopes of getting us back a little bit more on time, 
although running about 15 minutes late is about on time for 
Congress, in my opinion, based on my experience.
    But nonetheless, our next witness is Pramila Jayapal from 
Washington. And the gentlelady is recognized for 5 minutes in 
support of her positions on this subject.
    And the floor yours, Ms. Jayapal.

  STATEMENT OF THE HON. PRAMILA JAYAPAL, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
             CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF WASHINGTON

    Representative Jayapal. Thank you so much, Chairman Womack, 
and thank you to Chairwoman Lowey as well, for holding this 
hearing and for all your dedicated work.
    Since I have come to Congress, I have heard a lot of talk 
about the budget process being broken. And as the vice ranking 
member of the House Budget Committee under the great leadership 
of Mr. Yarmuth, I have been able to look at the process up 
close and consider how we use it.
    What is obvious is that there is a process on the books 
that has the promise of being able to be used effectively, but 
in reality, it has been thwarted time and time again.
    As a Budget Committee member, I plan to focus my remarks 
today on the Budget Committee's role. And first I would like to 
give a little bit of context.
    The budget resolution process was designed to give Congress 
a voice in setting fiscal policy. And prior to the enactment of 
the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, which established the 
Budget Committees as well as the Congressional Budget Office, 
Congress did not have its own source of budgetary information 
and didn't have a procedure to establish an overall fiscal 
framework.
    Rather, the executive branch housed budgetary information 
and was the only source of a fiscal plan. Congress acted on 
that plan in a piecemeal fashion, with each Committee reviewing 
proposals in its jurisdiction. There was no approval of overall 
levels of revenue, spending, and the resulting deficits and 
debt.
    Clearly, that was not a good way to budget. Revenue and 
spending decisions should not be made in separate silos. Each 
has an impact on deficits and debt. Changes in one are going to 
fundamentally require changes in the other, a change in the 
overall fiscal path, or both.
    And a perfect example is the recent tax bill. The 
Republican majority made a decision to cut revenue 
substantially, even though long-term deficits were already 
unsustainably high. That was then used to justify calls for 
even deeper spending cuts. And it had severe consequences for 
Americans across the country, who are struggling to make ends 
meet, to pay for healthcare, or even to put food on the table.
    The good news is that the budget resolution can and has 
been used to lay out a framework of priorities. Used properly, 
the budget resolution provides a way to lay out Congress' 
priorities, both for overall fiscal policy and for distribution 
across major functions or areas of national need.
    The reconciliation process provides a path to enact 
spending cuts or revenue increases included in a budget 
resolution that might require difficult votes. Major deficit 
reduction packages that implemented policies assumed in the 
budget resolution have been enacted, including those during the 
Clinton administration that led to budget surpluses.
    The budget resolution should and has set the stage for the 
Appropriations Committee to do their work.
    But sadly, the budget resolution has become only a 
messaging document rather than a governing document. It has 
incorporated policies that the majority doesn't actually plan 
to move during the upcoming year.
    And, for example, in recent years, trillions of dollars of 
savings are called for in the resolution, but are not included 
in the reconciliation directives.
    That is the mechanism to enforce the cuts. It is called 
reconciliation because the whole point of the process is to 
reconcile Federal law with the amounts assumed in the budget 
resolution. Failing to reconcile trillions of dollars in cuts 
suggests that the cuts are not meant to be real.
    Likewise, discretionary spending has been put at 
artificially low levels, even though there is widespread 
agreement that higher levels will be needed.
    Much of the savings in both categories has been 
unspecified, meaning that it is impossible to tell from the 
budget resolution what Congress' true priorities are. Revenue 
cuts have been sold as likely to cost nothing, even as the 
Joint Tax Committee's best estimates show that is not the case.
    None of this engenders respect or credibility for the 
process or for those of us who serve in Congress.
    It is time for all of us to step up and recognize that we 
can do better. The budget resolution process has a means to 
define what we want fiscal policy to be and a set of 
enforcement procedures to help us get there.
    There may need to be improvements to the process that can 
help make things move more smoothly, and we should welcome 
them. But realistically, we can't expect them to fix this.
    Rather, we need to approach the process with a realistic 
understanding of what we can do, a willingness to compromise 
when necessary, and a readiness to accept analysis on what 
policies will cost and save produced by our own in-house 
nonpartisan experts. If we don't do that, we have ourselves to 
blame for not being able to muster the resolve to use the 
process that we have efficiently.
    I thank you very much for your work and for your focus on 
this issue.
    [The prepared statement of Pramila Jayapal follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentlelady from Washington for 
her testimony this morning.
    Our next witness is Representative David Price from the 
great State of North Carolina.
    Representative Price, we appreciate you appearing before 
the Committee this morning. And the floor is yours, sir.

   STATEMENT OF THE HON. DAVID E. PRICE, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
           CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA

    Representative Price. Thank you, Co-Chair Womack and Co-
Chair Lowey and other members of the select Committee. I 
appreciate the chance to testify today, and I will submit the 
full copy of my text for the record.
    I have been following the work of this Committee and like 
much of what I have heard. The possibility of ending debt 
ceiling brinksmanship, for example, or moving to a calendar 
year budget cycle.
    But one of the ideas you are considering has set off alarm 
bells, and for that reason I would like to take a few minutes 
to detail my objections to a bad idea, namely, moving to a 
biennial appropriations process.
    I first testified about biennial budgeting about 20 years 
ago before the House Rules Committee, which was considering 
legislation to transition Congress to biennial appropriations.
    Then our fiscal situation was quite different. The 
enactment of comprehensive multiyear budget agreements in 1990, 
1993, and 1997, coupled with a growing economy, had produced 
several years of balanced budgets. In fact, we had been able to 
pay off $400 billion of the national debt.
    Since then, we have had two unpaid-for wars, unnecessary 
but expensive countercyclical response to the Great Recession, 
massive unpaid-for tax cuts, and now 7 years of extremely 
partisan and largely dysfunctional congressional budget 
politics.
    So, it is understandable that the idea of biennial 
appropriations would once again hold some appeal as a panacea 
for Members in search of solutions to our current woes. But 
this is truly a case in which the remedy would be worse than 
the disease.
    Of course, I understand the congressional budget and 
appropriations process have eroded significantly. The pressures 
of divided government and a polarized electorate, the increased 
use of the Senate filibuster, the general subjugation of 
Congress' constitutional power of the purse to partisan 
political considerations, all of these factors have greatly 
delayed the enactment of our annual spending bills and 
increased our reliance on continuing resolutions and omnibus 
packages.
    But biennial budgeting, by which I mean biennial 
appropriations, would do nothing to address the underlying 
causes of this dysfunction. It actually might make matters 
worse by weakening congressional oversight of the executive, 
jacking even more decisions up to the leadership of both 
parties, and increasing our reliance on supplemental 
appropriations bills considered outside the regular order.
    I want to stress that these same arguments do not apply to 
a multiyear budget agreement of the sort that served us so well 
in the 1990s, nor do they apply to a 2-year budget resolution 
of the sort Congress passed a few months ago. Indeed, our 
current appropriations work is greatly facilitated by the fact 
that that is a 2-year plan.
    But appropriations is another matter. The thorough review 
of individual agency programs and the determination of new 
funding levels must have year-to-year flexibility and is 
distinct from determining budgetary topline numbers.
    My arguments this morning are directed to the 12 
appropriations bills that must be passed under any budget 
agreement, no matter the duration of that agreement.
    Now, proponents of biennial appropriations claim that it 
would free up Congress to conduct oversight in the off-year. 
That is a supremely ironic claim, for the most careful and 
effective oversight Congress does is through the annual 
appropriations process, when an agency's performance and needs 
are reviewed program by program, line by line. Off-year 
oversight would be less, not more effective, because it would 
be further removed from actual funding decisions, reducing 
Congress' leverage.
    As the ranking member of the House Appropriations 
subcommittee on Transportation and Housing, I have seen 
firsthand the value of annual appropriations bills and how it 
bolsters congressional oversight.
    For example, last year the Federal Transit Administration 
made several administrative and policy changes, procedural 
changes to the capital investments transit program, the New 
Starts program. State and local agencies faced considerable 
uncertainty about how their projects would be reviewed and 
whether they could count on Federal funding commitments. 
Members of both sides of the aisle reached out to the 
Appropriations Committee with their concerns.
    So, in response, our Committee included several provisions 
and report language in the fiscal year 2018 omnibus 
appropriations bill on a bipartisan, bicameral basis, directing 
FTA to provide grantees with updated project ratings and to 
administer the program in accordance with the law.
    What if we had had to wait an additional year to do that? 
To wait an extra year to enact these policy provisions might 
have resulted in the failure of several large transit projects 
across the country. And the ability of the Committee to quickly 
respond to executive branch action proved decisive.
    Annual appropriations bill also serves as a way to respond 
to court rulings that may invalidate or make workable existing 
policies. They facilitate other policy tweaks that would 
otherwise fail to garner floor time. These housekeeping items, 
as we call them, almost always are dealt with on a bipartisan 
basis and they are vital to ensuring the effective function of 
government.
    A biennial appropriations process would also pose special 
challenges during the second year of the 2-year budget cycle.
    Just think about this. Under the existing appropriations 
cycle, Federal agencies typically begin formulating their 
budgets in the summer of the year before the President submits 
his budget request to Congress in February. That is a full 14 
to 15 months in advance of the start of the actual fiscal year.
    Now, if you ask agencies to put a budget request for the 
second year of a 2-year cycle forward, as much as 28 months in 
advance, that would require a level of planning and foresight 
that just might not be possible or realistic given the 
uncertainty of revenue and expenditure projections, the 
continually evolving challenges of the Federal Government.
    For example, the Tenant-Based Rental Assistance Program, 
often referred to as Section 8 vouchers, at the beginning of a 
cost cycle we receive estimates from HUD regarding renewals.
    Co-Chair Womack. The gentleman is running out of time. Your 
time has expired.
    Representative Price. All right. I will leave the Section 8 
example for the record and wrap up, Mr. Chairman.
    What I am saying, though, pertains to the second year of an 
appropriations cycle. And I just think we would have more 
supplemental appropriations bills, more reprogramming, and all 
the rest.
    So, in conclusion, the whole purpose of the biennial budget 
could be undermined by the proliferation of supplementals in 
the off-year. Perversely, we would have replaced the 
deliberative and democratic process of appropriations with 
supplemental bills that are sporadic, rushed, and heavily 
controlled by leadership.
    So, I don't think biennial appropriations is any better an 
idea today than it was 15 or 20 years ago. It would be a 
mistake to let recent budget disagreements lure us toward a 
supposed remedy that would actually make appropriations less 
systematic, less flexible, and less potent.
    We all know that the process has broken down, but biennial 
budgeting fixes none of this.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    [The prepared statement of David E. Price follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, gentlemen, for your testimony 
here this morning.
    I am going to allow the co-chair to make a statement.
    Mrs. Lowey.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Thank you very much.
    I just wanted to comment quickly on your presentation, 
perhaps because I agree with you 100 percent. And I think you 
present very carefully crafted arguments, and I know that your 
testimony will be an important part of the final record that we 
will review as we are making decisions.
    So, I just wanted to thank you again for the careful 
preparation of your presentation. Thank you very much.
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentlelady.
    And as is the case with all Members, written statements 
will be made a part of the official record of this event today.
    Thank you, Representative Price.
    Our next witness is the gentleman from Montana, the Senator 
from Montana, Steve Daines. Mr. Daines will have 5 minutes for 
his presentation.
    Co-Chair Womack. The joint select Committee appreciates the 
time that you have taken to appear before the Members' Day 
program here this morning, and we will give you the floor, sir.

  STATEMENT OF THE HON. STEVE DAINES, A UNITED STATES SENATOR 
                   FROM THE STATE OF MONTANA

    Senator Daines. Co-Chairs Womack and Lowey, thank you for 
your leadership and for giving us this Members' Day. It gives 
us an opportunity to share our experience on how to improve the 
very broken budget and appropriations process.
    I serve on the Appropriations Committee of the United 
States Senate. So, my remarks are somewhat framed in my 
experience of about 3 years in the Senate. I also want to thank 
Senator Perdue for his commitment to reform the budget process. 
David and I have been working a lot before the select Committee 
was put together. I am grateful for it. Thank you for elevating 
it to this level.
    Many of the Members currently serving in Congress come from 
business backgrounds, and I think we can take some of that 
experience. It is not the only experience that is going to help 
in this area, of course, but it will help us, I think, to frame 
a better process going forward.
    This process is incredibly broken, and so it should be no 
surprise that a profoundly broken process delivers a very bad 
result. Having spent 28 years in the private sector, passing a 
budget is not optional. You must pass a budget. In fact, 
passing a balanced budget is not optional. You must do that as 
well, or else you are out of business. $21.1 trillion of debt, 
$33.8 trillion of debt in 10 years, we have no option but to 
change the budget and the appropriations process.
    I just want to jump right into policy. I am going to try to 
remove the bun and get to the meat here.
    Let me share four recommendations that I have for this 
prestigious select Committee. First of all, I would combine the 
authorizing Committees with the corresponding Appropriations 
Committee. Consolidate them and then completely dissolve the 
Budget Committee. By doing this, we can start having real 
conversations about where to spend and how to spend it. 
Currently, we have two processes on different tracks that 
simply don't sync up. Integrating the processes into one 
Committee will ensure more coordination and better outcomes. 
The biggest single challenge to doing that will be leadership 
itself in these Committees.
    Members stay here for a long time. They get to Committee 
chairs. That, I think, will be the single greatest barrier that 
we will face in trying to implement that reform. But I think 
Senator Perdue and others have shown this incredible spaghetti 
tangle of authorizing Committees and Appropriations Committees. 
And then we have this Budget Committee on top of that, and it 
is no wonder this process produces a bad result. It is very 
complicated, and it is not unified. I think we could 
significantly improve this process by dissolving the Budget 
Committee, bring authorizing and Approps into single Committees 
that line up with their respective jurisdictions.
    Number two, the budget should be a law, not a resolution. 
We need to have an up-or-down vote on the entire budget, one 
number. One number that includes discretionary and mandatory 
spending. In today's terms, that means we would be voting on a 
roughly $4 trillion spending budget, not $1.2 trillion in 
discretionary.
    Number three--and I respectfully heard Representative Price 
and his views on biennial budgeting. I think we need to take a 
look at, and I will tell you why. I am a subcommittee chair on 
Approps. I believe that by budgeting over a longer period of 
time, it can make the process and outcomes more predictable for 
all stakeholders. This removes some uncertainty for Federal 
agencies and adds much-needed capacity to the Senate. I don't 
know if that has been talked about a lot. But one problem we 
had in the U.S. Senate is floor time. And the appropriations 
process we have today would consume a lot of that Senate 
capacity. A biennial budget actually frees up more capacity for 
the Senate to do the work of the people. You are much more 
efficient in the House than we are in the Senate. You guys get 
a lot better gas mileage.
    Fourth, we need to create incentives to pass a budget. I 
think we should look at both carrots and sticks. If any of you 
have served in State legislatures--I have not--but I think 46 
out of 50, conservatively, some say 48 out of 50, require a 
balanced budget. We should look at that for Washington, D.C., 
as well.
    But at a minimum, as we see--I know in the State of 
Montana, they don't get to leave town until the budget is done. 
And so, there is an incentive to keep members there until they 
actually get the budget completed. But I think we are going to 
put something here that compels this organization, this body to 
do it.
    I do think by moving forward on some of these ideas, we can 
fix this. We need to fix it. I know there have been many 
efforts--you know this--and failed attempts to reform the 
budget process. I hope it doesn't go down in history as one 
more failed Committee that came up with recommendations and 
nothing was done.
    I sincerely believe this is the number one reform facing 
Congress. I don't think there is anything more important than 
what you are doing right here. I think truly this is the most 
important work we can be doing at the moment.
    We need to act. No more CRs. No more omnibuses. Failure is 
not an option.
    Thank you for holding this session today and allowing me to 
share my thoughts.
    [The prepared statement of Steve Daines follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Daines, thank you very much for 
your testimony this morning.
    Our next witness hails from the State of Alabama. We are 
going to provide 5 minutes of testimony from Representative 
Robert Aderholt.
    Representative Aderholt, the Committee appreciates your 
time this morning. Look forward to your testimony. The floor is 
yours, sir.

 STATEMENT OF THE HON. ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
               CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF ALABAMA

    Representative Aderholt. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And 
thanks to the co-chairs for an opportunity to speak. And also 
to all the members, thank you for allowing Members to come and 
address the Committee today.
    Let me start by saying that I welcome today's discussion 
and opportunity to engage with members about the ways that we 
can make rule changes that improves our budget and 
appropriations process. The fulfillment of Article I, section 
9, clause 7 to responsibly oversee spending of public funds is 
one of the most crucial and necessary tasks that are executed 
by the Federal Government.
    Serving now in my 22nd year on the House Appropriations 
Committee, I have reviewed the process extensively. I have seen 
it in work over the years as I have served the people of the 
Congressional District, Fourth Congressional District in 
Alabama. With the trend of stopgap funding bills and government 
shutdowns, in this environment, there is a lot that we can do 
to ensure the American people that they are receiving effective 
government that they deserve. The work of passing 12 individual 
appropriation bills through the subcommittee, through the full 
Appropriations Committee, and then on the floor of each Chamber 
is a challenging process. It requires consensus and certainly a 
lot of hard work by a lot of people.
    The House Appropriations Committee has had dozens of 
hearings, met with administration officials to hear the budget 
justification. We have moved through the subcommittee process, 
the full Committee process with bipartisan agreements on much 
of the content that is in these funding bills.
    In recent years, the House has been able to consider and 
pass bills through this process despite the challenges that we 
have seen in the Senate. This has caused Congress under the 
leadership of both Republicans and Democrats to use combined 
spending packages as a way of forcing funding through the 
process. However, the status quo is not working, and I think 
that is what you are hearing from a lot of our colleagues 
today.
    The President, as you know, has promised that he will not 
sign another consolidated 12-bill package. In the House, we are 
trying to do our part to ensure that the process moves forward, 
that we have bills to go to conference with the Senate once 
they have completed their work. To ensure these bills will be 
considered in a timely manner, I think the--or I would submit 
that the Senate has got to strongly consider doing away with 
filibuster rule on appropriation legislation. By eliminating 
this Senate practice on appropriation bills, the Federal 
funding can be streamlined, and this institution can get back 
to upholding our constitutional responsibility.
    The Senate's responsibility is to the people they represent 
and to their constitutional duty to fund the Federal 
Government, not the administrative rules that are governing 
their body. Even though our Founding Fathers gave the House 
authority to originate money--bills through the origination 
clause in the Constitution, the House somehow thinks that now 
it is in our best interest to take a step back to the Senate 
internal rules. And what we have found is ourselves 
prenegotiating House bills with the Senate.
    I believe the House should continue passing appropriation 
bills that reflect the will of the people. We should then 
present each appropriation bill for Senate consideration. And 
then, as the House, hold out for passage so that the Senate can 
get to a formal conference. This conference should reflect a 
bipartisan approach that can reach a majority in each Chamber--
a simple majority and not a super majority. If the majority 
party wants to filibuster and shut down the government, then 
that would be their prerogative. This is what I would call, and 
I think most of us would consider regular order. It has worked 
for decades upon decades in this institution. But we have 
gotten away from that, and if we are going to be successful in 
making Washington work for the people instead of partisan 
gridlock, it is going to take getting back to regular order or 
these basics.
    Let me add that one proposal which I do not think is a good 
idea is having a 2-year appropriation bill. I am very concerned 
about the matter of oversight. The annual appropriations 
process allows for a relatively quick review of how response--
agency in addressing congressional concerns. It allows the 
entire House and Senate to be involved in the process in 
contrast to the reprogramming actions, and they do serve a 
legitimate process.
    Above all, we must remember that the legislative bodies 
representing--we are representing our voters. We take money 
from our voters, from hardworking families. And it is very 
legitimate that we use both directive and be very diligent in 
our oversight as we turn that money over to the executive 
branch.
    And, with that, I see my time is out, and I yield back.
    [The prepared statement of Robert Aderholt follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you to the gentleman from Alabama.
    Representative Lowey, the co-chair.
    Co-Chair Lowey. I just want to thank the gentleman from 
Alabama. And on an optimistic note, I am aware that the Senate 
is moving rather quickly working in a bipartisan way. And I am 
hoping that at a time near the time they complete their work 
and we complete the work, the bills can be meshed in a 
bipartisan way, and the authorizing poison pills that have been 
attached to the House bill can somehow disappear, and we could 
all work together and have a good bipartisan process.
    So, I just want to thank you.
    Representative Aderholt. Thank you. Thanks for letting me 
come before the Committee.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Representative Aderholt.
    Our next witness is a gentlelady from Connecticut, 
Elizabeth Esty. And the joint select Committee appreciates the 
opportunity to hear your testimony this morning. And we will 
open the floor for you for 5 minutes ma'am.

 STATEMENT OF THE HON. ELIZABETH H. ESTY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
             CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CONNECTICUT

    Representative Esty. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking 
Member Lowey, for the opportunity to present some views of how 
I think we can improve the budgeting and appropriations process 
in this House.
    In particular, I would like to focus on a broader principle 
of the breakdown of long-term decision making and planning. I 
see this with great clarity as the vice ranking member of the 
Transportation Committee where we have been unable to pass 
major infrastructure planning. And I think the American people 
are largely unaware that, unlike States and unlike individuals 
who have capital budgets, that we do not do that in the U.S. 
Congress.
    And so, the normal political pressure to do short-term 
planning has now become, I believe, significantly aggravated by 
where we are with deficits and in our budgeting process. So, I 
would urge the Committee, regardless of what specifics you come 
up with, that we should be focused on making good long-term, 
wise decision making for the American people. And I think we 
have gotten away from that. And I think the budgeting process 
has now compounded that process.
    I think there are some things we could look at in doing 
that capital budget, which I know that we have had previous 
Members of Congress who advocated for strongly 2-year budgets. 
But the bottom line should be we need to empower and equip 
Members of Congress to think about how to make those long-term 
decisions.
    The CBO plays an important role there. We have met with 
them and tried to solicit some ideas about what they could do 
by limiting them to a 10-year time window to look at and 
requiring a specific figure rather than ranges. I think we are 
limiting their ability to inform us.
    We know, for example, in the field of healthcare, 
preventive care has the most important benefits, not 10 years 
out but 20, 30, 40 years out. But they are statutorily 
prohibited from considering those long-term benefits.
    When I have asked them directly about what it would take to 
do that, they say, for one thing, they need statutory 
permission to do that. But I think they would also be more 
comfortable if they were allowed to give ranges or confidence 
levels further out: You know, we have high degree of confidence 
10 years out, but in the outer--further out years, we would 
expect savings. But these are more guesstimates, perhaps. I 
think that could help inform our debate whereas now they are 
not allowed to do that whatsoever. So that can be in preventive 
care. Certainly, that is true for infrastructure where we are 
just gridlocked. And we will pay for pieces of paper in our 
offices, but we won't pay for replacements of bridges and 
roads.
    The American people don't get why that is happening. And 
part of that, frankly, is the scoring process makes it hard. It 
makes it easy to do the piece of paper and really hard to 
replace the bridge.
    So, whatever ends up happening, I think we have to look at 
how the budgeting process can empower and inform Members to be 
wise, to make those long-term decisions. And the budgeting 
process should be part of that.
    We know we have got gridlock on many political 
disagreements. But I think notions about the value of 
preventive care and healthcare, about the importance of 
infrastructure, we all know that. We don't need to go to school 
for that. So, therefore, we need to a take good hard look at 
our budgeting and appropriations process to find out what are 
current impediments to us making wiser decisions.
    So those were my 2 cents about how we should approach the 
objectives, not the specifics of how we do it but really the 
touchstone of what we need to be doing. We all know that is 
true. The American people can't figure out why we can't get 
these budgets done. And I believe some of those longstanding 
practices or those guardrails we set in place have, in fact, 
have become an impediment to exactly what we thought we are 
supposed to be doing and certainly what the American people 
believe we are supposed to be doing.
    Thank you very much.
    [The prepared statement of Elizabeth Esty follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. The joint select Committee appreciates 
your testimony this morning, Representative Esty.
    Representative Esty. Thank you.
    Co-Chair Womack. Our next witness has just entered the 
room. We are going to ask the gentleman from California if he 
is prepared.
    The Committee appreciates the testimony from all the 
Members.
    And, Representative McClintock, we are going to give you 5 
minutes. The floor is yours. And thank you for being with us 
this morning.

   STATEMENT OF THE HON. TOM McCLINTOCK, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
             CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

    Representative McClintock. Great. Well, thank you for 
having me.
    All spending originates in the House. In a very real sense, 
the buck starts here. The government cannot spend a single 
dollar unless the House says it can spend that dollar. The 1974 
Budget Act gives the House a very powerful set of tools to 
control spending and balance the budget.
    For years, on the House Budget Committee, I have heard it 
said that the budget is merely an aspirational document 
offering our vision of the direction the government should 
take. That is simply not true. The budget is an operational 
document, the single most important tool that we have to 
control spending. The problem is we don't use it.
    I have also heard incessantly that it is the mandatory 
spending that is to blame, and that is beyond our control. 
Well, mandatory spending is out of control, but it is a lot 
easier to change than discretionary spending because the 
reconciliation bill gets expedited consideration in the Senate; 
the appropriation bills do not.
    The budget resolution sets limits on the discretionary 
spending that is appropriated annually. That is about one-third 
of our budget. It also limits the mandatory spending. That is 
set by statute. That is about two-thirds of our budget, and it 
gives us powerful tools to enforce both sets of limits. The 
problem is we don't use them. Why?
    Well, the first problem is on the discretionary side. Those 
limits are sent to the House Appropriations Committee which 
cannot exceed them. The House routinely meets this 
responsibility; the Senate does not because its dysfunctional 
cloture rule gives the minority the ability to block them. As 
the deadline approaches and the threat of a government shutdown 
looms, the appropriation bills are cast aside in favor of 
stopgap measures that continue the spending trajectory without 
serious reform.
    Now, that is easy to fix. Give appropriation bills the same 
expedited consideration in the Senate that the reconciliation 
bill already has. The bigger problem is on the mandatory side, 
and process reform is not going to fix it. The mandatory limits 
are supposed to be placed in reconciliation instructions that 
are sent to the House authorizing Committees. Those Committees 
are then required to make conforming statutory changes. If the 
Committees fail to act, the Budget Committee can do so 
directly. Either way, those statutory changes go into a single 
reconciliation bill that bypasses cloture. But this powerful 
process is never used. Why? Well, because decisions on 
reforming mandatory spending, mainly entitlement programs, are 
the most difficult decisions in our fiscal policy. It is easier 
not to make them and blame the process.
    Every year, the House Budget Committee produces a budget 
that it claims will balance in 10 years, and it lays out 
proposals on how to do it. But it never places these proposals 
in the reconciliation instructions that transform them from 
promise into action.
    This year's budget is case in point. It promises mandatory 
spending reforms to balance within 10 years but only places 5 
percent of those reforms into reconciliation instructions that 
will actually change spending. In other words, we are 5 percent 
serious about balancing the budget and 95 percent unserious.
    If we were serious about the mandatory reforms, we would 
put them in the reconciliation instructions and force the 
statutory changes necessary to make them. We would also include 
discretionary limits that would begin the trajectory back to 
balance in this year's spending. The fact is we didn't.
    With all due respect, that makes this Committee's work 
largely a fool's errand. The principal problem with the budget 
process is it requires very hard decisions. Changing the 
process isn't going to make these decisions any easier. 
Whatever the process, the decisions are going to get harder and 
harder every year that we don't make them.
    Let me close with a warning. The countries that bankrupt 
themselves aren't around very long. Debt the size that we are 
now carrying ends up either as a fiscal crisis like those 
paralyzing Venezuela and our own territory of Puerto Rico or as 
an economic crisis as the central bank buys up debt at the 
expense of economic growth as we are seeing in Japan and 
throughout Europe.
    Over the past 10 years, while populations increased 26 
percent, our revenues have more than kept pace. They have grown 
29 percent. But spending has grown 46 percent. In short, it is 
the spending, stupid. Our job is to control that spending. We 
have powerful tools to do so, but we have not used them. The 
fault, Dear Brutus, is not in our stars but in ourselves that 
we are underlings.
    [The prepared statement of Tom McClintock follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank the gentleman from California for 
his testimony this morning.
    Our next witness is from Illinois, Representative Bill 
Foster.
    Sir, we appreciate the opportunity to hear your testimony 
this morning. I will speak for the entire joint select 
Committee in thanking you for your testimony. And we will give 
you 5 minutes. And the floor is yours, sir.

STATEMENT OF THE HON. BILL FOSTER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS 
                   FROM THE STATE OF ILLINOIS

    Mr. Foster. Great.
    Well, good morning. I would like to begin by thanking Co-
Chair Womack and Co-Chair Lowey and the other members of the 
Joint Select Committee on Budget and Appropriations Process 
Reform for holding this Members' Day.
    I am here to discuss the debt limit, which I view as the 
most unnecessary and disastrous risk to financial stability and 
the economic recovery of the last 8 years. Over the last 6 
months, I have discussed this issue with various administration 
officials and many experts in hearings of the House Financial 
Services Committee and in private meetings.
    In the Committee, Secretary Mnuchin responded that he did 
not support it, the debt limit, as a mechanism for controlling 
spending and--last year. And in February of this year, he 
thought that the repeal should be one option discussed in the 
long term.
    I agree with that statement, and I hope to advance repeal 
as one option that this Committee considers. The debt limit is 
an artificial fig leaf over the fiscal irresponsibility in 
Congress. It sometimes gets referred to as being like refusing 
to pay for a meal after you have eaten it.
    On one hand, the debt limit instructs the administration 
not to issue debt beyond a certain point. On another hand--on 
the other hand, Congress slashes revenue without paying for it 
and increases spending across the board even on projects that 
do not make sense. The deficits created here inevitably trigger 
a crisis with the debt limit. As a result of the partisanship 
that has defined recent sessions of Congress, the debt limit is 
a self-inflicted risk that is unnecessary and obviously 
ineffective. Moreover, it creates a default risk that is not 
market-driven, complicating the calculation of risk and likely 
distorting pricing. The United States--if the United States 
ever exceeded the debt limit, results would be catastrophic for 
our economy and for hardworking Americans.
    This problem should not be a partisan issue. It is an issue 
that impacts middle class families in every congressional 
district and unnecessarily slowed the recovery from the Great 
Recession. A 2013 Treasury report found that when this Nation 
approached the debt limit without a clear path to raising it, 
the average mortgage in the United States increased $100 per 
month. We need to address our debt limit through the budget 
process, the Tax Code, and appropriations. We need to address 
our debt through the budget process, the Tax Code, and the 
appropriations, and not the artificial debt limit.
    Our economy should not endure a market-rocking event 
because of a partisan fight over an arbitrary number that is 
not related either to economic performance or to GDP.
    I asked the Federal Reserve Chairman Powell about the size 
of our debt relative to aggregate household net worth, which, 
as many have noted, recently exceeded $100 trillion. He agreed 
that we have to address our debt in the long run but that we 
are presently not nearing our carrying capacity.
    Our failure to provide adequate revenue to pay for the 
programs hardworking Americans need created a serious 
structural debt problem. Our economy is both rich and 
productive enough to fulfill our obligations to the most 
vulnerable.
    We can afford to ensure that Social Security, Medicare, and 
Medicaid are available in perpetuity. And I strongly believe it 
is a moral imperative that we do so. The debt limit does not 
provide fiscal discipline but does cause market problems. There 
is no hypothesized credit limit of the United States of which I 
am aware. But it is clear that it is greater than the current 
debt load based on the market appetite for Treasuries and low 
interest rates. Repeal would allow markets to impose this 
discipline. We should consider other mechanisms for forcing 
Congress to have real debates on fiscal policy. These could 
include changing House rules to provide for the privilege of 
the House for bipartisan budgets that balance or a queen-of-
the-hill process that could provide for votes on either end of 
the political spectrum and a centrist alternative with 
bipartisan support.
    I appreciate the opportunity to the joint--to testify 
before the joint select Committee, and I am happy to answer any 
questions.
    Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Bill Foster follows:]
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    Co-Chair Womack. The Committee appreciates your testimony 
this morning, Representative Foster. Thank you so much.
    Our next witness is the gentleman from Arkansas, Mr. 
Westerman, representing Arkansas' Fourth district. Bruce, the 
Committee appreciates the opportunity to hear your testimony 
this morning. You have 5 minutes, and the time is yours, sir.

  STATEMENT OF THE HON. BRUCE WESTERMAN, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
              CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF ARKANSAS

    Mr. Westerman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    And I want to also thank the joint select Committee for 
hosting this session to obtain Members' input on the current 
budget and appropriation's process.
    As with many of you, I am deeply troubled by current levels 
of Federal outlays and appreciate the opportunity to share my 
concerns today.
    Federal Government spending is out of control, unlike State 
spending, which is generally limited to the amount of money 
collected from taxes, Federal spending is permitted to vastly 
exceed income, and indeed it does.
    In April, the Congressional Budget Office released its 
annual budget and economic outlook, the 10-year economic 
forecast based on projected cost of current legislation. 
Economists at CBO predict the overall spending will reach $56.6 
trillion over the 10-year period from 2018 to 2028, ultimately 
exceeding 23 percent of GDP. Due to this obscene level of 
spending, budget deficits will continue growing at ever-
increasing rates. Altogether, deficits are likely to average 
4.9 percent of GDP, which is significantly greater than the 
projected average economic growth rate of less than 4 percent.
    And as the Nation's debt increases, so will interest 
payments. Annual interest payments are slated to reach $915 
billion by 2028. That is 3\1/2\ times what we have spent on our 
debt in fiscal year 2017.
    Deficit spending is easy. Balancing a budget is hard. It 
requires tough decisions that many do not wish to make and 
decisions that will inevitably upset certain individuals.
    But at some point, these decisions have to be made. We 
simply cannot continue spending beyond our means. I believe it 
is in our Nation's best interest to set priorities now while we 
have time to evaluate options and process decisions instead of 
just waiting for the day of reckoning unprepared with no good 
options when it comes. We owe it to our children and 
grandchildren and to all those hoping for a bright future in 
our country.
    Contrary to the assertions made of some, a plan to balance 
the budget within the next 10 years would not eliminate 
Congress' ability to respond to economic changes, natural 
disasters, or security threats. In fact, balancing the budget 
within 10 years is achievable even without slashing 
appropriations to government programs. We must simply just slow 
the rate at which our spending has been growing and is 
projected to grow.
    CBO projects that baseline spending at a year-over-year 
rate, growth rate of 6 to 7 percent over the 10-year budget 
period. To balance the budget, we don't have to cut spending. 
We just have to slow the rate of spending growth instead of 
growing it at the CBO baseline. We could balance by growing at 
the same rate as the economy grows, at the same rate as the GDP 
grows. And I believe we should tie and force ourselves to 
control the spending growth at the same levels that the economy 
grows. I think that is a fair shake, and that is what the math 
proves that it will take to balance a budget. Regardless of how 
we get to that number, we have to stay below those levels.
    In a graduate level statistics class, I remember two 
sayings that the professor made that I think apply to my 
service in Congress. The first one was he said that figures 
don't lie, but liars figure. And the second one was that 
numbers and people are the same; if you torture them long 
enough, they will tell you anything you want to know.
    It is time for us to quit torturing the numbers. It is time 
for us to use commonsense and math and look at the reality that 
if we continue growing government spending at the rates 
projected in the CBO baseline, we will never balance the 
budget. Let's balance the budget while we can with modest 
growth, not with cuts, but modest growth. It is a 2 to 3 
percent range that we are seeing in our economy.
    We also have to get back to regular order. And I am glad to 
see that the Senate is finally taking up appropriation bills. I 
hope we will get all those bills passed in the House. And I 
think it is the Budget Committee's responsibility to prepare--
or to force as much as we can. And if we can't force it now, we 
need to put policies in place to force regular order in the 
House and the Senate so that all these appropriation bills are 
debated and open in a transparent way and so that we know what 
we are spending the money on. And we are not including new 
programs in large omnibus bills.
    I believe the Committee has the ability to enforce this. 
And as a member of the House Budget Committee, I will support 
you in your efforts to do so. And I am here to lend whatever 
resources or assistance I am able to.
    With that, I yield back.
    [The prepared statement of Bruce Westerman follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you very much, Representative 
Westerman, for your testimony before the joint select Committee 
this morning.
    Our next witness comes from Utah, Representative John 
Curtis.
    The Committee is delighted to have you in front of them 
this morning and look forward to your testimony. You have 5 
minutes, sir, and the time is yours.

STATEMENT OF THE HON. JOHN CURTIS, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS 
                     FROM THE STATE OF UTAH

    Mr. Curtis. Thank you. Thank you, Chairman Womack and Co-
Chair Lowey, for holding today's hearings on reforms to 
Congress' budget and appropriation process.
    The American people are justifiably frustrated with 
Congress and our inability to do our most basic job: pass a 
budget and fund the government. I applaud the work of this 
joint select Committee for holding this critically important 
hearing to look at potential reforms to fix our broken budget 
and appropriation process.
    I want you to know I find myself thinking about you a lot 
in this Committee, and I hope you feel me cheering in the 
background for your success. As a relative newcomer to 
Congress, many members of this Committee likely don't know who 
I am, so I would like to take a brief moment to introduce 
myself. I am John Curtis. I have the great honor of 
representing Utah's Third Congressional District. Before coming 
to Congress last November in a special election, I was mayor of 
Utah's third largest city, Provo, Utah, for 8 years.
    Like many of you, having served in local or State 
government, I have had to make hard decisions needed to balance 
a budget, especially when that involved cutting spending. I am 
proud to say that as a mayor, we balanced our city's budget 
every single year, including my first year in 2010 when we were 
required to close a gap of 8 percent between revenues and 
expenses. Not only did we do it without raising taxes, but we 
also increased the level of services given to our residents 
and, at the same time, improved employee morale.
    Those who know Utah know that some of Utah's core values 
are fiscal responsibility and restraint. The Utah values of 
fiscal responsibility and restraint are best demonstrated by 
the fact that Utah's State constitution requires, by law, that 
the State and city government balance their budgets every year.
    To maintain a balanced budget, we rely on many good 
policies and restraints on lawmakers. But I am here today to 
share with you only one of those practices that I believe, if 
adopted by the Federal Government, could dramatically change 
the quality of our budgeting process.
    The idea was born when a former Governor threatened to veto 
the entire budget if the legislature didn't include her pet 
project. The idea is not unique to Utah, and it is not 
revolutionary. In fact, it is almost too simple. In Utah, we 
call it the baseline budget. At the first of every legislative 
session, the legislature adopts a baseline budget. This is 
largely the previous year's budget. Therefore, the default, if 
we fail to come to agreement, is the continuation of last 
year's budget.
    Natural inflation puts pressure on the legislative body to 
come up with a new budget. But while we do so, we are under no 
threat of a government shutdown. Think of it as a kinder and 
gentler continuing resolution. It allows for the important 
wheels of government to keep churning while we, void of 
pressure, study and deliberate without throwing hundreds of 
government responsibilities into a tailspin.
    I have been in Congress for only 7 months, and I voted on 
four continuing resolutions, and I have seen two shutdowns. 
Each time, I felt like a hostage with no option. As Members of 
Congress, we are given a several hundred-page spending bill 
often with only a day or two to consider it and told that if we 
don't vote in support of the legislation, the government will 
likely shut down. When this happens, there is simply no way to 
do our jobs as promised back home.
    By passing a baseline budget or essentially adopting the 
previous year's budget at the beginning of the legislative 
session, the State legislature is able to make meaningful 
adjustments to the spending levels for next year's budget 
without a threat of a government shutdown if they fail to come 
to an agreement.
    Utah is doing a lot of things right, and I believe this 
baseline budget process is one of many that Congress can learn 
from States like Utah. I strongly recommend that the select 
Committee study Utah's baseline budget process and consider 
recommending that it be adopted in Congress' budgeting and 
appropriation processes moving forward.
    Thank you for this opportunity to testify today, and with 
that, I yield my time.
    [The prepared statement of John Curtis follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Representative Curtis, for your 
testimony this morning.
    I am going to move quickly to our next witness from 
Connecticut. Representative Jim Himes represents the Fourth 
District of Connecticut.
    Representative Himes, the Committee appreciates the chance 
to hear your testimony this morning on this very important 
subject. And the floor is yours, sir, for 5 minutes.

 STATEMENT OF THE HON. JIM HIMES, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS 
                 FROM THE STATE OF CONNECTICUT

    Mr. Himes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Madam Ranking Member 
and distinguished members who are here. I would really like to 
thank you for bringing us together to today discuss an 
important topic at the heart of our governance, how to budget, 
how to raise revenue, and how to spend on a rational and 
fiscally sustainable path.
    As chair of the New Democrat Coalition, I am proud that our 
forward-thinking members have been at the forefront of budget 
reform looking for opportunities to plan for our future in a 
thoughtful, bipartisan, and rational way, which is the exact 
opposite of how this process has worked for the 10 years that I 
have been here. This is a moment of optimism for me, though a 
small one, because in 10 years, I have finally decided that the 
number of people who are truly interested in fiscal 
responsibility in this body can be counted on one hand. My 
friends on the Republican side of the aisle are absolutely 
horrified by deficits right up until the moment there is no 
longer a Democratic President to blame for them.
    Democrats all too often see spending as the first solution 
to every problem. Special interests and our constituents have 
their wish lists, but nobody wants to pay for those wish lists.
    I am a pessimist because I did see one plan a couple of 
years ago that was a very tough but fair plan. I am referring, 
of course, to the Simpson-Bowles budget which came out of the 
super Committee process. It was really, really tough, but it 
was fair. It protected the most vulnerable American citizens. 
It asked everybody to give up some of the sacred cows of their 
party. Yes, there were slight progressive tax increases, and, 
yes, there were things like chained CPI, which people on my 
side of the aisle did not like.
    That proposal, which was the result of a lot of hard work 
and political sacrifice, received exactly 33 votes in the 
United States House of Representatives, less than 10 percent of 
the membership. That is where we are. That is why I am a 
pessimist. But I do appreciate the Committee focusing on this.
    The only question in my mind at this point, having given up 
on the idea that we are collectively going to take the hard 
decisions and look at our various constituents and say 
everybody needs to give something, my fear is that the capital 
markets will finally impose discipline on the United States 
Government. So, the question is who is going to finally blow 
the whistle? Will it be us or will it be the capital markets 
who finally define for us what it is meant to be unsustainable?
    Now, I will point out that we have set ourselves up for a 
real problem here. When I came here 10 years ago, Admiral 
Mullen said the single largest threat to our national security 
is the debt. I was warned each and every day that we were going 
to see spiraling Treasury rates, interest rates going up. We 
were on the verge of catastrophe. The exact opposite happened. 
Interest rates stayed low. We continued to spend in a long-term 
unsustainable pattern. We just got through a process of adding 
$2 trillion to the deficit over a 10-year period, and yet 
remarkably the capital markets don't raise a whimper. That will 
not remain the case.
    So, we will see. I actually, sadly, though I am not 
temperamentally pessimistic, believe that it will finally be 
the capital markets defining for us what sustainability is that 
forces us to act.
    In the meantime, I just want to offer three ideas that I 
think might help the process and at least get us to a more 
honest process. Number one, first, do no harm. I have seen in 
10 years any number of hostage situations associated with the 
debt ceiling which does absolutely no good in terms of 
controlling the overall amount of debt or forcing fiscal 
discipline. Let's get rid of the hand grenade that each party 
gets to use once every couple of years. It led to downgrades. 
It led to market insecurity. Let's get rid of it. It does 
absolutely no good to anybody.
    Number two, let's put together a process to be honest and 
level with the American people on the complex nature of the 
problem and the big steps that we need to solve it. Again, 
Simpson-Bowles, now a part of distant history and a very 
painful thing for those of us who voted for it, pointed in the 
direction of actually making people think about what sacrifice 
means and who should do that sacrifice.
    Third, let's plan for the long haul. Let's bring Members 
together early to look at the far-out horizon, come to a 
consensus, and develop a plan that can outlast the shifting 
partisan wins. This could include a shift to biennial 
budgeting, including tough allocations that genuinely last a 
full Congress and allow agencies to efficiently plan ahead.
    Again, I hope that this Committee can shake this place in 
such a way that we do what we have been elected to do, which is 
to take the tough choices, to speak truth to the American 
people, and to preserve not just those programs which have done 
so much for the American people but to keep the economy 
competitive and to be worthy of the people who send us here.
    So, thank you to the Committee, and I yield back my time.
    [The prepared statement of Jim Himes follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. I appreciate the testimony of 
Representative Himes this morning.
    Our next witness from Kansas, Roger Marshall, representing 
the First District of Kansas. Sir, we appreciate the 
opportunity to hear your testimony this morning. We are going 
to give you 5 minutes as soon as we change a name placard. If 
you would engage that microphone, sir, we are going to give you 
5 minutes, and the floor is yours.

   STATEMENT OF THE HON. ROGER MARSHALL, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
               CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF KANSAS

    Representative Marshall. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And 
certainly, I don't need to preach to the choir here and explain 
to you the challenges before us and the inadequacy of our 
efforts and results since my time here.
    First of all, I want to just talk to you about solutions. 
My first suggestion is to consider separating the budget from 
the appropriations process. While it feels too much like an 
excuse I have heard from my own sons, having additional time to 
complete the annual budgeting and appropriation task would go a 
long way. While this city seems to live from new cycle to new 
cycle, I have never seen a company or organization that so 
often starts a year and continues working without a budget as a 
basic guide for the rest of their operations.
    While I don't like to admit that Congress is slower than we 
should be, there is something to be gained by recognizing this 
reality. Putting Congress on a 2-year budget cycle, a 2-year 
budget cycle allows an overarching agreement to be formed that 
Congress and then the work of Appropriations Committee can 
happen in a deliberate fashion rather than those two happening 
on top of each other, many times feeling like it is 
simultaneous to me. It seems like the budget has very little 
teeth to it.
    Next, I would talk about staggering fiscal years for 
appropriations bills. At first glance, I am not a person that 
likes to make things more complicated, but we currently are 
moving from a cliff-to-cliff governance that having all 12 
annual appropriations due in a single month creates. When all 
12 expire at the same time and Congress gets behind the eight-
ball, it is too easy to combine them into a large omnibus that 
leads us to passing one continuing resolution after another.
    Next, I would talk a little bit about the increasing 
involvement with the authorizing Committees. And certainly, I 
know there are many appropriators in the group and that this 
suggestion may not be popular, and I salute those people that 
are doing the best job they can under the circumstances. But 
the reality is, despite your best efforts to reach Members 
through Member Days and the appropriation request process, non-
committee members have much less involvement in the annual 
appropriation process. So, we need to look for ways to improve 
that.
    And then finally just to touch on entitlement programs once 
again. Right now, three-fourths of our Federal budget is going 
towards these entitlement programs, and it seems like we don't 
have a chance for the budget or appropriations Committees to do 
anything.
    Certainly, I understand the entitlement programs are 
necessary. The retirees in my district count on knowing how 
much and when social security checks and Medicare benefits will 
arrive. However, the current treatment of that spending sets up 
failure, as there is no practical opportunity to edit or adjust 
the programs, even if working decades into the future. Right 
now, healthcare expenses are responsible for actually 28 
percent of Federal spending. We have to find ways to have tough 
discussions and take this challenge head on.
    Much of what needs to be done is outside of the 
congressional budget process, things like putting consumers 
back in charge of their healthcare dollars, increasing 
transparency and supply chains, and freeing private companies 
to innovate. But structuring our budget process in such a way 
to provide additional scrutiny into where these mandatory 
dollars go can help us start to bring the healthcare costs 
down.
    Thank you so much for the chance to appear before the 
Committee.
    [The prepared statement of Roger Marshall follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Representative Marshall, we appreciate it. 
The Committee thanks you for your testimony here this morning.
    Our next witness doesn't need a lot of introduction, been 
around these parts for a long time. He is authoritative in a 
lot of subjects regarding budgets and appropriations, having 
served as the overall Chairman of the appropriations process in 
the House for 6 years, continues to serve on the Appropriations 
Committee as a subcommittee chair.
    And, sir, The Joint Select Committee appreciates the 
opportunity to hear your testimony this morning. So, at this 
time, I am going to recognize the gentleman from Somerset, 
Kentucky, Chairman Hal Rogers.

STATEMENT OF THE HON. HAL ROGERS, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS 
                   FROM THE STATE OF KENTUCKY

    Representative Rogers. Mr. Chairman, Mrs. Lowey.
    Co-Chair Womack. Make sure that mike is on, and the floor 
is yours.
    Representative Rogers. Thank you for the opportunity to 
testify this afternoon. I have been in this body for 38 years, 
35 of which has been on the Appropriations Committee. So, I 
have a little bit of a unique perspective on the process, 
because of that long period of time.
    Congress, of course, has the power of the purse and we are 
obligated to exercise that power, thoughtfully, responsibly, 
but also regularly. During my tenure as Chairman of the full 
Committee, my top priority, as was that of Mrs. Lowey, my 
ranking member, was returning to regular order, so that Members 
on both sides of the aisle had an opportunity to express the 
priorities of their congressional districts. Regular order 
means moving 12 bills through an open and transparent Committee 
process and then taking the bills to the House floor for 
discussion and debate in an open atmosphere.
    In the 6 years that I was privileged to lead the Committee, 
as a result of that openness, we drafted strong bipartisan 
bills. I was proud to work with Ranking Member Mrs. Lowey and 
her predecessor, Norm Dicks, to bring 138 bills to the House 
floor, 69 of which were ultimately enacted into law.
    Together, we debated over 2,100 amendments in the course of 
more than 550 hours on the House floor. The Committee held over 
650 budget and oversight hearings, to ensure our tax dollars 
were being spent wisely. I am pleased and grateful that 
Chairman Frelinghuysen has continued these important efforts, 
maintaining a spirit of hard work and collegiality on the 
Committee.
    The primary message, Mr. Chairman, Mrs. Lowey, the primary 
message I would like to convey to you today is that this 
important task, as time-consuming and politically difficult as 
it may be, needs to remain an annual exercise for two primary 
reasons: First, Congress has a responsibility to hold Federal 
agencies accountable to the American people through the 
appropriations process.
    Second, in the dynamic world we live in today, Federal 
agencies need to be nimble and responsive. Their appropriations 
should reflect changing priorities and needs, and they need to 
be able to move expeditiously through reprogramming requests 
and the like. And that means a constant contact with the 
appropriators all during the year, not just every other year, 
not just every year, but every day.
    On the first point, no matter which party sits in the White 
House, in our system of checks and balances, the Congress has a 
duty to ensure the executive branch is responsibly spending 
Federal resources according to Federal law.
    And I believe that moving toward a 2-year budget resolution 
as we have been doing, frankly, the last few years, is a good 
thing. It gives the Appropriations Committee and the Congress 
advance notice about what the targets are going to be 2 years 
from now so that we can plan for that.
    So, I think a 2-year budget resolution will go a long way 
to promote regular order and stability, provided it also 
includes annual appropriations, to give you, as a Member of 
Congress, the chance to question agency heads and the like 
frequently, not just once a year but lots of times a year.
    So, I am grateful for the work all of you are doing on this 
Select Committee, and I hope your recommendations will move our 
esteemed body forward.
    I have noticed, Mr. Chairman, too that since the Senate has 
been unwilling or unable to take up and pass the appropriations 
bills that we send over to them, the agencies picked up on that 
really quickly. When the agency head would come before our 
appropriating House Committee, they knew that we could not pass 
through the Congress the bill appropriating for their agency. 
So, they were very unresponsive to the House appropriators, 
because they knew we didn't have the whip to crack. And that is 
true even today.
    So hopefully, our esteemed colleagues on the other side of 
the Capitol will come to their senses and allow a majority vote 
on going to proceed. If they want to filibuster the bill once 
it gets on the floor, fine and dandy, but moving to proceed on 
appropriations bills ought to be a majority vote. Neither body 
should have the authority and power to shut down the 
government. That is why we are here.
    So, when the agencies that come before us to try to explain 
why they want an X amount of dollars and how they are going to 
use it, we need to be able to scare them, if you will, with the 
ability to pass these bills through House and Senate and make 
it law so that they can be responsible to us, as 
representatives of a lot of people.
    So, Mr. Chairman, I thank you for convening this meeting. 
Thank you for letting me have a chance to say a word or two. I 
will be happy to answer questions if you----
    [The prepared statement of Hal Rogers follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. I appreciate your testimony. Mr. Rogers, I 
am going to yield to my distinguished co-chair, Mrs. Lowey. I 
know she has some comments she would like to make.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Well first of all, it has been an honor for 
me to work with you for many years on the Appropriations 
Committee, and I appreciate your testimony and I feel strongly 
that appropriations have to be dealt with every year. And 
certainly, the Foreign Ops subcommittee is a perfect example of 
changing conditions in the world.
    On an optimistic note, it is my understanding that in the 
Senate, they are working together in a bipartisan way and are 
moving rather quickly and getting the appropriation bills 
through the process. So, I am always cautiously optimistic that 
together in a conference we can work together in a bipartisan 
way and somehow make all those poison pills disappear.
    So, I want to thank you very much. It has been an honor for 
me to work with you, and thank you for presenting your views, 
with which I agree. Thank you.
    Representative Rogers. Thank you, Madam Chair----
    Co-Chair Womack. I know our next witness, Dan Webster, is 
waiting in the wings. I just wanted to throw out one thing on 
the table for my friend from Kentucky, and that is, when the 
Speaker led this morning, his thesis statement was questioning 
whether or not anybody believed that the Senate was ever going 
to be able to manage and pass 12 appropriation bills in any 
given year through the Senate. And so that becomes a basis for 
a debate and a discussion about that.
    Now, the good news is when our Joint Select Committee first 
convened, we were careful not to make it a pick-on-the-Senate 
program, because half of our members are from the Senate, and 
they self-ID'd at the time that they were, indeed, part of the 
problem, that being able to manage 12 appropriation bills and 
because of Senate rules, there were problems there.
    Do you think a biennial budget with 12 titles of 
appropriations every year is doable, given the fact that the 
Joint Select Committee is not going to have the power 
necessarily to impose a change. We can only advocate through 
legislative text some changes, but do you think that getting 
maybe to the motion to proceed under a simple majority would be 
the elixir that fixes that side of the problem?
    Representative Rogers. I think so. I met yesterday and had 
a good long talk with the Senate Appropriations Chairman, who, 
as you know, the Senate now has passed a minibus of three 
bills, which we will be able to conference one of these days, 
hopefully. But I think the motion to proceed in the Senate 
should be a majority vote, just to bring it up and get it on 
the floor, appropriations bills, I would prefer. If they want 
to do all, that is fine, but especially appropriations bills, 
which are a different animal.
    And it is the existentialism. It is whether or not we 
survive as a government. But I think the motion to proceed 
should be a majority vote. Let that bill come to the floor; and 
if they want to filibuster it, hey, make my day. Speak all 
night, the way it used to be.
    But I've been here a little while, and the first 25 years 
on this Committee it worked, not like a clock, but it worked. 
We passed 12 bills. We went to conference on 12 bills with the 
Senate. There was give and take. By nature, we had to 
compromise to polish up a bill to be able to pass with a 
majority vote. So, I have seen it work, and it works fine until 
the Senate comes up with that rule that is a monkey wrench in 
the cogs of government. So, I would hope that that would 
change.
    I met yesterday with the President and the cardinals on the 
House and the Senate Appropriations Committee. And this was one 
of the main points of conversation that we had. And the 
President was very strong. That is not even the word for it. He 
was really strong to the Senators about changing that rule, but 
we found no sympathy on that side at this point in time.
    But I think the pressure should build and is building on 
the Senate to change an archaic rule that is preventing the 
government from operating. And I don't get too excited about 
things, but I am excited about this.
    Co-Chair Womack. That and Kentucky basketball.
    Representative Rogers. Yes.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you for your testimony.
    Representative Rogers. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and Madam, 
thank all of you for doing this hard chore. And it is good to 
see my friend from Louisville, Kentucky, who claims to have a 
good basketball team over there at U of L.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Appreciate your 
testimony.
    Our next witness is Dan Webster from Florida. The Joint 
Select Committee Members' Day group here this morning does 
appreciate the time you are spending with us. We look forward 
to your testimony. The floor is yours, sir.

   STATEMENT OF THE HON. DANIEL WEBSTER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
               CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF FLORIDA

    Representative Webster. Well, thank you, Mr. Chair, and 
others who are putting forth their time to listen to this hours 
of testimony, I am sure.
    I came to talk about maybe appearance of the process more 
than just the minute details of the process. I believe that 
there is mission creep between the Budget Committee, the 
Appropriation Committee, and in the end the substantive 
Committees, the authorizers. And if you look at it closely, you 
will see that the appropriators in many cases do substantive 
law. They do riders. They do other things, including approving 
appropriations for nonexistent authorizations which have 
expired.
    On the other hand, the Budget Committee bleeds over into 
substantive law by making assumptions of things that aren't in 
law right now. And not only that, they also talk about the 
funding of those, which is the appropriation processes. That is 
their job, the appropriators. And if you just see, it all kind 
of bleeds together.
    And then in the end, the authorizers in many cases set 
forth numbers, and that is not their prerogative, at least in a 
peer system. That is the appropriators. The appropriators take 
whatever is existing in current law, which is policy, and to 
whatever degree they determine they fund that policy--it could 
be zero, it could be $10, it could be a billion dollars--as 
opposed to the authorizers inserting numbers and basically 
making the appropriators follow suit.
    So that is what I would like to talk about today. I think 
the easiest way to get started on the revamp is to get rid of 
the Budget Committee. That way, at least one of those bleeding 
over into the others would go away. I think it is redundant in 
a lot of ways. It is not nearly followed. Some years when we 
don't do it, we go out and promote the fact we are not doing it 
because it is really not needed. And other years when we need 
it, we do it. And it is like it either comes and goes, 
depending on what is the circumstance, and that is both parties 
have done that.
    So, if you got rid of that, then the appropriators would 
only appropriate. They would appropriate on existing policy, 
whatever that policy is, and they would do it to the degree 
they determine and to the amount they determine or don't 
determine. And then on the other hand, the authorizers would 
not get to spend money. They could authorize something in let's 
say a bridge and right of way area and that you can spend money 
on bridges and right of way, but you don't necessarily put the 
amount down that you are going to spend. That is the 
appropriators' job.
    And so, with that, the reason I would say that is I believe 
that if we can purify each of those areas--and the easiest one 
is to just get rid of one, that certainly purifies their 
motives and other things--I think you end up with a process at 
least where you are going to be able to participate at whatever 
level you want to, but what you know you are not going to be 
able to put money into a program that doesn't exist in the 
appropriation bill. Nor, by amendment, could you be able to put 
that--I mean into--you can't put authorized policy in an 
appropriation bill, nor could you put an appropriation bill--
the appropriators cannot put policy in their particular bill.
    That is a summation. There are all kinds of details it 
would have to go through. How do you get what the overall 
spending levels are? How do you allocate to each of the subs 
and all that? I didn't go into that. I do have some ideas about 
that, but I just said if we start by setting it.
    The other is, I guess maybe the last thing, just we have 
too many lines on a sheet of paper, all of which claim to be 
the starting line for the budget or appropriation. And so, the 
baseline should be one, one baseline only. That way, the 
Members and public, everyone understands.
    Appropriators appropriate, the authorizers authorize, and 
there is one line that you start with. That is what I would is 
say is the way to simplify the whole process.
    [The prepared statement of Daniel Webster follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you very much for your testimony 
this morning. The Joint Select Committee appreciates your 
input.
    Representative Webster. Thank you.
    Co-Chair Womack. We have one remaining witness, and he is 
the gentleman from South Carolina five, Representative Ralph 
Norman. Sir, we again appreciate the chance to hear your 
comments this morning. We are going to give you 5 minutes, and 
the floor is yours.

    STATEMENT OF THE HON. RALPH NORMAN, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
           CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF SOUTH CAROLINA

    Representative Norman. Thank you, Colonel Womack. I 
appreciate the time with the Committee. I haven't been here as 
long as Hal Rogers or Dan Webster or Rob or a lot of you, but I 
just preface my prepared remarks with I don't think I have yet 
any--there is no topic that is of more concern to the people in 
my district than the budget, the deficit, the way we 
appropriate money, since I have been elected and even before 
then.
    So, I would just preface my remarks, this is on the minds 
of the people. It is on the minds of the people that put us in 
office. And I am a business guy. I run a development company. 
But I appreciate you taking the time, and I won't need the 5 
minutes.
    I think we all agree our budget process is broken. The 1974 
Congressional Budget Act laid out what our role was and the 
timeline for passing annual budgets and the 12 annual 
appropriation bills. The last time Congress passed all 12 
appropriation bills was 1997. That is 21 years ago.
    For six straight years, between fiscal years 2011 and 2016, 
not one single appropriations bill was passed on time. This 
isn't a Republican issue. This isn't a Democratic issue. As a 
business owner, as a developer, if I had not had a budget for 6 
years, I would be broke. I would not be up here where I am 
today, because you would not have the dollars. The company 
would not have the dollars to exist. So not having a budget 
process, from a practical sense, does not make sense.
    I firmly believe our Nation cannot and will not remain 
solvent if we keep passing trillion-dollar omnibuses and 
continuing resolutions. My constituents will not allow me to 
vote for something like that. This is a regular order and we 
must follow it.
    And what is amazing is the appropriation bills only cover a 
third of our Federal spending. I would ask that we try to find 
solutions, those of you who are on this Committee and those of 
us as we serve in Congress.
    The entitlement spending is the biggest driver of our 
spending problems. And I found pretty quickly up here everybody 
wants to cut until their ox is gored. And the current budget 
process does not force lawmakers to confront fiscal and 
economic reality.
    Would a biennial budget and appropriations process work 
better? Would strictly voting on monetary values with no policy 
riders in appropriations bills alleviate the problem? Last 
year, we passed all 12 appropriation bills in regular order 
with amendments, and the Senate did not do anything.
    I guess I would ask, what can we do to ensure the Senate 
acts? Would implementing language force them to act better? I 
don't know. All I would say is it is time for us, those of us 
elected officials to start making the tough decisions with 
spending, entitlement reform programs. We have got to start 
addressing these in a timely manner and go back to basics, 
which, as a business owner and business owners all across this 
country I think would agree with.
    Thank you, Colonel, for your Chairmanship, and thank the 
Committee with the steps they take that will hopefully solve 
this problem.
    [The prepared statement of Ralph Norman follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentleman from South Carolina 
for his testimony this morning.
    I will yield to the distinguished co-chair for any last-
minute comments.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Well, I just want to thank my co-chair. It 
has been a pleasure working with you. I appreciate all those 
who have submitted testimony and those who were here today. And 
I look forward to reviewing the information and then coming to 
some conclusions, which may or may not be implemented. But 
thank you so much.
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentlelady.
    That completes the Committee's business for today. I would 
like to thank all the Members who shared their views before the 
Committee.
    As was stated in the opening remarks, written comments 
already submitted will be made part of the official record. And 
in consultation with the co-chair, I seek unanimous consent to 
allow other members who may wish to input this process that 
were unable to be here today to have until the close of 
business on Monday, July 2, for such purposes.
    Without objection, so ordered.
    [The prepared statement of Rob Bishop follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    [The prepared statement of John Carter follows:]
      
     [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
     
    Co-Chair Womack. And, with that, the Committee stands 
adjourned.
    [Whereupon, at 12:22 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]


          OPPORTUNITIES TO IMPROVE THE APPROPRIATIONS PROCESS

                              ----------                              


                        THURSDAY, JULY 12, 2018

                          House of Representatives,
                      Joint Select Committee on Budget and 
                             Appropriations Process Reform,
                                                   Washington, D.C.
    The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:07 a.m., in room 
1334, Longworth House Office Building, Hon. Steve Womack and 
Hon. Nita M. Lowey [co-chairs of the committee] presiding.
    Present: Representatives Womack, Woodall, Arrington, Lowey, 
Yarmuth, Roybal-Allard, and Kilmer.
    Senators Blunt, Perdue, Lankford, Ernst, and Bennet.
    Co-Chair Womack. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. The 
Joint Select Committee on Budget Process Reform will come to 
order. I want to welcome you to the fifth public hearing of the 
Joint Select Committee on Budget and Appropriations Process 
Reform.
    The most important role given to Congress under Article I 
of the Constitution is the power of the purse. Our panel is 
charged with ensuring we have a working process in order to 
fulfill this essential duty.
    During our hearings so far we have identified some of the 
recurring challenges that need addressing. Those have been 
extremely productive discussions. I was especially pleased to 
see the level of engagement from and hear the ideas of Members 
during our Members Day meeting.
    While we have discussed the annual budget resolution at 
length during a previous hearing, today we are going to focus 
on what is supposed to happen next, and that is the 
consideration of appropriations bills.
    Especially in a reform-focused committee like ours we 
certainly need to be mindful of past processes and let 
history's successes--and their failures--guide our decisions. 
And the fact of the matter is that the current process needs 
improvement. I think both sides of the aisle agree on that.
    We on this panel are charged with designing a neutral 
process for the future, one in which Congress can move forward 
with its budgetary agenda no matter which party holds the 
majority. Budgetary priorities, outcomes, and results should 
come from elections. Thus, a properly functioning budget and 
appropriations process should be neutral to specific outcomes.
    That being said, as we engage in conversation today I urge 
members to think about designing a process for the future. I 
believe we can do that by considering what the modern Congress 
can handle right now and anticipating the issues future 
Congresses might need endure.
    Without question I have tremendous respect for the decades 
of experience that will come before us today, but I want to 
challenge us all to think about how that experience can be 
applied to what future officeholders will face as they try to 
fund the government on time.
    To help us think through the current appropriations 
process, including its link to the annual budget resolution, we 
are pleased to welcome two incredibly distinguished and 
experienced witnesses. While both served on the same side of 
the aisle, their perspectives demonstrate that the issues we 
are trying to fix transcend party lines.
    In fact, as I was thinking through the potential witnesses 
one name quickly stood out in my mind: Leon Panetta. This is an 
individual whose seasoned career encompasses many positions 
that are relevant to our deliberations. He served as a 
congressional staffer, executive branch official, adviser to 
the mayor of New York, chairman of the House Budget Committee--
his painting hangs in these chambers--White House Chief of 
Staff, Director of the Office of Management and Budget, 
Director of the CIA, and finally, Secretary of Defense.
    Given his tremendous background, I knew his presence at 
this hearing today was vital.
    Secretary Panetta, it is an honor to have you. Thank you 
for being here.
    We are also pleased to welcome David Obey, who served for 
decades as part of the Wisconsin delegation in Congress. During 
his tenure he led as both ranking member and chairman of the 
House Appropriations Committee.
    Chairman Obey, as an appropriator, I also appreciate you 
being here today to give us your valuable insight.
    And with that, I want to yield to my co-chair, Mrs. Lowey, 
for her brief opening remarks.
    Mrs. Lowey.
    [The prepared statement of Steve Womack follows:]
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    Co-Chair Lowey. Thank you.
    And welcome to the Joint Select Committee's fifth hearing. 
Today we have two witnesses with many, many years of experience 
with the budget and appropriations process and a wealth of 
knowledge on that subject. Both are good friends.
    So I am looking forward to hearing your direct, honest 
testimony.
    One is David Obey, who served in the House for 42 years as 
a Representative from Wisconsin. He was a longstanding member 
of the House Appropriations Committee, served as chairman or 
ranking minority member of that committee for almost two 
decades. He has also been involved in many past debates about 
budget process reform.
    And our other witness, with whom I also had the privilege 
of serving, is Leon Panetta, who is another former Member of 
the House, past chairman of the House Budget Committee. In 
addition, he has extensive experience at very senior levels of 
the executive branch, including service as Director of OMB, 
White House Chief of Staff, Director of the CIA, Secretary of 
Defense.
    So today I am delighted that we will hear from them about 
what could be done to make our budget and appropriations 
processes work better.
    In addition to talking about procedural changes that might 
help, I hope we will get the benefit of their long-term 
perspective on the polarization and partisanship that is now 
the fundamental cause of many of our difficulties.
    I think I will read that sentence again because I really 
feel that is the cause.
    So I hope we will get the benefit of their long-term 
perspective on the polarization and partisanship that is now, 
in my judgment, the fundamental cause of many of our 
difficulties.
    So I look forward to the testimony. I should also mention 
that, unfortunately, I will need to leave part way through the 
hearing to attend the first House-Senate conference committee 
meeting on 2019 appropriation bills. I wish I could stay for 
all of what should be a very interesting session.
    And, frankly, just to throw some information into the mix, 
what is very interesting about this appropriations season is 
the Senate is operating in a bipartisan way. Every bill they 
have completed is bipartisan, where last night we completed 
Labor-HHS with about 50 amendments.
    So we are operating very differently, and that could be an 
interesting discussion in itself as to process.
    Thank you, my co-chair.
    [The prepared statement of Nita M. Lowey follows:]
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    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the distinguished co-chair, the 
gentlelady from New York.
    Now I would like to welcome our distinguished witnesses. 
First, and as I told him when he came in, I didn't know whether 
to call him chairman, chief, director, Mr. Secretary, so I 
think I will just say Jimmy's daddy is here to be a witness 
before this committee.
    So, Secretary Panetta, thank you so much for being here. It 
is an honor to have you.
    And for both gentlemen, your official statements are being 
made as part of the official record of this proceeding, and we 
are going to give you 10 minutes each to present your testimony 
at your pleasure.
    Sir, the floor is yours.

  STATEMENTS OF THE HONORABLE LEON PANETTA; AND THE HONORABLE 
                           DAVID OBEY

                   STATEMENT OF LEON PANETTA

    Mr. Panetta. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I 
appreciate the opportunity to be able to be here and share my 
experiences and thoughts with you on the tough task that is in 
front of you to try to implement important budget reforms that 
can hopefully improve that process.
    I am also honored to be here with a dear friend and former 
colleague of mine, Dave Obey. Dave and I together served on the 
Budget Committee, but more importantly, in all the other 
positions I held I had to deal with David when he was chairman 
of the Appropriations Committee and always found him to be 
someone who was fully committed to trying to do the right thing 
for the country.
    So I am honored to have this opportunity.
    And I think, you know, both of us obviously will give you a 
sense of the history that we experienced and what made the 
process work at the time.
    In the 50 years of public life that I have had, I have seen 
Washington at its best and I have seen Washington at its worst.
    The good news is I have seen Washington work. And I have 
seen Democrats and Republicans with a willingness to work 
together on issues. We have always had our political 
differences. In my first experience in Washington, I was a 
legislative assistant to Tom Kuchel, who was a Republican from 
California, minority whip. I served under Everett Dirksen.
    And at the time there were a lot of Republicans, both 
conservative and progressive, but they viewed their 
responsibility in the Senate as working with Democrats, people 
like Jackson and Magnuson and Dick Russell, Sam Ervin, and a 
number of others, Fulbright. They worked together on 
fundamental issues.
    When I got elected to the Congress, Tip O'Neill was the 
Speaker, the Democrat's Democrat, but he worked very closely 
with Bob Michel who was the minority leader. And that was the 
legacy that I came into as a freshman Member, which was that 
you work with your ranking members, you work with the other 
party on the legislation that you have to deal with.
    And so one of the fundamental messages that I have to 
stress is the importance of bipartisanship to making this 
process work. This is a tough process. Budget process is tough. 
Getting the appropriations bills done is tough. And it is 
difficult to do even when you are working together. It is 
almost impossible to do when you try to shove this stuff 
through the process on your own as one party.
    The history of the budget process in the period when it 
worked is the history of bipartisanship. The Budget Act was 
passed on a bipartisan basis. David and I worked with chairmen 
of the Budget Committee who worked with their ranking members, 
Bob Giaimo, Del Latta; on the Senate side, Pete Domenici, 
Muskie, a number of others, worked together.
    When I was chairman of the Budget Committee I had the honor 
of working with Bill Gradison and then with Bill Frenzel, and 
we worked together. And the result was that we made some 
significant progress.
    It was not easy. It was a tough time. Deficits were going 
up for a lot of reasons. But there were three important steps 
that were taken that I think ultimately led to a balanced 
budget.
    One was the 1990 budget agreement in which we assembled 
both Republicans and Democrats and representatives of the 
administration to negotiate an approach to deficit reduction. 
And we met, we negotiated, we finally went out to Andrews Air 
Force Base and spent close to 3 or 4 weeks negotiating out 
there.
    The agreement at the time was that if the Democrats would 
come forward with $250 billion in spending savings that the 
Republicans would be willing to put $250 billion in tax 
increases on the table.
    And so we spent a lot of time. It was tough. None of these 
decisions are easy. But we put together a $500 billion deficit 
reduction package, a close to $500 billion deficit reduction 
package.
    And we had to push it through. It was not easy. But we 
ultimately pushed it through in a bipartisan vote, an omnibus 
package. It included a budget resolution, it included 
reconciliation, and it included appropriations bills. But it 
was passed, and we did it on a bipartisan basis.
    The next effort that I think was important, I was OMB 
Director and worked for Bill Clinton in putting that budget 
together, and again, $500 billion in deficit reduction. 
Unfortunately, that wasn't done on a bipartisan basis, and it 
was tough. It only passed by one vote in the House and in the 
Senate.
    And then lastly, the bipartisan effort to put together a 
balanced budget in 1997.
    All of that contributed to a balanced budget and a surplus. 
And then it was the breakdown, I think, in bipartisanship that 
ultimately turned that all around.
    The process is broken. It is broken because obviously 
bipartisanship has broken down. Regular order has broken down. 
There is a lack of enforcement. There is a lack of the ability 
to work together and to have to wait for crisis in order to 
drive the process.
    I often say democracy is a process that we do through 
leadership or crisis. The problem in this place is that crisis 
becomes the driver now more than leadership. And when you 
operate by crisis you have to wait for something terrible to 
happen in order to do the right thing, and what you usually 
wind up doing is kicking the can down the road.
    And lastly, there has been a misuse of the reconciliation 
process and the misuse, I think, of the general budget process, 
which has lost a lot of respect.
    What are the recommendations to try to fix it? I lay it out 
in the testimony. I think the idea of a biennial budget is 
worth looking at. It is not easy. There are problems that you 
have to work through. But I think the more you can provide 
additional time to do it and additional time for oversight on 
ongoing programs, I think that is something to seriously 
consider.
    I think a joint budget resolution may make sense, as well, 
to bring the President into the process. The way this game 
works is the President presents his budget and then Congress 
decides to go its own way. There is little communication until 
you do the appropriations part of it. You really ought to 
engage in the overall budget discussion with the President 
early on. So that is worth thinking about.
    I think you ought to change to a calendar basis just to 
give yourself more time instead of the fiscal year approach. It 
is not a cure-all, but at least the additional time would help 
you.
    I think you have to show a price to be paid for failure to 
pass a budget resolution, so that legislation that has a fiscal 
impact, frankly, should not move unless you have passed a 
budget. You need to provide a process to increase the debt 
ceiling so we don't have this crisis. We had the Gephardt Rule, 
which tied to the budget resolution. I think that is worth 
looking at.
    Budget gimmicks, you have to get rid of budget gimmicks, 
the whole idea of rosy scenarios and magic asterisks, the kind 
of games that are played. And I have been a part of some of 
that. I know what those games are. You have got to be able to 
discipline people so they don't use it.
    Paygo is a very important enforcement tool. We would not 
have balanced the budget without paygo in which we said if you 
are going to come up with spending, if you are going to come up 
with tax cuts, you have got to pay for them and not increase 
the deficit. You have got to get back to that.
    You should do a common baseline between CBO and OMB. 
Instead of fighting over growth numbers, frankly, you ought to 
operate on the same consensus numbers from both of them.
    I think you need some control of emergency funding. It has 
got out of hand. You need to set up an emergency fund and 
better controls over how that operates.
    And I will tell you, even from the OCO perspective on 
defense, the fact is when you have been in war for a long 
period of time I don't see why you have to keep going to OCO. 
It ought to be part of the budget, frankly, for the defense 
budget.
    Lastly, some check on mandatory spending. Two-thirds of the 
budget is mandatory spending. We don't pay enough attention to 
mandatory programs. And then a 10-year budget projection.
    I think the most important guidance I can give you is that 
the best way to pass budget reforms is to do a budget deal and 
to do a comprehensive budget deal. If you can put those pieces 
together, then you can pass the reforms as part of that. We did 
that in the 1990 budget agreement.
    If you can't do that, and that is probably the case, then 
this joint committee ought to try on a bipartisan basis then to 
make recommendations with regards to some key changes. You 
don't have to do it all, but at least do a few changes to show 
that this place can operate on a bipartisan basis when it comes 
to the budget.
    This is not a game. This is about the fiscal health of this 
Nation. We are facing a fiscal crisis; 78 percent of GDP is now 
debt. We are looking at it going to 152 percent of GDP, 
according to CBO. That is trouble for our economy. It is 
trouble for resources. It is trouble for the American people 
and for all of the things we care about.
    So that is what is at stake here. I know that this 
committee is given the responsibility to do reforms. I think 
you have the leadership capability to try to move something 
that sends a signal to the American people that this place can 
operate the way it should, with Republicans and Democrats 
agreeing on tough decisions to be able to govern. That is what 
democracy should be all about.
    Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Leon Panetta follows:]
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    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentleman.
    Mr. Obey.

                    STATEMENT OF DAVID OBEY

    Mr. Obey. First, let me apologize for my voice this 
morning. If some of you can't hear what I am saying don't worry 
about it, you are not going to miss a hell of a lot.
    I am happy to be here today with Leon Panetta.
    Co-Chair Womack. Let's make sure that microphone is on.
    Mr. Obey. That is a little better.
    Leon is a good friend. He is truly a great American. All 
you have to do is read his resume to understand that. And if 
you know him, you know even more so that that is true.
    We have gone through many battles together, but one 
difference that separates the two of us is that I am from the 
Pre-Cambrian Era and Leon is not. He was elected in 1976 after 
the Budget Act of 1974 was in place, so that is the only 
process he has ever known. I was elected in 1969 before there 
was a budget committee. In that time the appropriations process 
worked reasonably well. We just didn't realize it at the time.
    At that time the President's budget meant something. There 
was no talk about it being dead on arrival. The way it worked 
was fairly simple. The President sent down the budget. The 
Appropriations Committee held its hearings and produced its 
bills. The Ways and Means Committee was on a separate track and 
took whatever actions they thought was appropriate.
    There was no formal arithmetic discipline. Discipline came 
from the recognition by the committee and by the party leaders 
that if the year's work was irresponsible there would be a 
price to pay in public opinion and at the ballot box.
    Under that system, from 1960 through 1974, and please 
remember this, from 1960 through 1974 deficits averaged a 
little less than 1 percent of GDP. In the worst year the 
deficit was 2.8 percent. By comparison, in the years after the 
Budget Reform Act, from 1974 through 2010, the year I retired, 
deficits averaged 2.9 percent of GDP, three times as high, and 
in 1 year it hit 9.8 percent.
    From 1974 on Congress has searched for a magical provision 
to rein in the deficit, a process provision. Ever since, the 
budget process has been as chaotic as it has been super 
complicated.
    Why? Much of the blame has been dumped by some on the 
Appropriations Committee. That is the wrong target. The main 
procedural problem is that the committee with the 
responsibility to pass the bills that actually determine 
specific spending decisions has nothing to do with the budget 
blueprint under which they are required to operate.
    When you get right down to it, the main job of the Budget 
Committee is to agree on three macroeconomic numbers: total 
spending, total revenues, and the level of the deficit.
    In contrast, the committee that has the responsibility to 
broker the thousands of program compromises necessary to 
implement that budget is the Appropriations Committee.
    So the Budget Committee can fly at 30,000 feet, but the 
Appropriations Committee and the Ways and Means Committee have 
to slug it out on the ground level in hand-to-hand combat. That 
means that if the Budget Committee targets are too optimistic, 
ideological, or unrealistic the Appropriations Committee cannot 
get the votes on the floor to implement their product.
    When I retired in 2010 I was succeeded by Hal Rogers as 
Appropriations chairman. I watched what happened to him. Each 
year the Budget Committee would push a highly aggressive budget 
resolution through the House, but when Hal tried to implement 
that resolution with actual program-by-program cuts.
    Members who had voted for the budget resolution would see 
what the resolution in macroterms actually required in 
microprogram terms, and Members who had voted for the 
resolution initially would then say, ``What? You want me to cut 
what? Are you crazy? Hell, no.'' And the system stalled.
    So what would I do to change things? That depends on 
whether you want to do major surgery or a patch job. For 
instance, 2-year appropriations is a wonderful idea if you want 
to erode congressional power or weaken Congress' ability to 
deal with the bureaucracy and bury the Congress in 
supplementals. Outside of that, it is a terrific idea.
    If you want to do fundamental change, I would do four 
things. One is procedural. I would abolish the Budget Committee 
and return to the practice of using old-fashioned informal 
political sanctions to impose fiscal responsibility. That would 
give you more time to focus on the bills that actually spend 
the money.
    The Budget Act simply adds one more hurdle that Congress 
must overcome without adding 3 months more to the calendar. All 
the budget resolution really is, is an institutional press 
release if it is not followed up by something else.
    People will say, ``Oh, my God, you can't do that or the 
deficit will balloon again.'' I would simply say that the 
numbers I previously cited demonstrate that the empirical 
evidence for that view is nonexistent. Deficits are larger now 
as a percentage of the economy than they were before the Budget 
Committee was created to prevent it.
    Second, recognize what history tells us on revenues. 
Recognize that in the last 50 years the budget has never 
approached balance when revenues as a percentage of GDP have 
not neared 20 percent.
    Third, recognize that we are not just in danger of passing 
on an uncontrolled budget deficit to our children, we are also 
in danger of leaving them with an infrastructure deficit, a 
skilled worker deficit, a science and tech deficit.
    Recognize that over the past 50 years nondefense 
appropriations spending has never been less than 3.1 percent of 
GDP. The budget resolution passed by the House last year called 
for shrinking that to 1.7 percent of GDP by the end of 10 
years. I invite you to decide whether that is either achievable 
or desirable.
    The fourth thing I would do is recognize that the main 
problem is not procedural, it is political. My favorite 
philosopher is Archy the Cockroach, who said once that what 
matters is not so much what system you have, what matters is 
what you do with whatever system you happen to have.
    I would ask you to learn a lesson from 1994 when I chaired 
Appropriations the first time. I became chairman midway through 
the session after Bill Natcher died. In spite of that fact, we 
finished all appropriation bills before the start of the next 
fiscal year.
    That didn't happen because I was such a hotshot chairman. 
It happened because the very first thing I did when I became 
chairman was to go to my ranking Republican, Joe McDade. I told 
Joe that I knew we would never agree on the details of 
appropriations, but I asked him how he would feel about the 
committee reporting a bipartisan 302(b) budget allocation. He 
jumped at the chance.
    For the first and only time in the history of the Budget 
Act, that is what we did. It meant that we had agreed on how 
much money each Appropriation subcommittee would allocate, or 
would be allocated, but left the details to the subcommittees.
    Unfortunately, it will be almost impossible to resurrect 
any degree of bipartisanship because of the way you all are 
elected. Too many of you come from hugely safe districts. The 
way your districts are drawn produces little incentive to 
compromise.
    That problem is beyond the reach of this committee to 
correct. But please at least recognize that your basic problem 
is not the budget process. The budget process is simply one 
example of how our political system has crippled the 
legislative system.
    Meanwhile, if all you really want to do is to put a patch 
or two on the process, I would recommend one procedural change. 
Right now the Budget Committee chair and Appropriations 
Committee chair live in two different political worlds.
    If you want to make the process more realistic, do one 
thing. Either make the chairmen of the Appropriations and Ways 
and Means co-chairmen of the Budget Committee or make the 
Budget Committee chair rotate between the two. That way the 
people who are expected to deliver the goods are the people who 
are actually manufacturing them.
    [The prepared statement of David Obey follows:]
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    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentleman for his testimony.
    We will move straight into questions, and I will begin.
    To both of you, but particularly Secretary Panetta, two 
things that in reading between the lines of your testimony, 
there are two things that come to mind to me. One is the word 
``discipline,'' having the discipline to do what the process is 
outlined to produce, and the other one was ``bipartisanship.'' 
And as Mr. Obey has just testified, that is beyond kind of the 
control of the Joint Select Committee.
    But is it possible to get to a solution to the challenges 
that face the modern day Congress without a discipline to deal 
with the process the way it has been given to you and without 
some spirit of bipartisanship, which seems to be very elusive 
across the spectrum of issues facing the Congress?
    Mr. Panetta. Well, Mr. Chairman, as stressed by both of our 
comments, you can't do one without the other. I mean, that is 
the problem.
    I think the reality is that bipartisanship and the ability 
to work together is the key to implementing discipline. If one 
party alone tries to implement that discipline and doesn't have 
support across the aisle then it is going to be stopped and 
blocked and basically will be pushed to a point where it 
doesn't serve the process that it was designed to implement.
    Look, there is no question, I mean, your fundamental 
problem right now is the lack of a willingness to enforce what 
the Budget Act is all about. And admittedly, the Budget Act and 
the budget process has never been an easy one to implement 
because it does represent discipline.
    As chairman of the Budget Committee, you are never popular 
because you are establishing priorities. But the nature of the 
budget process is to establish priorities. It is not about 
numbers. This is not about just moving numbers around. It is, 
what are the priorities of this country? That is what is 
reflected in any budget.
    And we are not going to achieve any of our priorities if we 
don't manage our budget, because it is going to eat away at our 
ability to provide the resources necessary.
    And, look, the reality is--David touched on this--but the 
reality is that the budget you are dealing with is now less 
than a third discretionary and two-thirds mandatory. There is 
no way you are going to deal with a $20 trillion debt and not 
be willing to confront the mandatory issue.
    Now, I understand the politics of that, and I know how 
tough it is, but if you are being honest with the American 
people about the need to deal with the deficit, you are not 
going to deal with the deficit on the discretionary side alone, 
that is a joke, especially when you are increasing defense.
    So if you are serious about doing this you have got to deal 
with all of those areas. That requires discipline. It requires 
a willingness to take risks. Leadership is about taking risks. 
And if that willingness to do it, if that courage to do the 
tough decisions is not there, you can frankly implement all the 
budget reforms you want, nothing is going to happen in terms of 
the major problem.
    So discipline is the key, but you have really got to have 
bipartisanship and a willingness to work together to make the 
tough decisions necessary to deal with spending, discretionary, 
defense, entitlements, and what David talked about, revenues. 
All of that has to be part of the package.
    The only successful packages I was a part of in terms of 
budget agreements included all those elements. If you want to 
deal with the budget deficit, you have got to deal with all of 
those elements. But to deal with that, it needs to be 
bipartisan, and you damn well need to have the cover of the 
leadership. If the leadership isn't willing to back you up on 
those kinds of tough decisions, you are not going anywhere.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Obey, a quick thought?
    Mr. Obey. Yes, Mr. Chairman.
    The father of the Budget Act in the House was Dick Bolling 
from Missouri, who was my mentor. And I talked to him the night 
before the Budget Act was scheduled on the floor, because we 
had a lot of controversy with it. And I remember him saying 
that unless the leadership of both parties played the numbers 
straight in the budget process so that people had confidence in 
the integrity of the process, that you could never expect 
anybody to support the results.
    And that is what has happened, in my view. You have had all 
kinds of gimmicks. I mean, my God, when you take a look at the 
assumptions that were made.
    I remember one year good old Ed Muskie, we were in 
conference. We were $400 million away from reaching the target 
number we needed on the deficit. And so Muskie wanted to take 
it out of agriculture.
    And so in the end if you took it out of grain, you 
antagonize the grain farmers; if you took it out of dairy you 
antagonize dairy. And so what the committee did was to tell the 
dairy guys they were going to take it out of grain, they told 
the grain guys they were going to take it out of dairy, and 
they passed it by subterfuge.
    You have got to play straight with the numbers or you are 
never going to get anybody to support it.
    Second thing is your substance has to be seen as fair and 
just for the people you represent. Otis Pike from New York said 
this during debate: You will never be held in high regard or 
deemed ethical while you say you can't balance a budget unless 
a constitutional amendment makes you; while you accept 
gloriously optimistic economic projections rather than deal 
with real ones; while you write a Gramm-Rudman bill and then 
spend days finding ways to get around it; while you let one man 
make $500 million a year while thousands sleep on the streets.
    And then the last thing I would note is a statement that 
Bolling put in the record just prior to the debate on the 
Budget Act, when he said this: The objective of budget reform 
should be to make Congress informed about and responsible for 
its budget actions, not to take away its power to act.
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentleman.
    Mrs. Lowey.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Thank you again for your thoughtful 
testimony.
    First of all, to Mr. Obey. Two weeks ago we heard testimony 
from Speaker Ryan in which he endorsed the idea of biennial 
appropriations, putting funding bills on a 2-year cycle. You 
note that you oppose this proposal, as do I. So number one, 
could you elaborate on why you think switching to biennial 
appropriations would be a bad idea?
    And, secondly, for either of you. One of the problems we 
have been having recently is getting appropriations done, 
because there is a tendency to drag in all sorts of unrelated 
legislative issues into the appropriations process.
    It is hard enough just reaching agreement on funding 
levels, but when we become the authorizing committee, because 
the authorizing committees can't do their work, and we try and 
resolve issues of banking regulation or environmental law or 
healthcare policy, I just wonder whether all these riders--and 
I mentioned before that we were in till about 11:30 last night 
on Labor-HHS, because there were 50 amendments, all kinds of 
legislative issues.
    Maybe you can tell me, Chairman Obey, how are these riders 
handled? I am not even getting into Mr. Panetta's in-depth 
discussion. But how did you deal with riders in the past? We 
are becoming the authorizing committee, because the authorizing 
committee can't do their work, and then we get into all kinds 
of policy arguments and amendments like the 50 last night.
    Mr. Obey.
    Mr. Obey. Well, first of all, with respect to 2-year 
appropriations, I believe that the Congress is not in any 
position to give away any of its powers. It has given away far 
too many through the years.
    And if you take a look at what happens, if you have a 2-
year appropriation, understand, once you pass that 
appropriation bill the bureaucracy doesn't need you for the 
rest of that cycle.
    Under a 1-year appropriation you have always got something 
that they want. It is called money. And it makes it tough to 
get away from the Congress if the Congress is going to have you 
right back up again next year. It is hard on the Congress to 
have to go through it twice, but it is the way you preserve 
your power vis-a-vis the bureaucracy, in my view.
    Secondly, this idea that somehow if you appropriate 1 year 
you will have all of this time in the second year to do 
oversight--bull gravy. The fact is that if you do that what 
happens is that you lose the leverage, you lose the leverage 
that you have with a 1-year budget.
    Thirdly, supplementals. Congress already does too much by 
way of supplementals. We funded the longest war in the history 
of the country on a supplemental. I mean, it is absurd to even 
think about adding a process that will make it much more likely 
that Congress will have to wrestle with supplementals.
    And then the fourth problem is that if you then add to it 
the inclination of Members to grab what must be a must-pass 
bill and attach their favorite authorizing project to it, then 
you have got a prescription for chaos.
    So I would say first do no harm. Don't give up the power 
that the Congress has. Especially in these days, this democracy 
requires that you hang on to it.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Well, I thank you very much.
    Do you have a comment on that, my friend?
    Mr. Panetta. Just a short comment on it.
    I think part of the problem is the breakdown in the regular 
order process that took place. When I was first elected--and 
David obviously before that--but when I was first elected, the 
committees meant something. The subcommittees meant something.
    And, look, we had very diverse Members in the Congress. On 
the Democratic side we had everybody from Sonny Montgomery to 
Ron Dellums and a lot of others. And yet, what we did was we 
operated within the committee process. We had a chance in 
subcommittee to do hearings, to make amendments, to vote on 
that legislation. We had a chance in full committee to do 
hearings and vote on legislation.
    And the leadership backed up that process. The leadership 
basically said: We are not going to take up bills unless they 
go through the regular order process.
    And you felt as a Member that you had a role to play in 
terms of legislation. It wasn't being done by the leadership. 
It wasn't being done by the Rules Committee. It wasn't being 
done by a group in a dark office someplace. It was done by you. 
You were part of the process.
    That is shut down. And so, yes, you are going to get a hell 
of a lot more riders. Why? Because the authorizing committees 
aren't doing anything. So they are going to basically put the 
riders on appropriations bills because they know appropriations 
bills ultimately have to move. So you are going to get a lot 
more riders with a breakdown in regular order.
    And, look, the process right now, appropriations operates 
on CRs. I mean, I know the work is done in committees. You try 
to work through these bills. But ultimately everybody knows 
that we are going to face a cliff out there, and you are going 
to wait until you face the cliff to basically have to do 
anything.
    And so everybody plays the CR game. And that breaks down 
the process that David talks about where the committees are 
working on this stuff, doing oversight, doing all the things 
they have to do.
    Because you know what is going to happen. You know the game 
that is going to be played. You wait until the cliff happens. 
You wait until you have to raise the debt ceiling to push you. 
And the leadership is going to get together and try to cut a 
deal in order to make sure the government doesn't collapse.
    That is the way you operate now. That is a lousy way to 
govern.
    Co-Chair Lowey. Just, Mr. Chairman, if I may just----
    Co-Chair Womack. Please.
    Co-Chair Lowey.----repeat a couple of facts before, so we 
don't get too depressed here.
    We sometimes have to take the long route to get things done 
to satisfy everyone's political base. I am not saying whose. 
But in 2018, for example--obviously we are dealing now with 
2019--we ended up with a really good bipartisan omnibus, a 
really good appropriations bill. I know because I was on the 
phone every night. We got rid of 169 riders. You could ask, how 
did those riders get in, in the first place? But that is 
another story.
    And then that takes us to last night, where we are here 
with 50 amendments on the House. Senator Shelby is working in a 
bipartisan way with Senator Leahy. They are bringing bills to 
the floor. At some place the charade in the House may be 
completed, and I have a feeling it is going to end up in a 
positive bipartisan bill, because it has to.
    So sometimes you have to go through the machinations, 
because the authorizers aren't doing their work and they had to 
bring them into appropriations. And I am not saying, and I 
welcome, the reason we wanted this hearing, to hear maybe how 
we could shortcut this.
    But in the end after everyone has done their press release 
and we deal with all the poisoned pills, we ended up with a 
pretty good process. And on each of the subcommittees of which 
I am a visitor and a part, there really was some good 
bipartisan discussion.
    So I won't throw the whole thing out, but it is an 
interesting process the way it is working now, and it may be a 
longer, longer process.
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentlelady.
    Senator Lankford.
    Senator Lankford. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Gentlemen, thank you being here very much.
    Mr. Panetta, let me start with you on this. Thanks for the 
very detailed recommendations that you put in place. I want to 
continue what Nita was talking about as well on the 2-year 
cycle.
    You make a pretty strong case for having a 2-year budget 
process. Would you have that same case for a 2-year 
appropriations process, especially with an insight on 
contracting, CRs, which you mentioned before, lost months when 
you can actually do contracting?
    You have been on both sides of this. It gives you a unique 
perspective. So help me understand where you are coming from on 
a 2-year budgeting process, 2-year appropriation process.
    Mr. Panetta. Look, the reality right now is that most of 
the agreements that are being made are made over a 2-year 
period to try to give you some relief so you don't have to 
fight the same wars the second year.
    Look, the biggest problem--and I have seen it from both 
sides, obviously from the Hill perspective, but also from being 
in the administration, particularly as Secretary of Defense--
the worst problem in terms of defense is uncertainty and not 
knowing what the numbers are going to be and not knowing 
exactly what is going to be available.
    And you have weapon systems that are out there that have to 
be funded. You have troops that have to be paid. You have all 
kinds of requirements that have to be dealt with. And you are 
not sure what exactly you are going to get.
    And particularly when sequestration happened, you had this 
process of then slashing funding across the board. And at the 
time I said it is really going to impact on our ability to do 
maintenance and all the other things that have to be done.
    So it is the uncertainty in the process. And I think a 2-
year process, since in many ways it is now incorporated in the 
dealmaking that goes through it, I think a 2-year process that 
lays it out for 2 years--look, on the appropriations side I 
think Mike Enzi has a good idea of perhaps running six bills 
one year and six bills the next and allowing some degree of 
oversight in the offyear.
    But the fact that you can lay out some degree of certainty 
with regards to where you are going so that you can do the 
planning and you can do the kind of decisions that have to be 
done, I think that is an important thing to consider in this 
process.
    Senator Lankford. The connection between reprogramming 
dollars with appropriations committees and for agencies having 
to be able to come back for reprogramming authority, is that a 
sufficient hook to be able to push agency back to 
appropriators?
    Mr. Panetta. Yeah. No, it always is. I think that is right.
    Senator Lankford. Let me ask you, you had an extensive set 
of paragraphs on budget gimmicks, with a full confession that I 
occasionally used a couple when I was sitting in the other 
chair. So talk to me about a little bit of how that actually 
fixes the process.
    You talked about ChIMPS, you talked about timing shifts, 
you talked about the magic asterisk. Are there any of those 
that are in particular that you say this is a big issue, or it 
is just deal with all of them?
    Mr. Panetta. I think you have to deal with all of them, 
because, look, the nature of the way you do this process is 
that it requires difficult decisions. And every time that you 
have to make cuts, every time you have to deal with spending 
programs it is, instead of going directly at it, if you can 
find a way around it that is what happens. That is the way we 
operate. And as I said, I have been part of that.
    And so I can remember once as OMB Director I had 
recommended as OMB Director that--it was about $8 billion, and 
I recommended that on the transportation bill, instead of 
allowing for people to add new projects to the appropriations 
bill, that they would have to be authorized by the 
Transportation Committee.
    Well, it was somebody named Bob Byrd on the Senate side who 
did not like that because he was able to pave a lot of West 
Virginia based on the appropriations bill. And so Bob Byrd 
called, called the President, and said, ``You know, Mr. 
President, I am not going to be able to support your budget if 
you include that provision.''
    So the President called me and suddenly I was $8 billion in 
the hole. And so I told the people at OMB, ``Where can we go to 
come up with $8 billion?'' And we found some additional savings 
in different places. But I still got down to I think it was 
about $3 billion to $4 billion.
    And finally I looked at my economist and I said, ``Look at 
that growth number and figure out if maybe a half percent on 
growth might be added.'' And that took care of the problem.
    So, yeah, you are in a box, you turn to those gimmicks. The 
problem is it erodes the system. It erodes the honesty of the 
process. Sometimes you get to a date, and it is the end of 
September, and if you can move that payment to the 1st of 
October you can save money in that year. It is phony, but it is 
the game that is played.
    So I think if you are serious, I would look at each of 
those gimmicks to try to make sure that they are not being used 
because it is dishonest. It is dishonest.
    Mr. Obey. If I could just make a point on that, backing up 
what Leon says about dishonesty.
    Jim Jones' portrait is hanging here on the wall. He is from 
the same State that you are and that I was born in, Okmulgee. 
And he had a big confrontation with President Reagan on the 
budget in 1981. And when the time was approaching to vote on 
the budget, at that point Jim Jones thought he had it won 
because his budget resolution produced a smaller deficit than 
Ronald Reagan's.
    So what happened was that over a 10-day period the Reagan 
administration simply decided that they were going to change 
some of their economic assumptions.
    And so then when we returned to town, lo and behold, all of 
a sudden the low dollar man in terms of the deficit was Ronald 
Reagan, not Jim Jones, and that is why Jim Jones lost the vote 
that turned control of the floor and the Congress over to the 
minority.
    My point being, that is my basic objection to the Budget 
Act as it stands. It forces Members of Congress to focus so 
much on details and gimmicks rather than determining what their 
basic values are and how they are going to deal with them. And 
sometimes we function a whole lot better on an informal basis 
than we do if we have to meet artificial targets that require 
us to do artificial things.
    And I would just show you one thing. I have got an old 
chart which I held up on the House floor during that 1981 
debate, and what it showed was the projection.
    The deficits under Gramm-Rudman I for fiscal year 1985 to 
1990, the deficits were projected to go from $172 billion to 
zero in 1990.
    Instead, they went from $212 billion to $220 billion. Most 
of that was simply due to games that were played on economic 
estimates and assumptions.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Yarmuth.
    Representative Yarmuth. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    And thanks to both of you for sharing your experience and 
wisdom with us.
    Mr. Obey, I remember well during my first two terms here 
when you were chairman of Appropriations, and you were during 
certain seasons the most popular person in the House, because 
everybody was trying to get their congressionally directed 
investments, also known as earmarks, approved.
    We haven't really had much discussion in this joint 
committee about earmarks. Would you both discuss what impact 
you think restoring earmarks might have in resolving some of 
the polarization, the conflicts that we have in the process 
now?
    Mr. Obey. Well, I am yes and no on it, because I have been 
in the middle of that fight for so long.
    The problem is that Congress ought to have the right to 
determine where money goes on a district-by-district basis to 
at least some degree. They shouldn't be able to decide it all, 
but if I represented my district for 42 years I think I had a 
hell of a lot better idea of what was needed for different 
communities than the OMB Director did.
    The problem is that that is true for 90 percent of the 
Members, but then you have always got 1 or 2 percent who foul 
the nest by getting greedy, by getting slippery, or sometimes 
even sleazy, and it gives the institution a bad name.
    So I guess what I would say is, in theory, I would like to 
see earmarks restored because that represents one manifestation 
of congressional power. But when I see what it does to the 
institution it is very hard for me to recommend that they 
restore those, if you can find some way.
    The other problem you have is when you start to explode the 
number of earmarks. The Labor-H bill went from zero earmarks to 
over 4,000 earmarks within a 4- or 5-year period. That eats up 
an enormous amount of staff time just checking out the project 
to make sure that somebody isn't pulling a fast one.
    And so it is a prerogative that the Congress ought to have, 
but I would rather look elsewhere for preserving the Congress' 
constitutional authority.
    Mr. Panetta. I am a supporter of allowing Members to do 
this, because I think Members are elected to represent their 
constituents. And if there is a need that your constituency 
faces, you ought to be able to have the opportunity to go to 
the key chairman and members of a committee and justify 
providing funding for that particular effort. I think that is 
part and parcel of your responsibility as a representative of 
the people.
    There are ways to try to check this. I think the reason 
earmarks became such a target is because they got out of 
control. Huge numbers were added to certain bills. I think they 
created real problems. Some of those earmarks were unjustified. 
That created real problems.
    But I think if you have a limited number and you have 
greater transparency in what is included in earmarks so the 
public knows what is a part of it, I think there is a way to do 
this.
    And I have to tell you. From the approach of running this 
place, from the approach of being in the administration as 
chief of staff trying to be able to get things done up here, 
the ability to be able to focus on what somebody needs is a 
very important incentive to trying to urge that individual to 
do the right vote.
    And I think having given that up has really hurt both the 
leadership and it has hurt the ability of administrations to be 
able to work their will on the Hill.
    Representative Yarmuth. I appreciate that.
    Mr. Obey. I agree with that, too. Let me just one point. 
One of our problems is we know so many things that ain't so. 
And the number one project that got Congress into trouble on 
earmarks was the Bridge to Nowhere.
    But guess what? Number one, that was not done by the 
Appropriations Committee, it was done by the authorizing 
committee. Number two, the money that went to that bridge came 
out of Alaska's share, it didn't come out of anybody else's. So 
the Congress took a real beating for stuff that wasn't so.
    Representative Yarmuth. Thank you very much.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Blunt.
    Senator Blunt. I am no expert on the Bridge to Nowhere, but 
I think number three is it actually went somewhere, under the 
circumstances you mentioned.
    Not much good said about the Senate. The Senate is designed 
to be a disappointing institution, and we fulfill that.
    But I appreciate Co-Chairman Lowey's comments that we have 
tried this year. We got all of our bills out of the committee 
by the end of June, moving those bills in packages. We don't 
have a lot of history here in recent years. Somebody could walk 
off the field at any moment.
    But not allowing the appropriations process to become the 
authorizing process is important. There are times when 
authorizers and appropriators and everybody else agrees this is 
a moving vehicle, this is something that needs to be done, this 
is the moment to do it.
    And then the other comment that Congresswoman Lowey made is 
she is leaving here to go to a conference committee.
    Co-Chair Lowey. It cancelled.
    Senator Blunt. Now this is a much more unique thing than it 
would have been a decade ago, the idea of going to a conference 
committee.
    And to go back to my other comment, anybody could walk off 
the field at any moment. And Congresswoman Lowey said the 
committee meeting was just canceled. But we both voted to go to 
conference, and we are ready to go to conference. And maybe 
some experience.
    Part of the problem is we haven't had a real number since 
the Budget Control Act. And I think both of you have addressed 
that in different ways. You have to have some agreed-to number 
to know how you are starting.
    So one reason this year might work better than last year is 
last year we weren't shooting with real bullets until about 
November, when there is an agreement, okay, here is the real 
number we are going to use.
    The whole process, the budget process, the spending 
process, the entire process is based on we know so much that 
isn't so, like Congressman Obey just said, we know this is not 
going to work out this way, makes it really hard to get in and 
do the work that we need to do.
    A couple of thoughts. One, I don't think it is coincidental 
that the real breakdown in the process ended about the same 
time Members didn't have anything to go home and specifically 
talk about.
    What about the idea that Senator Byrd objected to that you 
can only appropriate things that were authorized, with the 
transportation caveat? But would that be a way back to where 
Members had more reasons to talk about what they had voted for 
than we currently give them?
    Mr. Panetta. I think it is important. I did it as OMB 
Director, frankly, I did it as chairman of the Budget 
Committee, was to really stress the importance of the 
authorizers to do their job in authorizing particular spending, 
rather than having the Appropriations Committee have to totally 
carry that ball and have to deal with unauthorized projects of 
one kind or another.
    You know, the problem I see now is, as I said, when I was 
here every one of these committee rooms was working. There were 
subcommittees meeting, there were full committees meeting. You 
know, the committees I served on were having hearings. They 
were doing markup. They were in business.
    And, frankly, the chairmen of those committees and the 
ranking members would not have it any other way. The chairmen 
of the authorizing committees said: You damn well are not going 
to move this through appropriation because it is my 
jurisdiction.
    That is the way it used to operate, and that has broken 
down, and I think it has made the problem that much worse.
    Senator Blunt. I want to get to calendar year. One of your 
recommendations was we would have more time if we worked on the 
calendar year rather than the current fiscal year. I would like 
both of you to comment on that.
    That is your recommendation. So, Congressman Obey, do you 
want to start? Would that make this process work any better 
than where we currently are?
    Mr. Obey. I don't really care. What I care about is whether 
or not you can get your work done.
    Senator Blunt. Right.
    Mr. Obey. And I just think that if you eliminated the 
budget, the necessity to pass the budget resolution, if you 
went back to the old system of simply informal agreements 
between the leadership and the committees about how much ought 
to be spent on this, that in that area, you would have a lot 
more time to deal with appropriations. I think that would be a 
bigger change.
    Senator Blunt. So you would buy that extra 3 months by just 
eliminating the budget process.
    Mr. Obey. Yeah. And if you want to do it, if you want to do 
the additional, or if you want to move the date, as well, I 
don't care. I don't know if it would help or hurt. But I do 
know that right now we are spending a hell of a lot of time on 
an institutional press release that doesn't spend a dime.
    Senator Blunt. Secretary Panetta.
    Mr. Panetta. You know, I mean, I understand David's point. 
And, frankly, at that time Appropriations, Ways and Means, I 
think there was a process that they abided by.
    But the reality is that you are now operating in a 
situation where you are facing trillion-dollar deficits. You 
have got a $20 trillion debt that is going to explode in the 
outyears, all of the projections say what is going to happen.
    And I don't think you can do this just simply by 
Appropriations and Ways and Means because of the tough 
decisions that are going to be necessary in order to put this 
back on the right track. That is the problem.
    Appropriations is not going to do that on their own. They 
don't deal with mandatory. And Ways and Means is not going to 
do what they have to do without some kind of mandate from the 
budget process in terms of reconciliation the way it is 
supposed to work.
    So I think the reason you have got to put a better process 
in place in terms of the budget is to try to deal with the 
challenges we are facing as a country in terms of trying to 
ultimately put this country on a better fiscal track over the 
next 5 to 10 years. You are going to need that kind of budget.
    I know how appropriations operates on a year-to-year basis. 
I know how Ways and Means operates on a year-to-year basis. But 
the bottom line is you are not going to deal with the elements 
of the budget that have to be dealt with in order to improve 
our fiscal situation without having at least a committee that 
looks at the whole picture.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Bennet.
    Senator Bennet. I guess I would like to start where you 
ended.
    First of all, I wonder whether either of you would be 
willing to run for Congress again, based on your testimony? And 
while you are considering your answer to that let me ask this 
question.
    After 10 years of budget press releases and cliffs and 
wasting money for the Defense Department and shutting the 
government down, all in the name of fiscal responsibility, we 
find ourselves in a place where next year, I guess, we are 
going to collect about just under 17 percent of our GDP in 
revenue and we are going to spend almost 21 percent spending as 
a percentage of GDP.
    That will provoke, create the largest deficit that we have 
had as a percentage of GDP in the Nation's history outside of a 
war or recession.
    And, Secretary Panetta, you mentioned earlier that the way 
you see it, it is either management by crisis or by leadership. 
Leadership is better than crisis. But there is not a lot of 
leadership around here, and I am really worried about a crisis.
    And I wonder whether you could both sort of help us 
understand what the conditions are, the political conditions, 
you are both politicians, what they need to be for us to 
actually address this issue, grapple with this issue in a 
meaningful and responsible way, what the process, Leon, looks 
like that you are talking about really. I mean, if you were 
here, what would it look like to drive a budget agreement that 
dealt not just with discretionary but mandatory spending, as 
well?
    And then finally, if you could each just say a word about 
what it would mean for Members to actually take back some 
responsibility from leadership. There are a lot of us that have 
worked here throughout a time when there has not been any 
opportunity for Members to make decisions about the kind of 
things you are talking about.
    So any perspective on any of that I would appreciate.
    Mr. Panetta. Well, that is the issue that I really struggle 
with, which is, how can this place get back to governing? And 
in many ways that is the bottom line. You are elected to 
govern. You are not elected to come back here and pound your 
shoe on the table and simply play politics. You are elected to 
come back here to govern. And governing involves some tough 
decisions.
    And the issue is, how can we get back to that? Because I am 
not so sure, frankly.
    When I was here, governing was good politics. It made sense 
for me to come back here and work, even if it was a Republican 
administration, a Republican President or a Democratic 
President.
    If we governed and did what we thought was necessary, found 
the right consensus, found compromise, got things done, even 
though my constituents might not always agree with my 
positions, they knew we were governing and running the country.
    I am not so sure right now that governing is considered 
good politics as opposed to stopping the other side from doing 
what they want to do.
    You guys are engaged in trench warfare up here. You are in 
your trenches, and you are fighting this war, and you are 
throwing grenades at one another, and every once in a while you 
come out of there. You are worried about somebody shooting you 
in the back if you try to negotiate something. And so nobody 
wants to go into no man's land, so you stay in the trenches.
    How do you get break that? How do you get back to 
governing? That really requires tough leadership that is going 
to have to take risks.
    Look, when David and I were here it was not only the 
leadership. I mean, look, Tip O'Neill and Bob Michel used to 
kick the hell out of us if we didn't get the budget resolution 
done. They backed us up on tough enforcement. Tip used to 
constantly say, ``When are you getting the budget resolution 
done? We need it done.'' And they were pushing, they were 
pushing, and backed it up.
    And so you need to have that leadership at all levels. We 
had chairmen, strong chairmen at the time, people like 
Rostenkowski, people like John Dingell.
    And let me tell you something, these were not chairman who 
just kind of sat back and waited to see what the hell the 
budget was going to give them. They basically used to come to 
me and say, ``What the hell are you up to? What are you 
doing?''
    And I had to visit every chairman. When I was budget 
chairman, I visited every chairman to try to make sure that 
they were informed of what was going to happen, because 
otherwise that chairman had the power to throw the whole damn 
thing off track.
    So because there was leadership at those key levels and all 
of them wanted--I mean, they thought--it was abhorrent if we 
didn't pass a budget resolution. I mean, Tip O'Neill, Tom 
Foley, everybody was on my butt in order to make sure we got 
it. They cared about that.
    If that is not there, if that pressure is not there, if 
everybody sees that you can take shortcuts in the process, it 
is not going to happen under any circumstance.
    The other thing, very frankly, is you need a President of 
the United States who cares about this stuff. I mean, if a 
President of the United States really cares about this stuff 
and is willing to convene bipartisan leadership to focus on the 
tough choices that need to be made and is there to back it up, 
let me tell you something, then you will see things happen.
    George Bush made the pledge, ``Read my lips, no new 
taxes.'' And I remember as Budget chair he asked me to come up 
and talk to him after he soon got elected. And I said, ``You 
know, Mr. President, let me tell you something. You are not 
going to be able to stick by that, because the deficits are 
going up, and you are going to have to confront that.''
    And he said to me, ``Frankly, look, I can't back away from 
that now, but there will be a point at which we will have to 
sit down and negotiate an approach.''
    And to his credit, it was tough for him. I understand the 
politics of this stuff. It was tough. But he was willing to go 
ahead and negotiate, Republicans, Democrats, and that is what 
led us to the 1990 budget agreement.
    It took courage. It took courage. You know, he may well 
have paid a price for that. But you guys are elected to 
exercise leadership. And I think, unless you bring those 
ingredients to bear, Members on their own are not going to 
touch this stuff because it is volatile.
    You are not going to deal with entitlements. You are not 
going to deal with raising taxes. You are not going to deal 
with all of the issues you have to deal with, because it is 
trouble. Doing that on your own, it would be nuts.
    But if you knew you had the cover of leadership, and you 
knew that there were people that were going to protect you in 
making these tough decisions, then there are Members that are 
willing to walk that line. But if that is not there, this is 
tough to do.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Ernst.
    Mr. Obey. If I could just comment on something Leon said.
    My problem with all of this is that we are all talking 
about what we do on the process and in order to solve a 
political problem. The problem the country is facing is not 
process, it is political. It is political. It is political. And 
everything else is just avoidance. You can't deal with the real 
problem on this committee.
    Start with districting. I was elected for 42 years from a 
52 percent Democratic district. That meant that I had plenty of 
incentives to try to find independent votes and some Republican 
votes on a good day, and that is what it took to get elected in 
a district like that.
    Today we have got too damn many 72 percent districts rather 
than 52 percent districts. And as a result there are no 
incentives to legislate. There are no incentives to compromise.
    Do you think Joe McDade could do today what he did with me 
when I got him to agree to a bipartisan 302(b) allocation out 
of Appropriations? Do you think Joe McDade could do that today 
without having his head handed to him? Like hell. No way on 
God's green earth that he could do that.
    Do you think that I proposing a joint 302(b) allocation 
back in those days in 1994, do you think I could do that under 
this atmosphere today? I sincerely doubt it. So you have got 
the districting problem.
    And then you have got campaign finance. The major reason I 
retired--I love this place--but the major reason I retired is 
that I knew in a 52 percent district I was going to have to 
spend all of my time being a glorified telemarketer raising 
dollars, and that is the last damned thing in the world I 
wanted to do when I came here.
    And so it is what the political system is doing to 
everything else. We are not attacking the Medicare. We are not 
attacking healthcare in a constructive way. Parties are looking 
for a way to one-up everybody else. And you have got to have 
some incentives built into the system or it is just a bunch of 
high-minded talk that isn't going to get us anywhere.
    So you have got to look beyond the process issues, and then 
if you could somehow change the political atmosphere process 
will take care of itself, because Archy the Cockroach is right. 
What counts is not what system you have, what counts is what 
you do with whatever kind of system you happen to have.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Ernst.
    Senator Ernst. Thank you to our witnesses today. It has 
been really good to hear from both of you.
    And I appreciate, Secretary, your words on leadership and 
courage and assuming that risk. And the issue that faces this 
committee, though, is what do you do in the absence of 
leadership?
    So we are tasked with coming up with a plan that will move 
our Congress forward. And so a number of different discussions 
have gone on here. You both have laid out different ideas on 
how we could reform the process if the process is to be 
reformed.
    Mr. Obey, you mentioned the incentives. Sometimes those 
motivating factors can be punitive, as well. And one of the 
things that we have talked about as far as incentives for 
Congress to get their work done is to perhaps withhold Members' 
pay, their recess, travel, until we get a budget in place.
    Because no matter what process we have in place, I don't 
care what it is, I am going tell you, and you know this, 
Members of Congress are always going to find a way around that 
system. And we will end up with CRs, we will end up with other 
gimmicks.
    What do you think about those ideas, no budget, no pay, no 
budget no recess? Could you both maybe talk a little bit about 
those ideas?
    Mr. Obey. What do I think of those ideas? Not much.
    Senator Ernst. Can you expound?
    Mr. Obey. I don't really think I need to. I mean, if you 
are a freshman legislator in the House of Representatives and 
you come in here, and the institution fails and doesn't produce 
a product, why should that individual Member pay the price for 
the idiocy of the institution? I don't think they should.
    Senator Ernst. Secretary.
    Mr. Panetta. I know all the thoughts about trying to force 
doing what is right. This is a cycle we always go through. I 
remember when I was on the Budget Committee that same kind of 
politics as now. Republicans didn't want to raise taxes. 
Democrats didn't want to cut entitlements or spending.
    And so if people weren't willing to confront those issues, 
then everybody was thinking: What is the shortcut here? How can 
we do this without having to really face those tough decisions?
    And so people were coming up, obviously, with a balanced 
budget amendment for the Constitution. I mean, Gramm-Rudman was 
basically the shortcut. I mean, Gramm-Rudman basically said 
let's just set this path and cut the hell out of everything in 
order to stick to that path. Well, it is one way to do it, but 
the problem is Congress never stuck to it. And so we always 
found a way around it.
    I think, frankly, the greater key is to, if you come to a 
decision on this joint committee to establish some changes or 
reforms, then I think it is absolutely essential for the 
leadership to require that you abide by those changes. And I 
think they are the ones that are going to have to push Members 
to then take the steps necessary to get it done.
    That is the best way it works, is to have them lean on the 
people that have to do the right job. And they have ways to 
basically be able to twist arms. They have to do it every day.
    And there has to be, I think, peer pressure that basically 
comes at play here so that everybody is pushing to adhere to 
it.
    I think if you establish penalties of one kind or another 
the problem is that not only will Members feel that that really 
is overstepping the line in terms of hurting them, but more 
importantly, what will happen is they will find other shortcuts 
to trying to get the job done, because then their pay or 
whatever will be on the line so they will find another 
shortcut.
    I think what you want to do is find a way to make sure they 
stick by the process.
    Mr. Obey. Let me just say, there is an assumption here, I 
think, that the leadership is always going to do well. 
Sometimes the leadership is incredibly ignorant on specific 
problems facing committees. I will tell you one story.
    Bill Young, when Bill was chairman of the House 
Appropriations Committee and I was ranking member, Bill and I 
were very close. I really loved him.
    And he came up to me one day, he said, ``I just got to talk 
to somebody. You have no idea what just happened to me.''
    I said, ``What is that?''
    He said, ``I was in my office, and the phone rang, and it 
was Speaker Hastert. And he said, 'Bill, we have got a 
rebellion on our hands and I need to talk to you about it 
quick. We need you to come right down here to my office.'"
    So Bill went down, he walked into the Speaker's office, and 
the Speaker said, ``Bill, we have got a number of our junior 
Members here and they are upset with no progress, and they are 
demanding that we move appropriation bills. How soon can you 
start moving those damn appropriation bills?''
    And Bill looked at him and said, ``Well, Mr. Speaker, first 
I have to have an allocation.''
    And the Speaker said, ``What is an allocation?''
    The way this place needs to work, political parties have a 
very legitimate role to play. But the kind of politics I was 
taught was that the leaders of both parties would decide the 
direction they wanted to take their caucuses and their parties 
nationally. They would decide what direction they wanted to 
take, and they would put together their ideas on how to do it.
    Then you bring it into the Congress. And then what the 
committees are supposed to do is to leaven that product with 
the knowledge that individual committee members have picked up 
through years of working to understand this stuff.
    And there is an advantage if you have got somebody who has 
been on Labor-H for 12 years and knows, really knows how NIH 
works. Committees are supposed to be able to know enough to 
persuade the leadership to modify their product so that it will 
stand the test of political reality when it hits the newspapers 
and when it hits the floor.
    And so you need a balance. You need a balance between 
strong leadership also needs to be informed leadership, and 
then also super informed committee members who know enough 
about these individual programs to know what is a good idea and 
what isn't. And maybe you ought to modify the Speaker's pet 
project in order to make it saleable.
    I am proud of the fact that in the years I was chairman 
Nancy Pelosi never ordered me to do anything. If she wanted me 
to do something she would come in and she would be mighty 
persuasive.
    But in the end if I said, ``Nancy, I am sorry, but here is 
why I can't do this,'' she would listen. She might not like it 
and she might raise hell with me and ask me to change my mind, 
but she respected my knowledge and I respected her obligations 
and her knowledge.
    Senator Ernst. And I appreciate the input. If I could just 
wrap that up, I do believe that we will find a way around any 
process if there isn't something that is forcing us because of 
all the things that you outlined with partisanship and so 
forth.
    So I do support having measures in place to force us to do 
our jobs because, unfortunately, with the dynamic we have right 
now we are not doing our jobs and we don't have the leadership 
that compels us to do our jobs.
    Thank you.
    Mr. Panetta. I think as long as you are thinking about 
that, I mean, I think, rather than kind of going after pay or 
what have you, I think trying to clearly set an approach that 
says legislation that does have a fiscal impact will go nowhere 
without a budget being approved. I think you need to turn to 
the process and what needs to be done, and then the price you 
pay is that you can't just simply find ways around it, avoiding 
the necessity for some kind of budget.
    Senator Ernst. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Co-Chair Womack. Thank you, Senator.
    Mr. Kilmer.
    Representative Kilmer. Thanks, Chairman.
    Thanks for being with us.
    Maybe, Mr. Panetta, I will start with you. I am struck that 
process changes and enforcement mechanisms only really work 
when they are implementing and enforcing policies for which 
there is a bipartisan political consensus, and when there is 
not that political consensus they break down.
    So at one of our prior hearings Maya MacGuineas was here 
and talked about ways you could increase the transparency and 
awareness of some of the fiscal challenges that you have spoken 
so eloquently to.
    One of the suggestions that she spoke to was having some 
sort of a fiscal State of the Nation address where the GAO or 
the Comptroller General would come in and actually lay out some 
of our long-term fiscal challenges. I wanted to get your 
impression of that.
    Mr. Panetta. Well, I think those are all good ideas. I 
think having some kind of summary or some kind of report or 
message with regards to our fiscal health is important.
    But, frankly, that is the responsibility of the President 
of the United States. And we have not really in recent years 
had Presidents address this country on the fiscal crisis that 
we are facing, largely because Presidents are like everybody 
else, that would interrupt their ability to get the money that 
they want to get for the spending that they want to do.
    And so there are very few Presidents in recent years who 
have really spoken clearly to the American people about the 
kind of crisis we are confronting. And I think the result is 
that everybody then thinks you can tiptoe past the graveyard, 
and nobody pays attention to the level of crisis that we are 
confronting.
    And one of the reasons we were able to pass the 1990 budget 
agreement and the 1993 budget agreement was because Ross Perot 
in his campaign made this an issue. You need to have at a 
national level somebody who is willing to address the crisis we 
are confronting.
    Representative Kilmer. Mr. Obey, I enjoyed reading your 
testimony and the references to Archy the Cockroach made me go 
on Amazon and buy ``Raising Hell for Justice.''
    So I had already read ``Worthy Fights,'' for what it is 
worth, Mr. Secretary.
    I wanted to echo the observations of Chairman Lowey. You 
have seen this interesting dynamic this year where the Senate 
has committed to a bipartisan process, agree on 302(b)'s, not 
having the partisan riders, a very different process than the 
House. I got an opportunity to think a lot about process reform 
during our 13th hour of markup last night.
    I am struck that the Senate hasn't been more successful in 
finding success because of rules or process, but because they 
have made a commitment to a bipartisan and consensus bill 
process.
    Now, having said that, in your testimony you made reference 
to reconstituting the Budget Committee so that it more 
accurately reflects sort of the realities of what is coming out 
of Ways and Means and of what is coming out of approps. I was 
hoping you could just speak a bit more about why you think that 
would improve the budget process.
    This is for you, Mr. Obey.
    Mr. Obey. Well, I think there is a very good reason why the 
Senate appears to be working in a more bipartisan way than the 
House is on this stuff, and it is called districting. It is the 
way the lines are drawn.
    If you are in the Senate you represent the whole mixture of 
pressures and counterpressures in a State. If you are in a 
House, and if your legislature has drafted it so that Democrats 
and the Republicans are super safe, then they don't have any 
pressure to compromise.
    In fact, the pressure is just the opposite. If you pull a 
Joe McDade and try to work out a compromise with Dave Obey, you 
are going to get skinned by your hard right. And if you are 
Obey trying to work out a compromise with McDade, the same 
thing might happen.
    So, I mean, we can talk all we want about these little 
issues. They are all around the edge issues as far as I am 
concerned. What counts in the end is what kind of incentives 
you have in the system besides human nature. What kind of 
system do you have built into the system to pressure people to 
do what is for the good of the order. And the only way you get 
that is to change, redistricting. I think you also need to 
counterweight the incredible role of money in this place.
    And, thirdly, you have got to have a party leadership who 
is going to pull the main single issue groups in your umbrella 
into your office and tell them to go to hell, that you are 
going to do what is right and you need their help to do what is 
right, and if they want to hit you with their priorities after 
A, B, and C are done, fine, but until then to hell with you.
    I mean, until you get that kind of approach from our 
leaders, until they mean it, and until the involved citizens of 
this country decide that it is more important to get something 
done than to have me win all the time, we are just going to be 
going nowhere.
    This is a crisis. Yes, the debt and the deficit is a 
serious problem, but it is not the crisis that we have with the 
crisis of confidence in the political system right now. That is 
the real crisis. And I don't see much real work being done on 
that.
    Representative Kilmer. Thanks, Chairman. I yield back.
    Co-Chair Womack. Senator Perdue.
    Senator Perdue. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    I would like to thank both the co-chairs for these 
outstanding witnesses today. And I so respect their 
contributions, their careers.
    And I thank you both for being here today. It has been very 
fascinating.
    I have only been in the Senate 3 years. I am on the Budget 
Committee. I come from a business world where this conversation 
is alien to me. I mean, we fund things. We do budgets like 
breathing. You have to.
    Biennial? I don't know any corporations that do biennial. I 
know a couple States do.
    The last 3 years we have been looking at best practices of 
other countries, States, and companies, and I can't find 
anybody that has a budget resolution that is not a law, leads 
to an authorization that really hasn't been done in two 
decades, and then an appropriation process.
    I believe, frankly, after looking at this in depth--and I 
want to get your opinion on two questions very quickly, and I 
will get to it very quickly--I think this whole process was 
doomed the day the 1974 Budget Act was enacted. It has never 
worked. It can't work. It will never work. It has only funded 
the government on time four times in 44 years.
    And, Secretary, I think 2 of those years were on your watch 
in the nineties. There were 2 years in the seventies right 
after it was enacted. Other than that, we have always used 
continuing resolutions. As matter of fact, we used 177 
continuing resolutions in those 44 years.
    And actually, and we don't write about this much, but 
Congress has actually shut the government down 20 times during 
that period of time.
    Now, you talk about breeding confidence with the 
electorate. I am sorry, but that just doesn't do it.
    So my question is twofold. I think there are two levels of 
issues here. One is, how do we fund the government on time 
without all this drama without the use of CRs? That is the 
primary focus of this committee.
    But you both bring up the second dimension of this, and 
that is dealing with this debt crisis. I thank you so much for 
calling it a crisis because sometimes up here we just kind of 
skip past the graveyard here on this thing.
    How do you ever get at the spending issue if you don't 
really consider all of your expenses? Let me be a little more 
direct. And I would like, Chairman, you, and, Secretary, both 
address this, if you will. We spent $4.3 trillion this year in 
total expenses. About 1.3 of that is discretion. The balance of 
that is mandatory.
    By definition, in the Senate the Finance Committee is in 
charge of Social Security and Medicare, and so in theory you 
think, well, okay they are in charge of mandatory expenses. But 
they never really get looked at by the definition of mandatory.
    So the question is, how in the world should we be thinking 
about--I don't know any other budget process in the world that 
doesn't budget its full expenses. And it forces you then to 
look at the withholding equation on the revenue side, on Social 
Security, the same thing on the Medicare side.
    We are told the Medicare trust fund goes to zero now in 8 
years. I don't know any other better definition of a crisis 
than that.
    Help me understand how we are going to ever solve this if 
the budget authorization and funding process, appropriation 
process, only deals with 25, 30 percent of what we spend. And 
how would you recommend we think about that, Secretary?
    Mr. Panetta. Well, you can't do it. You can't do it. You 
are not going to solve the problem facing this country unless 
you deal with all aspects of the budget. That is the reality. 
And people have tried to avoid dealing with certain aspects of 
it. And so the result is that it distorts the process.
    I mean, the idea that you can--you increase defense, leave 
mandatories alone, and simply go at it through the 
discretionary accounts, you know, you are kidding yourself in 
terms of whether or not that is going to deal with the larger 
crisis that you are confronting.
    So it seems to me that if--I mean, if the budget process is 
going to count for anything, the only justification for the 
budget process is that it looks at that bigger picture.
    And that should be the responsibility of the Budget 
Committee, to look at that bigger picture and where we are 
headed and then to deal with each of those elements. What are 
we doing on discretionary spending? What are we doing on 
defense spending? What are we doing on mandatory spending?
    I mean, I think mandatories, frankly, ought to be part of 
the budget process, and looking at the different mandatory 
programs. How they are being spent? What kind of trouble are 
they in? How effective are they? Because a lot of this stuff on 
autopilot has been going on for years without taking the time 
to really look at the elements of it. So that ought to be part 
of it.
    And, very frankly, revenues have to be part of that, as 
well. There is a revenue part of the budget that is extremely 
important to the entire picture.
    You have to look at all of that. And the only way you are 
going to be able to address the level of crisis that we are now 
confronting, and it is like a business, you can't run a 
business and not look at every aspect of your costs in that 
business.
    And if you do that you can get the costs down. Tough 
decisions. You may have to fire people. You may have to do 
things that cost you money. They are tough decisions. But that 
is what running a business is all about.
    Well, the same thing is true here. You want to run the 
country, you are going to have to make some tough decisions on 
these issues.
    And it is the process of avoiding those tough decisions 
over these last 12 or 15 years that has gotten us into deeper 
trouble. It is easy to spend money in this place. It is easy to 
cut taxes in this place. But when you have to pay the piper, 
when you have got to say what are we doing to the deficit, what 
are we doing to the taxpayers in this country, then people try 
to find a way around that responsibility, that accountability.
    And somehow, unless we get back to that larger process of 
looking at the larger picture, we are going to continue to try 
to find ways to get around the responsibilities that we have.
    Mr. Obey. I guess what I would say is that we need to 
remember that there is no requirement in a democracy for a 
happy ending. There just isn't. And we aren't going to have a 
happy ending unless we recognize that some fundamental things 
have to change. And I go right back to redistricting.
    I think it is modestly possible for the Senate in the end 
to tackle these issues. I think it is highly unlikely that the 
House will be able to successfully attack these issues so long 
as you have the same people coming here time after time.
    It used to be fun to solve problems. I mean, when I chaired 
the Foreign Operations Subcommittee, and Nita was a member of 
the subcommittee then, when we went to conference the Senate 
chair was Bob Kasten from my own State. And before we sat down 
in conference I sat down with my staff, and the very first 
question I always asked was, ``What does Bob have to have in 
the end in order to sign up?'' And we would work from that 
point.
    When I became chairman I was naive enough to think, ``Aha, 
now that I have got the gavel I can do things my way.'' No way. 
I mean, I discovered that the job of a chairman is to find that 
point at which you get 218 votes. That is the job of a 
chairman. And then secondarily, if he can also in the process 
push his values and his favored programs, that is a bonus. But 
first you have to get things done.
    And so until we change the basics I don't see how we get 
there. I wish I did. I know that political consultants will say 
never leave them with a downer. I am sorry, I see the downers 
right now, and I wish I didn't.
    Senator Perdue. Thank you.
    Co-Chair Womack. Representative Woodall.
    Representative Woodall. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    And thank you all both for being here. I was a young 
staffer during both of your tenures here.
    I remember just as much color from you, Chairman Obey, on 
the floor then as you are giving us today. I thank you for 
that.
    I stare at your picture, Mr. Secretary, day in and day out 
on this committee.
    I appreciate in your opening that you said we actually have 
a responsibility as a joint committee, not just an opportunity. 
I have always thought of it as an opportunity, but the truth is 
we do have a responsibility to get something done.
    The biggest disappointment of my short congressional career 
was the supercommittee that had an opportunity to look at every 
single dollar of government spending, take it directly to the 
floor to avoid the politics that you all have both talked 
about, and they couldn't find a single dollar on which they 
agreed.
    I wanted to focus on that just for a moment, coming from a 
regular order appropriations process. Coming from both an 
Article I and an Article II spot as you do, Mr. Secretary, what 
do you think about that supercommittee process, where you say 
we are going to try to bring together some thought leaders and 
we are going to bypass the regular committee process and send 
some tough decisions directly to the floor if the authorizers 
are failing to handle it on their own?
    Mr. Panetta. Look, I always thought as Budget chairman that 
it was our responsibility to make those tough decisions. And 
the fortunate thing is at the time I had the broad support of 
leadership, the President, and others, to be able to take those 
steps.
    I also understand that that may be impossible right now, 
particularly as far as the House is concerned. I don't think it 
is impossible in terms of the Senate, but I think it is 
impossible in terms of the House.
    And for that reason I was a little bit--I was concerned 
that when Simpson-Bowles made their recommendations--and the 
President asked me about that. And I said, ``You ought to 
endorse what Simpson-Bowles did.'' Because, very frankly, it is 
bipartisan. Tough decisions were made. I think you might not 
agree with all the recommendations in it.
    But I think it is important to endorse the process. And he 
was concerned about some of the particular recommendations. I 
understand that.
    But I think you may have reached the point where you may 
need to have a Simpson-Bowles-type commission, be able to make 
recommendations that deal with each of the areas I just talked 
about, because I don't see that happening otherwise. And, very 
frankly, unless you have those decisions in place, I am not 
sure that process alone is going to get you there.
    Representative Woodall. I look around at particularly the 
newer Members who are here. They came because of the sense of 
urgency that you all both describe. And I see lots of Members 
that would be pleased to cast that deciding vote. If all they 
had to trade for the future security of the country was the job 
that they have today, they would happily trade it away.
    I have always said the happiest folks on Capitol Hill were 
the Democrats who lost their job over the Affordable Care Act. 
What a small price to pay for doing something that you thought 
was going to move the country in the right direction.
    But thinking about doing big things, 1983 Social Security 
amendments. No one was poor-mouthing those changes. Raised 
taxes, reduced benefits, raised ages, did all the tough things, 
but everybody was on board collectively, and so we all were 
touting our successes as a body and as a Nation instead of bad-
mouthing them.
    You mentioned, Mr. Secretary, what Ross Perot did to allow 
the 1993 Reconciliation Act, but as I remember that act, there 
was not one Republican vote for that on the House side, it was 
strictly a partisan bill.
    I go back and look at the budgets that you were able to 
move through the House. Time and time again not a single 
Republican vote on the floor of the House.
    We sometimes talk about the good old days as if they were 
really pretty good, and the fact is this partisanship has been 
going on a long time.
    I value the three-step process, a budget where people can 
stake out a political vision, an authorizing process where 
perhaps I am going to overpromise because I don't actually have 
to come up with the dollars, and an appropriations process that 
now the rubber meets the road. It lets some political steam off 
the pot.
    In the name of process reform we have talked about reducing 
those steps. Chairman Obey recommended abolishing the Budget 
Committee in his opening comments. Tell me about how that 
lets--the potential for letting steam off the pot in a three-
step process versus the burning of time that could be used more 
productively elsewhere.
    Mr. Obey. Well, I don't see much to recommend the existing 
system. I mean, the problem you have, just look at Hal Rogers' 
problem when he took over for me as chairman of the committee. 
And take a look at the transportation bill which he tried to 
bring to the floor.
    I mean, that transportation bill contained the reductions 
that were necessary in order to meet the targets of the budget 
resolution or the assumptions of the budget resolution. And 
what happened to him? He got chewed up alive. I mean, because 
in my view the Budget Committee overreached.
    It is easy to do that. If you come up with a bright idea, 
it is easy if somebody else has to implement it, because you 
can only squawk about the imperfections of the latter guy's 
style that were to blame. That is not what the problem is.
    In my view, the Budget Committee in recent years has 
overreached because they thought it was more possible--or it 
was possible to do more than, in fact, was possible.
    I don't like supercommittees because the whole idea of 
committees in the first place is to take the people who know 
the most about a subject and put them to work on it. And 
usually with supercommittees you have got people who, as I said 
earlier, they can fly at 30,000 feet, but they don't have to 
then explain to granny in a nursing home why you are going to 
have your benefits shaved back this year.
    So to me what is most important first is to understand. We 
need a sense of balance. Yes, we have a budget deficit, and 
that is a serious problem. We also have an infrastructure 
deficit. We also have an education deficit, if you want to talk 
about education.
    I mean, the problem with the Bowles committee is that 
expectations around here before it was established, people 
would say, ``Oh, domestic discretionary, they are not the 
problem. They have already been cut.'' And then each time 
recommendations came up they cut further in domestic 
discretionary.
    So I just don't trust wise ones at the top who don't have 
to implement whatever reductions you are talking about. To me, 
I don't like the product that the Ways and Means Committee 
produced in this Congress, but at least they had a level of 
knowledge about it that is higher than a lot of people who 
would have been likely to be appointed to any commission to 
look at the same problems.
    Representative Woodall. Mr. Chairman, can I just ask, I 
know Mr. Obey is speaking with heart as an Article I servant. 
Could I just ask the Secretary whether or not he is giving us 
advice today on behalf of Article II or on behalf of Article I?
    Where does your heart sit, Mr. Secretary, having served at 
both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue?
    Mr. Panetta. You know, my view is that Article I and 
Article II both have to work together in order to govern the 
country. And if the President of the United States thinks that 
he is going to be able to get this done without a partnership 
with the Congress and the ability to get it done, then he is 
wrong, it ain't gonna happen. And if Congress thinks that 
somehow they can make this process work without the executive 
branch and working with him, I think that is also a mistake.
    I think what is missing in particular with these last few 
years, I mean, look, with Republican administrations that I 
worked with at the time that I was here, we had a very strong 
working relationship. I worked very closely with Dick Darman 
when he was OMB Director. I worked very closely with Jim Baker 
when he was operating out of the White House. And they would 
come up and we would sit down and we worked through these 
issues.
    And the ability to have that kind of partnership, the 
ability to have that kind of consultation is what makes our 
democracy run. And the inability to have that when you try to 
basically force your way through in a particular way, that is 
what undermines, I think, the effectiveness of our democracy.
    So you can make this process work if there is trust. I 
mean, the biggest problem right now is there is a lack of trust 
between the branches and between Members and between the people 
and this institution. There is a lack of trust. And, very 
frankly, if you don't have trust in our democracy it is not 
going to work.
    And somehow we have got to find a way to restore that 
trust. And the way you do that is by talking to one another, 
talking with people in authority, respecting who they are, 
listening to them, and then trying to figure out a way for both 
of you to be able to get it done. That is the way our 
Forefathers designed it, and that is the way it is supposed to 
be.
    Co-Chair Womack. Mr. Arrington.
    Representative Arrington. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Madam 
Chairwoman.
    I agree with Senator Perdue, our panelists have been 
outstanding. And the thought that reoccurs to me is with the 
wisdom and intellect and experience of all the folks that we 
have had come before this committee, if we can't at a minimum 
improve the process we are in deeper trouble than I even 
thought as a new Member.
    And by the way, Mr. Secretary, I really thoroughly enjoy 
working with your son Jimmy. He is one of those American first 
guys. He is a dad first. He is a Panetta first. Way before you 
get to being a Democrat.
    And I have to say as a new Member, I am encouraged with my 
cohorts who came to not just move the deck chairs around, but 
to fundamentally change the game up here for the American 
people.
    And so with that, it seems to me that whether you are 
trying to do what Senator Perdue articulated as our sort of 
first goal and get predictability and certainty in getting a 
budget out and funding the government or you are trying to have 
budget outcomes that somehow improve the position fiscally of 
this country and chip away at the deficit and debt.
    Either way, you have to acknowledge, as Chairman Obey 
mentioned earlier, that we don't have the political will 
collectively. I would like to think I do. I think everybody 
would like to raise their hand and say, ``Well, I do.'' But 
collectively, we know that we don't. Republicans don't. 
Democrats don't.
    So can we just start with that assumption, that we don't 
have the political will? And then and only then can you really 
get at solving both the process issue and the outcome issue. At 
least you have an opportunity to.
    Now, I think you first have to acknowledge, and I agree 
with Chairman Obey, there are structural issues with campaign 
finance, gerrymandering, I hate it. We can all kick around 
ideas how to change that. I would actually think, because we 
haven't fixed gerrymandering, I am a term limit guy, as well.
    There are lots of structural reforms to consider that I 
think would improve the behavior. I think most States, like the 
great State of Texas, work on a balanced budget because they 
have a forcing mechanism, the Balanced Budget Amendment to the 
Constitution.
    Now absent that, we have to come up with what Senator Ernst 
suggested in her discussion with you, and that is a forcing 
mechanism. It is the only way to do it. Let's just acknowledge 
the nature of the beast is what it is.
    I am trying to figure out how you can't be so squirrely in 
the process that whatever enforcement mechanism you put in 
place that you don't have some rule in the 11th hour where 
everybody can vote on it, nobody is accountable for it, the 
American people don't understand what happens, and we just keep 
on going down that path of destruction, sleepwalking, as they 
say, off this cliff.
    I would go back to her question. And you said something, 
and I am hopeful, because you had at least--something resonated 
with you in the way of an enforcement. No budget, no pay, no 
budget, no recess, I don't know if those will work, I am 
willing to try all of them.
    But no budget, no spend, no budget, no pass, no 
legislation, no spend, that has a fiscal impact. So you think 
that that might work. So we have got an issue, an item on the 
table for consideration. Would you expound on that?
    Mr. Panetta. Well, the way it operated was that in order 
for the authorizing committees to move spending legislation, in 
order for Appropriations to move their bills, there had to be a 
budget.
    And what happened was that as the Budget Committee failed 
to pass budget resolutions, then they came up with this trigger 
mechanism to basically assign levels to the Appropriations 
Committee to operate without a budget, and that bypassed the 
process.
    I think it is important to stick to the basic discipline of 
the process, which is pass a budget, and pass it by a certain 
date. And if it doesn't pass you are not going to move any 
legislation that has some kind of fiscal impact. And, frankly, 
appropriations committees ought not to move forward.
    Now, I understand the politics, if you are suddenly stuck 
and you can't do anything, then you find waivers, you find ways 
around it. I mean, that is the way we govern. But it really 
does require some degree of discipline. If you are going to 
establish any process, you have got to have the ability to try 
to stick to that discipline.
    And, look, the biggest problem here is none of these 
decisions that we are talking about are easy, and there isn't a 
process way to make them easy. They are very tough decisions.
    And the problem right now is I think most people in this 
institution would like to be able to somehow move the process 
without pissing off people. It doesn't work that way. You are 
going to have to offend people, with the decisions in the 
budget, with the decisions on discipline, you are going to have 
to do that. People don't like to take political risk.
    But I have never seen a leader in this institution--or, 
frankly, in the Presidency--I have never seen leader who has 
been able to lead and not take risks. And that is what you are 
going have to--that is probably the first principle that is 
going to have to apply here.
    Representative Arrington. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield 
back.
    Co-Chair Womack. I thank the gentleman.
    Thank you, Secretary Panetta, Chairman Obey, for appearing 
before us today.
    I want to advise members that they can submit written 
questions to be answered later in writing. They will be made 
part of the formal hearing. Any members wishing to submit 
questions or extraneous material may do so within 7 days.
    Now, this concludes our fifth public hearing and fulfills 
the Bipartisan Budget Act statutory requirement for this select 
complete to conduct at least five such hearings by November 30. 
While our requirement has been fulfilled, I believe there is 
value in exploring topics for additional hearings in the 
future.
    Looking back, I believe our hearings have been insightful. 
With each discussion I have been encouraged by the involvement 
and participation of our members and impressed by and grateful 
for the advice and testimony brought by the many outside 
witnesses, including the 25 of our colleagues who participated 
in Members Day.
    I am happy to report that bipartisan, bicameral consensus 
is steadily growing with our group of 16. In fact, a number of 
our members have already submitted their reform ideas for 
improving the budget and appropriations process, and I am 
encouraging all members to submit any ideas in writing to the 
co-chairs.
    While the statutory deadline for reporting our 
recommendations is the 30th of November, I have said from the 
beginning that the work drafting a proposal should begin sooner 
rather than later, and that time is now.
    With that said, starting this month the co-chair and I will 
begin working informal working sessions. All members are 
welcome and encouraged to attend. I am hopeful all members 
will. The mission of this panel is too important not to 
succeed, and your ideas and feedback garnered through our 
months of collective work are essential to that goal. So our 
staffs will be in touch regarding the pending schedule of these 
informal meetings.
    Once again to our witnesses this morning, Secretary 
Panetta, Chairman Obey, thank you so much for your insightful 
testimony here today.
    And with that, this hearing stands adjourned.
    [Whereupon, at 12:11 a.m., the committee was adjourned.]

                  Congressional Budget Office Briefing

                       Materials prepared for the

                         Joint Select Committee

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                               H.R. 7191

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115th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 7191

 To implement reforms to the budget and appropriations process in the 
                       House of Representatives.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                           November 29, 2018

Mr. Womack (for himself and Mr. Yarmuth) introduced the following bill; 
 which was referred to the Committee on the Budget, and in addition to 
 the Committee on Rules, for a period to be subsequently determined by 
the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall 
           within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
 To implement reforms to the budget and appropriations process in the 
                       House of Representatives.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE; TABLE OF CONTENTS.

    (a) Short Title.--This Act may be cited as the ``Bipartisan Budget 
and Appropriations Reform Act of 2018''.
    (b) Table of Contents.--The table of contents for this Act is as 
follows:

Sec. 1. Short title; table of contents.
                  TITLE I--BIENNIAL BUDGET RESOLUTIONS

Sec. 101. Purposes.
Sec. 102. Definitions.
Sec. 103. Revision of timetable.
Sec. 104. Biennial concurrent resolutions on the budget.
Sec. 105. Committee allocations.
Sec. 106. Revision of biennial budget.
Sec. 107. Additional amendments to the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 
                            to effectuate biennial budgeting.
Sec. 108. Reconciliation process.
Sec. 109. Amendments to the Rules of the House of Representatives to 
                            effectuate biennial budgeting.
Sec. 110. Membership of the Committee on the Budget.
Sec. 111. Rulemaking authority.
Sec. 112. Effective date.
                        TITLE II--OTHER MATTERS

Sec. 201. Views and estimates of committees.
Sec. 202. Annual supplemental budget submission by the President.
Sec. 203. Hearing on the fiscal state of the Nation.

                  TITLE I--BIENNIAL BUDGET RESOLUTIONS

SEC. 101. PURPOSES.

    Paragraph (2) of section 2 of the Congressional Budget and 
Impoundment Control Act of 1974 is amended to read as follows:
            ``(2) to facilitate the determination biennially of the 
        appropriate level of Federal revenues and expenditures by the 
        Congress;''.

SEC. 102. DEFINITIONS.

    Section 3 of the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act 
of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 622) is amended--
            (1) in paragraph (4), by striking ``for a fiscal year'' 
        each place it appears and inserting ``for a biennium''; and
            (2) by adding at the end the following new paragraphs:
            ``(12) The term `direct spending' has the meaning given to 
        such term in section 250(c)(8) of the Balanced Budget and 
        Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985.
            ``(13) The term `biennium' means any period of 2 
        consecutive fiscal years beginning with an even-numbered fiscal 
        year.
            ``(14) The term `budget year' has the meaning given that 
        term in section 250(c)(12) of the Balanced Budget and Emergency 
        Control Act of 1985.''.

SEC. 103. REVISION OF TIMETABLE.

    Section 300 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 631) 
is amended to read as follows:

                              ``timetable

    ``Sec. 300. The timetable with respect to the congressional budget 
process for any Congress is as follows:


                                                 ``First Session
On or before:                             Action to be completed:
First Monday in February................  President submits budget.
February 15.............................  Congressional Budget Office submits report to Budget Committees.
 March 1................................  Committees submit views and estimates to Budget Committees.
April 1.................................  Senate Budget Committee reports biennial budget.
May 1...................................  Congress completes action on the biennial budget.
May 15..................................  Appropriation bills may be considered in the House of Representatives.
June 10.................................  House Appropriations Committee reports last annual appropriation bill.
October 1...............................  First fiscal year of the biennium begins.
 



                                                ``Second Session
On or before:                             Action to be completed:
First Monday in February................  President submits budget.
February 15.............................  Congressional Budget Office submits report to Budget Committees.
June 10.................................  House Appropriations Committee reports last annual appropriation bill.
October 1...............................  Second fiscal year of the biennium begins.''.
 

SEC. 104. BIENNIAL CONCURRENT RESOLUTIONS ON THE BUDGET.

    (a) Contents of Resolution.--
            (1) In general.--Section 301(a) of the Congressional Budget 
        Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 632(a)) is amended--
                    (A) by striking ``On or before April 15'' and all 
                that follows through ``the following:'' and inserting 
                the following: ``On or before May 1 of each odd-
                numbered calendar year, the Congress shall complete 
                action on a concurrent resolution on the budget for the 
                biennium beginning on October 1 of that calendar year. 
                The concurrent resolution shall set forth appropriate 
                levels for each fiscal year in the biennium and for at 
                least each fiscal year in the next 2 bienniums for the 
                following--'';
                    (B) in paragraph (6)--
                            (i) by striking ``for the fiscal year'' and 
                        inserting ``for each fiscal year in the 
                        biennium''; and
                            (ii) by striking ``and'' at the end;
                    (C) in paragraph (7)--
                            (i) by striking ``for the fiscal year'' and 
                        inserting ``for each fiscal year in the 
                        biennium''; and
                            (ii) by striking the period at the end and 
                        inserting ``; and'';
                    (D) by adding after paragraph (7) the following:
            ``(8) subtotals of new budget authority and outlays for 
        nondefense discretionary spending; defense discretionary 
        spending; direct spending; and net interest.''; and
                    (E) by adding at the end of the matter following 
                paragraph (8) (as added by subparagraph (D)) the 
                following: ``The concurrent resolution on the budget 
                for a biennium shall include procedures for adjusting 
                spending and revenue levels, committee allocations, and 
                other amounts in the resolution during the second 
                session of a Congress to reflect an updated baseline 
                that will be used for scoring purposes.''.
    (b) Additional Matters in Concurrent Resolution.--Section 301(b) of 
the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 632(b)) is amended--
            (1) in paragraph (3), by striking ``for such fiscal year'' 
        and inserting ``for either fiscal year in such biennium'';
            (2) in paragraph (8), by striking ``and'' at the end;
            (3) in paragraph (9), by striking the period at the end and 
        inserting ``; and''; and
            (4) by adding at the end the following:
            ``(10) include total combined outlays and revenues for tax 
        expenditures.''.
    (c) Hearings and Report.--Section 301(e)(1) of the Congressional 
Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 632(e)) is amended by striking ``fiscal 
year'' and inserting ``biennium''.
    (d) Goals for Reducing Unemployment.--Section 301(f) of the 
Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 632(f)) is amended by 
striking ``fiscal year'' each place it appears and inserting 
``biennium''.
    (e) Economic Assumptions.--Section 301(g)(1) of the Congressional 
Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 632(g)(1)) is amended by striking ``for a 
fiscal year'' and inserting ``for a biennium''.
    (f) Section Heading.--The section heading of section 301 of the 
Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 632) is amended by striking 
``annual adoption of'' and inserting ``adoption of biennial''.

SEC. 105. COMMITTEE ALLOCATIONS.

    Section 302 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 633) 
is amended--
            (1) in subsection (a)(1)--
                    (A) by striking ``for that period of fiscal years'' 
                and inserting ``for all fiscal years covered by the 
                resolution''; and
                    (B) by striking ``only for the fiscal year of that 
                resolution'' and inserting ``only for each fiscal year 
                of the biennium'';
            (2) in subsection (c)--
                    (A) by striking ``subsection (a)'' and inserting 
                ``subsection (a)(1)'';
                    (B) by striking ``for a fiscal year'' and inserting 
                ``for a budget year''; and
                    (C) by striking ``for that fiscal year'' and 
                inserting ``for that budget year'';
            (3) in subsection (f)(1)--
                    (A) by striking ``for a fiscal year''; and
                    (B) by striking ``the first fiscal year'' and 
                inserting ``either fiscal year of the biennium of that 
                resolution''; and
            (4) in subsection (f)(2)(A), by--
                    (A) striking ``the first fiscal year'' and 
                inserting ``either fiscal year of the biennium of that 
                resolution''; and
                    (B) striking ``the total of fiscal years'' and 
                inserting ``the total of all fiscal years covered by 
                the resolution''.

SEC. 106. REVISION OF BIENNIAL BUDGET.

    Section 304 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 635) 
is amended to read as follows:

    ``permissible revisions of concurrent resolutions on the budget

    ``Sec. 304. At any time after the concurrent resolution on the 
budget has been agreed to pursuant to section 301 and before the end of 
the biennium, the two Houses may adopt a concurrent resolution that 
revises or reaffirms the most recently agreed to concurrent resolution 
on the budget. Any concurrent resolution that revises or reaffirms the 
most recently agreed to concurrent resolution on the budget shall be 
considered under the procedures set forth in section 305.''.

SEC. 107. ADDITIONAL AMENDMENTS TO THE CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET ACT OF 1974 
              TO EFFECTUATE BIENNIAL BUDGETING.

    (a) Enforcement of Section 303.--Section 303 of the Congressional 
Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 634) is amended--
            (1) in subsection (a)--
                    (A) by striking ``for a fiscal year'' and inserting 
                ``for a biennium''; and
                    (B) by striking ``the first fiscal year covered by 
                that resolution'' and inserting ``either fiscal year of 
                that biennium'';
            (2) in subsection (b)(1)(B), by striking ``the fiscal 
        year'' and inserting ``the biennium''; and
            (3) in subsection (c)--
                    (A) in paragraph (1)--
                            (i) by striking ``for a fiscal year'' and 
                        inserting ``for a biennium''; and
                            (ii) by striking ``for that year'' each 
                        place it appears and inserting ``for each year 
                        of that biennium''; and
                    (B) in paragraph (2), by striking ``after the year 
                the allocation referred to in that paragraph is made'' 
                and inserting ``after the years the allocations 
                referred to in that paragraph are made''.
    (b) Section 305.--Subsections (a)(3) and (b)(3) of section 305 of 
the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 636) are amended by 
striking ``for a fiscal year''.
    (c) Section 311 Point of Order.--
            (1) In the house of representatives.--Section 311(a)(1) of 
        the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 642(a)) is 
        amended--
                    (A) by striking ``for a fiscal year'';
                    (B) by striking ``the first fiscal year'' each 
                place it appears and inserting ``either of the first 
                two fiscal years covered by such resolution''; and
                    (C) by striking ``that first fiscal year'' and 
                inserting ``either of the first two fiscal years''.
            (2) In the senate.--Section 311(a)(2) of the Congressional 
        Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 642(a)(2)) is amended--
                    (A) in subparagraph (A), by striking ``for the 
                first fiscal year'' and inserting ``for either of the 
                first two fiscal years''; and
                    (B) in subparagraph (B)--
                            (i) by striking ``that first fiscal year'' 
                        the first place it appears and inserting 
                        ``either of the first two fiscal years''; and
                            (ii) by striking ``that first fiscal year 
                        and the ensuing fiscal years'' and inserting 
                        ``all fiscal years''.
            (3) Social security levels.--Section 311(a)(3) of the 
        Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 642(a)(2)) is 
        amended by--
                    (A) striking ``for the first fiscal year'' and 
                inserting ``for either of the first two fiscal years''; 
                and
                    (B) striking ``that fiscal year and the ensuing 
                fiscal years'' and inserting ``all fiscal years''.

SEC. 108. RECONCILIATION PROCESS.

    Section 310(a) of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 
641(a)) is amended--
            (1) in the matter before paragraph (1), by striking ``A 
        concurrent'' and all that follows through ``shall'' and 
        inserting ``A concurrent resolution on the budget for a 
        biennium shall, for each fiscal year of the biennium'';
            (2) in paragraph (1)(A), by striking ``for such fiscal 
        year'' and inserting ``for each fiscal year of the biennium'';
            (3) in paragraph (1)(C), by striking ``such fiscal year'' 
        and inserting ``each fiscal year of the biennium''; and
            (4) in paragraph (1)(D), by striking ``such fiscal year'' 
        and inserting ``each fiscal year of the biennium''.

SEC. 109. AMENDMENTS TO THE RULES OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES TO 
              EFFECTUATE BIENNIAL BUDGETING.

    (a) Clause 4(a)(4) of rule X of the Rules of the House of 
Representatives is amended by striking ``any allocations'' and 
inserting ``its allocations for the budget year'' and by striking 
``fiscal year'' and inserting ``biennium''.
    (b) Clause 4(b)(2) of rule X of the Rules of the House of 
Representatives is amended by striking ``for each fiscal year''.
    (c) Clause 4(b) of rule X is amended by striking ``and'' at the end 
of subparagraph (5), by striking the period and inserting ``; and'' at 
the end of subparagraph (6), and by adding at the end the following new 
subparagraph:
            ``(7) use the second session of each Congress to study 
        issues with long-term budgetary and economic implications.''.
    (d) Clause 4(f) of rule X is amended--
            (1) by striking ``fiscal year'' the first place it appears 
        and inserting ``biennium'';
            (2) by striking ``that fiscal year'' and inserting ``each 
        fiscal year in such ensuing biennium''; and
            (3) in subparagraph (1) by striking ``six weeks after the 
        submission of the budget by the President'' and inserting 
        ``March 1''.
    (e) Clause 3(d)(1)(A) of rule XIII is amended by striking ``five'' 
both places it appears and inserting ``six''.

SEC. 110. MEMBERSHIP OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE BUDGET.

    (a) Clause 5(a)(2) of rule X of the Rules of the House of 
Representatives is amended--
            (1) by striking subdivisions (B) and (C); and
            (2) in subdivision (A), by striking ``(A)'' and by 
        redesignating items (i), (ii), and (iii) as subdivisions (A), 
        (B), and (C), respectively.
    (b) The amendment made by subsection (a) shall take effect 
immediately before noon, January 3, 2019.

SEC. 111. RULEMAKING AUTHORITY.

    Sections 109 and 110 are enacted by the Congress--
            (1) as an exercise of the rulemaking power of the House of 
        Representatives, and as such they shall be considered as part 
        of the rules of the House and such rules shall supersede other 
        rules only to the extent that they are inconsistent therewith; 
        and
            (2) with full recognition of the constitutional right of 
        the House to change such rules at any time, in the same manner, 
        and to the same extent as in the case of any other rule of the 
        House.

SEC. 112. EFFECTIVE DATE.

    This title and the amendments made by this title shall take effect 
immediately before noon January 3, 2019.

                        TITLE II--OTHER MATTERS

SEC. 201. VIEWS AND ESTIMATES OF COMMITTEES.

    Section 301(d) of the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control 
Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 632(d)) is amended to read as follows:
    ``(d) Views and Estimates of Other Committees.--
            ``(1) In general.--Not later than March 1 of the first 
        session of a Congress, or upon the request of the Committee on 
        the Budget of the House of Representatives or the Senate, each 
        committee of the House of Representatives and the Senate having 
        legislative jurisdiction shall submit to its respective 
        Committee on the Budget its views and estimates (as determined 
        by the committee making such submission) with respect to the 
        following:
                    ``(A) Any legislation to be considered during that 
                Congress that is a priority for the committee.
                    ``(B) Any legislation within the jurisdiction of 
                the committee that would establish, amend, or 
                reauthorize any Federal program and likely have a 
                significant budgetary impact.
            ``(2) Additional matters.--Any committee of the House of 
        Representatives or the Senate and any joint committee of the 
        Congress may submit to the appropriate Committees on the Budget 
        its views and estimates with respect to all matters set forth 
        in subsections (a) and (b) which relate to matters within its 
        jurisdiction.
            ``(3) Joint economic committee.--The Joint Economic 
        Committee shall submit to the Committees on the Budget of both 
        Houses its recommendations as to the fiscal policy appropriate 
        to the goals of the Employment Act of 1946.''.

SEC. 202. ANNUAL SUPPLEMENTAL BUDGET SUBMISSION BY THE PRESIDENT.

    Section 1106 of title 31, United States Code, is amended by adding 
at the end the following:
    ``(d) On or before December 1 of each calendar year, the President 
shall submit to Congress an administrative budget for the fiscal year 
beginning in the ensuing calendar year, which shall include up-to-date 
estimates for current year and prior year data and credit reestimates 
for the current year (as included in the Federal credit supplement of 
such budget).''.

SEC. 203. HEARING ON THE FISCAL STATE OF THE NATION.

    (a) In General.--Not later than 45 days (excluding Saturdays, 
Sundays, and holidays) after the date on which the Secretary of the 
Treasury submits to Congress the audited financial statement required 
under paragraph (1) of section 331(e) of title 31, United States Code, 
on a date agreed upon by the chairs of the Committees on the Budget of 
the House of Representatives and the Senate and the Comptroller General 
of the United States, the chairs shall conduct a hearing to receive a 
presentation from the Comptroller General reviewing the findings of the 
audit required under paragraph (2) of such section and providing, with 
respect to the information included by the Secretary in the report 
accompanying such audited financial statement, an analysis of the 
financial position and condition of the Federal Government, including 
financial measures (such as the net operating cost, income, budget 
deficits, or budget surpluses) and sustainability measures (such as the 
long-term fiscal projection or social insurance projection) described 
in such report.
    (b) Effective Date.--The requirement under subsection (a) shall 
apply with respect to any audited financial statement submitted on or 
after the date of the enactment of this Act.

                     Press Release Accompanying the

                       Introduction of H.R. 7191

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