emitted that was from the president when he was a candidate. which would lead me to have some concern about what his role is in regard to energy. in regard to his energy secretary who is also implementing the policies of the president in 2008 with an interview with "the wall street journal" he said quote, somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels of europe. as you know they pay $9 a gallon implementing the policies of the president in 2012 february 29th he was questioned where he was asked if it was his overall goal to get our prices of gasoline lower to which he responded no, the over jaul goal is to decrease our dependsy on oil to build and strengthen our economy. also doesn't sound like rhetoric of someone in energy that watts to lower the cost of energy. and then quickly to give a quote from you on march 4th, 2009, in

a budget hearing you said to mr. grassly, the cap and trade would increase the cost of energy for those types of energies that are particularly carbon intensive. it doesn't increase the cost of energy -- it does increase the cost of nrmg and that's necessary if you're going to change ou people use energy. we have ewe mr. geithner, we have the energy secretary and the president all making comments that would lead the american people to believe that you're not supporting lower energy costs, but policies that would increase the cost of energy. >> i think the question you asked at the beginning, the policies the president is promoting are helping to facilitate a huge expansion in oil and gas across the united states. a significant reduction on our depends on foreign sources of oil. >> let's talk about that quickly. >> a big expansion to use other sources of energy in the time. >> let's talk about the change of oil production in dust.

i don't want to talk about private lands or state lands, i want to talk about federal lands. it's fair to say that from 2010 to 2011 there's been 11% decrease in oil production on federal lands, is that correct? >> as you know i'm not the secretary of energy, i'd be happy to give you their view, his views on those basic questions if that would be helpful, i would be happy to do that. >> you don't contest that that federal land production on oil has decreased. >> i don't know. it's not my thing. overall production is rising quite substantially. >> you just said that it's rising substantially. i would agree with you it's rising because of private lands and state lands that are being opened up to exploration instead of federal land. i only have -- it wouldn't be happening if the regulatory tax policies were having -- >> in regard to our budget, the president's budget, you've indicated that he's supporting tax increases, is that right? >> only on the top 20% of

americans. >> just quickly. i had a chance to review the budget. >> what the president's does as cbo pointed out last week is over the next five years it reduces -- >> when does the balance? >> i'll answer your question. >> what year does it balance? >> roughly 2016-2017. >> in what year? >> to primary balance in 16-17. that's to make sure revenues cover expenditures except for interest. >> when does it balance with interest? >> it doesn't balance in the ten-year window and that's what we budget for. >> don't you think we have a plan -- >> not in the next ten years. no way. no responsible way to achieve balance in the next ten years. >> i yield back. >> time for the gentleman has expired. the chair observes there are three more members in the hearing room who have not asked

questions. it's our intention to clear these individuals to keep the chairman on his schedule. if other members are monitoring the hearing in the afss. don't bother to come, you are too late. >> that is a bipartisan disinvitation. >> the chair now recognizes the gentleman from california, mr. sherman for five minutes. >> as to gas prices i will comment about six months before bush left office they were as high or almost as high as they are today. the collapse of the worldwide economy in late 2008 dramatically reduced gasoline prices. i don't think that's the strategy we want to employ as global as that goal is. in addition, natural gas prices are lower than they've ever been. there is a north american market for natural gas. so production on this can consult prices and has. that allows us to displace the coal while still generating

electricity. and finally oil is traded worldwide. there's a worldwide price for oil. and a slight increase in production in north america is not going to change the worldwide price. a couple of issues about funding small business. if we had member lending for credit unions and if the credit unions had alternative capital, without washington risking taxpayer money, we'd have capital in the hands of small business. i thank the secretary for nodding, but i hope that we get nodding here in this committee because it is a matter that congress needs to deal with. now as to iran, as you know, mr. secretary, i was disappointed early in the administration where we augmented the imf with $105 million, but did not demand the suspension of iran from the imf and our action in effect

created a billion dollars of special drawing rights adds the imf was supplemented. i would hope that before we do anything else to help the imf, we insist at a minimum that iran not be given any additional special drawing rights. but perhaps you could comment on that. and/or better yet that iran would be suspended. it's the purpose of the imf to help member states when they face the financial crisis and it is the policy of the united states to create a financial crisis in iran. so it strikes me as odd that we would participate -- that we would be both setting the fire and funding the fire department. >> good point and well said. i share your view on this. i would point out that the cukelative impact of the range of things that we have done to iran has been overwhelmingly

powerful. we have some more to do. >> you do have some more to do. that brings to the next question. we've acted to sanction the central bank of iran and a certain other designated banks wouldn't it be far more effective if we designated all iranian banks. if you forced me to go to change from bank of america or wells fargo or some lesser known institution that would not cause me to change my heartfelt policies. shouldn't we be dez natding all banks and working with swift toex collude all iranian banks from the swift program. >> excellent question. it's something we're going to keep taking a look at. if it makes sense, we're going to do it. to get it to work, we have to get the rest of the world to do it. >> the journey starts with us designating them all and trying to persuade europe to designate

them all or secondary sanctions, which i realize is not the first choice of the administration. >> i kbree. if it makes sense to do it, we'll do it. but at the moment, i don't think that remaining gap itself is particularly material to our objectives. if it becomes so, we'll take a look at it. >> i hope you would answer for the record how many banks remain unsanctioned by the united states or remain participants in wift and that is a question i iranian banks are a part of swift. i'd like to shift now to housing. and i guess this might be a question for the record my time is ending that is fannie and freddie are implementing programs that will streamline the short sale process and reduce the response time to the consumer. do you agree it would be prudent for the gses to produce short sales instead of allowing the property to fall into foreclosure? and can you speculate as to or

inform us as to why the gses have taken so long. and then the second question for the record is, does it make any sense to hit the gses with a 110% dividend rate when we have to lend them the money to pay us the dividend and they're not -- i believe in high dividend rates when it's a private institution we're getting money from somebody else. but taking money out of our right pocket to our left pocket. finally, does it make sense for us to use the gses as a piggy bank or pay for for nonhousing related programs by increasing the guarantee fee at fannie and freddie? >> time of the gentleman has expired. the secretary can submit his answers 3 brighting. the chair recognizes the gentle lady from new york, miss hayworth. >> thank you chairman. mr. secretary, referring to the conversation, the exchange that you had with the honorable member from texas mr. green a few moments ago, discussing

taxes and the fact that it sounds as though you're of the opinion that a certain amount of raising taxes will actually have a nets benefit for the economy, for growth. we look across the country at, you know, obviously we have a states that have all their own economic climates in a sense and they have their own state tax structures. can you point to an example with among our states in which a higher tax structure or heavier tax structure has resulted in greater economic growth in those states vis-a-vis others with lower tax structures. >> i think i can give you a better example which is that -- it's not exactly true, but basically what the president's proposing is to return the effective tax rate to the richest americans pay that the level that prevailed in the

second half of the 90s. that was a period of enormous growth for the american economy. very high rates of private investment growth, productivity growth, very profitable time for american business and individuals. no material evidence from that period of time that those tax rates at that time were damaging the economic growth prospects. that's the best example. another way to think about this. we're having a national debate about this. it's a good debate to have, what would you do otherwise? we can't go out and borrow the trillion dollars we need to sustain them. it's unfair to ask people to take that out of medicare benefits. hard to imagine we should ask middle class americans to raise their taxes to protect the rich from higher tax rates. i don't see the basis for doing it. can't meet the defense needs of the country realistically with those tax rates for the richest americans. it's that reluctant conclusion and the evidence from the 90s that we think it's better than the alternatives.

>> with all due respect we don't have an example among our states that suggests that higher taxes work. i agree with you we have a tremendous challenge that faces all of us. but i think the solution that meets with praise from both sides because certainly i'm one of those who wants very much to work with you and all of our colleagues is growth. of course, we've just hit a milestone as you know our corporate tax rate is now the highest in the developed world. so i think that i hope that the administration's giving careful consideration to the budget proposal that chairman ryan is introduced today that does reduce substantially those tax rates. i know the administration's talked about reducing corporate tax rates and making the tax

code fairer and flatter. and i thank you for that consideration. on a separate topic, mr. secretary, basel three. you referred to structuring banks. it's going to affect our banks as well in various ways. there is concern that agency morning backed securities will be considered level two capital instead of level one even though in this country they have been considered to be equivalent to sovereign debt. can you assure our participants that you're going to be working with the regulators to try to make that playing field even, if you will? >> again, i can say that i know they're taking a look at it. it's the fed's authority. it's not mine. i don't, my sense is from a distance that those concerns about the capital requirements and that kind of stuff have a material adverse impact on say the price of mortgages.

i don't think those are really justified at this stage, i know the fed's looking at it. >> mr. chairman, i yield back. >> thank you, for yielding back. chair now recognizes the gentleman from delaware mr. carney for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i appreciate your managing the hearing today. otherwise i wouldn't get a chance to ask a few questions. secretary, thank you for coming. i'd like to first public thank you for the work that one of our assistant secretaries did, mary miller on the onramp, the ipo onramp bill. i've tried to point out as we discussed the bill in this committee and on the house floor that it was really out of an effort by the treasury department that these ideas emerged and we appreciate her work on that. ial want to thank you for your work on the housing issues. i was part of the letter that was led by a ranking member frank to you encouraging treasury to implement hamp more

like harp and i understand that that's happening. no need for comment. i'd like to go back to the two questions i raised in my opening statement. and the first is the sustainability of the solution for groost. it's whhard for me to imagine. you said in your testimony this is just the initial phase. that severe austerity steps are being taken, economic reforms and budgetary reforms in these countries. it seems to me greece has the worst of all worlds. they can't deval their currency. they're attached to a currency that is really reflective more of a german economy than their own. they're going to continually as you pointed out in your testimony, i think get into this downward spiral that's forced by the solution. would you comment fourth on that. >> >> you're exactly right, a member of europe has two disadvantages. they don't have their own currency and they can't set their monetary policy

independent of the rest of europe. they also don't have a mechanism for fiscal transfers that makes the united states work. they don't have that piece that hamilton put in piece to allow transfers to cushion the effects of downturn that affect part of the continent not all of it. those two things are big disadvantages. you're right to emphasize that greece is making progress towards sustainability. whether they get there or not is going to depend if they can sustain political support. >> politically -- >> i think that there's no good choices available to them. >> right. >> one choice might be exit. what happens in that kind of a situation where they opt out of the eu? >> i think that i know they've spent a lot of time looking at that question. and it's true that the rest of europe has too. i think they've looked at it and concluded it would be much worse for them. much more expensive and costly

economically. i think they're -- that's their judgment to make. most of the things they're doing, most countries would have to do in their circumstances. most countries even if they had their own currency, found themselves in that deep a hole they'd have to do a lot of these things to bring the government down to efrt and fix the financial system and start a business and make sure people pay their taxes. they're doing things that are necessary, inevitable, unavoidable and make things better over the long run for them. >> so you said if your statement that the impact on u.s. banks of the write down of the financing for greek bonds has had no material. >> no material impact. >> what about on the cds side. >> again, no material. >> how do you know that? is there anything? >> because the fed it's really directed to them that they have a really very good feel today in partly because of all the reforms that have been put in place for the direct and indirect exposures to the

financial institutions to greece, for example. so they -- they can judge how large they are and they're very, very small and the cds protection that was written was really quite small, too. >> finally, the financing of our own debt. i share the same concern that he has. i was encouraged that you said you're going to try to restrekture. when i was secretary of finance in the state of delaware we were constrained by law by how it was structured so you didn'tive didn't get into situations where you're kind of betting on the future. it looks like, you know, from where we sit today, you've got basely zero interest rates and a significant amount of debt financed short-term debt -- shoerm bonds and they're going to have to be refinanced at some point presumably at higher debt. at some point we're going to be

penalized unless we get a better ten-year fiscal plan. >> the prudent, responsible, conservative thing to do is extend the maturity of our debt. we've done that significantly over the last two and a half years. we're closer now to the average of what most other countries do. that makes sense for us. >> i'm happy to hear that. thank you again for your service. >> mr. secretary, we thank you for your time and your testimony. we will allow you to exexcuse yourself now. the chair notes that some members may have additional questions for the witnesses which they may want to submit in writing without objection the record will remain open for 30 days for members to place questions to the witness and to place response in the record. >> mr. chairman, i want to acknowledge my gratitude to you -- it's difficult when you have all these members in a limited amount of time. i thank you for the fairness and eofficialsy for which you conducted this hearing. >> i will accept the gratitude. this hearing stand adjourned.

>> wisconsin, maryland and the district of columbia hold primaries tomorrow. and that's where the republican presidential candidates are spending their time today. mitt romney is in wisconsin, he has a rally in milwaukee this afternoon. rick santorum is spending the day in rural wisconsin, with a rally this afternoon in oshkosh. and newt gingrich is campaigning in maryland talking to hood college republicans this afternoon. you can find primary results and reaction tomorrow night on c-span, our coverage begins at 7:00 eastern. join the conversation by phone, at faith facebook.com/c-span or

twitter@road wh. and each night watch american history tv prime time here on c-span3. tonight, the 34th president, dwight david eisenhower. the architect, followed by sisen hower's granddaughter on the opposition to the design and a film about president eisenhower produced by the u.s. army all tonight on american history tv prime time. >> when we're warned in the next 12-18 months america will suffer a catastrophic cyber attack they don't choose those words indiscriminately and we're four or five months into that it tells me that we have to move rapidly but not in a way that violates privacy or the basic tenets of privacy and encourages quick reaction, not sort of

regulatory environment. >> tonight t chairman of the house subcommit on communications and technology, congressman greg walden on cyber security and privacy, at 8:00 eastern on the communicators, on c-span2. >> congressman bobby scott recently hosted a discussion on preventing youth crime and legislation called the youth promise act. it would provide grants for local anti-gang and anti-violence programs. this panel met to discuss the proposed law. it's under two hours. thank you and good afternoon. thank you for joining us this afternoon for an important briefing on critical youth violence prevention legislation,

the youth violence act. we're grateful for support for this legislation. when it comes to crime policy we have a choice, we can reduce crime or we can play politics. but far too long congress has chosen to play politics by enacting tough on crime slogans, such as three strikes and you're out, you do the adult crime, you do the adult time, or mandatory minimums and things like that. although these policies sounded appealing, their impact ranges from negligible reduction to crime to actually increasing the crime rate. these slogan-based policies have led to the creation of what the experts at the children's defense fund have called the cradle to prison pipeline. in a report in the subject children's defense fund identified various contributing factors to the pipeline including poverty, a struggling education system, and an unresponsive punitive juvenile justice system. the results of this pipeline are

staggering. in its report, the cdf estimated that for boys, black boys born in 2001, one in three have a chance of going into prison during their lifetime if we don't make changes. while white boys have about a one in 17 chance. national prison statistics also reflect the pipeline's construction, since 1970, the number of individuals incarcerated in the united states has risen from 300,000 to over 2 million. that makes the united states the world's leading incarcerator by far with an average incarceration rate seven times the international average. this chart -- this chart shows the average incarceration rate, the green bar shows the incarceration rate of most countries that you could name.

the purple, the first reddish bar, is the united states average and the purple bars the 2200 is the average african-american incarceration rate and the top bar almost 4,000, the african-american incarceration rate and the top ten states. now, the american -- the united states rate of over 700 per 100,000 is not only the highest in the world but it's also above that which the pew research center shows is counterproductive. they calculate incarceration over 350 per 100,000 give us diminishing returns and anything over 500 per 100,000 becomes counterproductive. if you look at the chart you can see how far off base we are. other statistics indicate that the pipeline is also expensive. the cost for prisons have gone from about $9 billion in 1982, to over $65 billion this year

and the increase, the rate of increase for prison costs was six times greater than the rate of increase for higher education. evidence is clear that if we want to reduce crime we need to invest in research-based programs for at risk youth. programs such as teen pregnancy prevention, prenatal care, new parent training, nurse home visits, head start and other early childhood education programs, quality education, after-school programs, summer recreation jobs and summer recreation jobs, access to college, job training, all of them work effectively to get young people in the right track and keep them on the right track. by doing so we actually save more money than we spend. we also need to invest in research-based effective interventions for young people already caught up in the cycle of delinquency. to save money and lives we should be focusing not on playing politics but what

actually works in order to get young people on the right track and keep them on the right track. one of the aspects we have found that is highly correlated with incarceration is the drop-out rate. this chart is a chart for african-american males, 25-30, green is high school graduates, reddish is high school drop-out. you can see a significant change between 1970 and 2000. 1970, you could drop out of school and go get a job and not get in trouble. but by 2000, with an information-based high tech economy, if you dropped out of school, the likelihood of you being employed today is by the time you're 25 to 30, african-american males, is about 30%. about a third are out in the street and about a third are actually in jail today.

not just probation and parole and all that, behind bars today according to the study. and so, once someone drops out of school, the trajectory they are on is a trajectory toward misery. and that's why i once again introduced the youth promise act and the 112th congress that puts evidence based and cost effective programs into play at the community level. the act would mobilize community leaders by requiring the community to come together and form a committee, consisting of everyone who has anything to do with young people getting in trouble. it's obviously law enforcement, but it's also the school system, the health and mental health agencies, social services, faith-based communities, community organizations, after school programs like the boys and girls clubs, the business community, everybody get together to decide what the problem is and what can be done on an