when you look at this bipartisan agreement, which is the fiscal commission plan, we can see pieces we like, pieces we don't like, but it is truly a long-term blueprint. if there's anything the committee can do, that's something i embrace. it's not going to be fun. we're going to have to make some tough decisions here and tough calls on what we do. if we're going to be frank with colleagues on the other side if we are just going to debate what we should be doing in the sense of a process, people are sick and tired of debating the process. what they want to know is what we're going to do. i'm interested in figuring out a long-term budget plan. that's what we have a chance to do. i can argue that we should have a budget debate the chairman knows my views. i'm not afraid of any amendment. bring it on. i don't care. i've been through the budget vote-a-rama on the floor my first year. it was a joke. it was a waste of time. message-rama is what i call it.

at the end of the day, we all looked at each other, slapped each other on the back and said we did a great job and walked out. the president didn't have to adhere to the budget. i would like the executive branch to adhere to the appropriators. but we don't have that process. why not set up a process that we lay out a long-term plan. it's important to remember we already reduced the deficit through budget cuts over the last few years. significant progress. almost $2 trillion. 100% of the deficit reduction comes entirely from spending cuts we've done. we're already, if you look at the economy, where we've been. i know some people think we can do better and i agree. but we've come a long ways in three years, we have done some reduction. we have a stronger economy. as i mention as a former mayor, you cannot solve this problem by

just cutting your way out of it. there's no way. i don't care what commercials people will run in the future. against me on this. or what brochures people are going to write up, or what one liners people are going to say. i've had to deal with these. it's a combination of things. but first off the only approach is going to have a direct impact on local and state governments, which really means more government. no, that's law enforcement, that's teachers. that's people taking care of kids through day care assistance. it's juvenile justice systems. it's our court systems. it's everything that you can imagine. so i commend the chairman for taking a balanced approach. a nonpartisan approach. i remember the bowles-simpson plan came out, so many people wrote press releases. i could probably pile them up here. and we have it in front of us. we don't have a gang of six, no disrespect to the people who worked on that. we don't need a supercommittee. this is the budget committee. this is what i thought the budget committee does. we get a chance to do this long-term.

i said before when i came -- the formula for strong economic health to this country has three pieces to it. yes, we have to cut budgets. i've done that when i was mayor. i offered multiple solutions cutting the budget here. armed services committee, we did a variety of things and had good discussion. it also means you have to have two other components. you have to have new revenues and smart investments. the fiscal commission plan before us today is a very good start in this direction. it carries a lot of credibility with me. if you look at the architect of the plan, as i said, it's very balanced. i respect the plan because it is a broad-based approach. including defense and mandatory

spending. including health care. i share the chairman's view that a balanced approach which addresses spending and revenue and tackles both mandatory and discretionary spending is the way we'll get our fiscal house in order. i want to point out the plan reduces the overall spending by $3 trillion over ten years. it also includes $1.4 trillion on discretionally cuts and $ain't 40 billion in mandatory savings. below during the reagan era. on the revenue side, i wholeheartedly support the message of tax reform on this plan. which is basically a plan that is a bipartisan plan that's already on the table. senator wyden and myself proposed. comprehensive tax reform is the best way to reduce our deficits through lowering rates, broadening the base. and cutting tax expenditures. over ten years the revenues will average 19.7% of gdp, which is the same as under president clinton.

snard w -- senator wyden has said tax reform worked in 1986 and it can work again. and it creates jobs. you can't associate the total '86 debt reform with the millions of jobs that came after it, but it sure did help. i believe we need to up complicate this truly hard tax code. i got plenty of calls from people frustrated in the last minutes as they figure out the last number they had to pay or they thought they were getting a refund and did not get. we need to untangle this tax code. doing so will push economic growth and create jobs. that increases revenue. it will lower corporate tax rates to make american businesses more competitive, which will help business create good jobs. increased tax revenues without raising tax rates. having said all that, i want to

make it clear this plan is not perfect. there are provision that say i staunchly support and others that i simply are not on board with. i'm very concerned about the government-wide chained cpi that senator whitehouse talked about which would reduce benefits for current social security retirees. the chained calculation to cut can accumulate over time. it will get worse for people who are just retiring and lucky enough to live long lives. that means the grandmas and grandpas have a future that will be hit the hardest. this is not the right way to cut the costs, because social security doesn't contribute to the deficit. worse, the plan eliminates a fundamental feature that has been part of the program since the beginning. under the law, everyone receives nearly the same level benefit, unrelated to wages. this proposal among other things raises the normal and early retirement ages and cuts the cost of living adjustment, which already undermeasures the inflation rate. that means benefits would not

keep up with increases in the cost of living. most troubling, this budget proposal endorses these changes despite the fact it acknowledges social security cannot run on a deficit and is not responsible for our budget problems. this approach gets worse for older americans because it would also increase their share of costs for medication. it's not a good combination. lower benefits and higher cost copays. another problem i have with the plan is it increases gas taxes by 15 cents. >> senator, might i say we've gone over time. if you'd be willing to -- >> i'll summarize and submit this. >> that would be good. >> we're right on the nose. let me just say that there are some good things and there are bad things with the proposal. i am looking forward to the debate. i hope we don't just keep hammering over what we should and what we could but what we will do. i think this proposal lays out a broad based bipartisan support, and i look forward to the great debate that we have here. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator.

>> thank you, mr. chairman. i appreciate the senator from alaska suggesting this is a good starting point. and i think if it is a good starting point, there's got to be an end point somewhere. that means we have to have vote and have an opportunity to amend it and do what we would do if we were actually marking up a budget. and i would say that we are on this side sympathetic to you. we feel your pain. we liked it better when you were going rogue and actually talking about doing a real markup. but i think there's been a lot of suggestion that the bca is the budget. that was the replacement and substitute for having a budget. i would argue the bca is what you end up with when you don't have a budget. last year when we didn't write a budget we ended up at the 11th hour rushing to cobble something together to meet a deadline on the debt limit. we didn't address the important issues of entitlement reform and tax reform, which the super

committee was supposed to address. there again, that's something that should have been our responsibility through this process. and let me just say, too, that i think that the suggestion that this be a starting point is all fine and good. we've had votes on the president's budget here last year. the house voted on the president's budget this year. the house voted on some version of the bowles-simpson commission plan. and it only got 38 votes over there. my understanding is, i don't know, i haven't seen it yet, but your mark is higher in terms of taxes and spending than what was voted on and only received 38 votes in the house. but i would argue that we can do big things around here. we need to do big things around here. and if you look throughout history, when faced with the crisis, this institution has demonstrated the capacity in working with the white house to accomplish some pretty big things.

social security reform in '83, that was a republican president. democrat congress. '86 was tax reform. that was republican president and democrat house. '96 was welfare reform, democrat president and republican congress. there's a history and a precedent when necessary for us to do some big bold things. and so it really is unfortunate that what we're left with right now is not doing our job and again, i don't think any of us here are suggesting that you don't approach us with the best of intentions and want to get a budget, but we understand, too, that the statements that have been made by members of your leadership are going to make it very, very difficult for that to happen. even if we were to produce a budge, to actually get a vote on the floor. and so many of us on this side are disappointed. i think there's an expectation by the american people who have to live within budgets that congress ought to do its job.

and when you're talking about massive amounts of debt and massive deficits and tremendous need for a genuine, serious reform, it can happen. it does take leadership not only here, but from the white house. and in my view, we've not had a president who is leaning in to the big challenges that we face. it was evidenced by his budget, which as i said, got zero votes in the house of representatives. so i think it's unfortunate we are where we are. my hope would be that at some point we could come forward and actually produce a budget and have a debate where we have votes and have an opportunity to talk about what i think are the big issues facing this country and the crisis ahead of us if we don't act soon. so i would just simply say that i think most of us on this side, you probably heard many of them already speak are ready to go to work. and ready to have a real process whereby we actually vote on

amendments and try to get to a place where we can get something to the floor of the united states senate where all members have an opportunity to try and improve and strengthen move us in a direction that will put our country on a more sustainable fiscal track. >> i thank the senator. senator warner is recognized for a statement. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i apologize about having to step out for a little while. you know, thank you for breaking a little glass. this was lord knows not the traditional approach. lots of probably ideas about how this came about or why it came about. but as a guy who's only been here three years, you know, kind of the process here around this document that seems to be more

about gotcha for future -- for future electoral campaigning process than how you actually try to reach a common ground on a plan that 65%, 70% of us could actually agree upon that would solve the problem, you know, i think is a much better approach. i know -- lord knows i know this simpson-bowles plan which i have more than a passing familiarity with will make -- will make folks on both sides of the aisle, some folks on both sides of the aisle really upset. i think that's great. because i think it means there may actually be a chance for the -- for those of us who think there are 65 or 70 of us who actually could find common ground, it might give us a chance to get at the bat. clearly, for all of the merits

or demerits that the -- you know, the ryan budget has coming out of the house, you know, it's not going to become law because it comes out as a partisan vehicle. if you were to put a democratic proposal here that eked out of the budget committee by one vote and got 52, 53 votes at the end of the day, it's not going to become law. because our colleagues on the other side aren't going to feel like they've got some ownership in it. at least with this document, and there have been now super committee, simpson-bowles, rivlin-dominici, gang of six, i think there was some former senators as well, they have all been out there, and all plus or minus 10 or 15% have come up with a plan that's got a mix of tax reform, entitlement reform.

some additional cutback in domestic discretionary. some cutback in defense. so i think this is a good idea as a starting point on where we go. i'll just make a couple of other comments. for those of us, i think about you and senator crapo, all of the hours we spent on gang of six and some of the critiques that we didn't fully finish. i still think we were much further along than some in the press gave us credit for. but that sure as heck didn't happen overnight. that took enormous weeks and weeks and months of back and forth and negotiating and trying to understand each other's perspectives in ways that i think were valuable. i think the opposite of that was the -- was the budget control act. which in a moment of crisis was thrown together and was -- i just have to tell you from my perspective was kind of my single biggest moment of embarrassment of being a united

states senator when i think we did an enormous disservice to this country and to any kind of creeping economic recovery as we limped out of that late july and early august and threw up something that, you know, in earlier days we might have all been accused of did you read the bill? but we had no choices because there hadn't been the preliminary work done. and we set up downstream events that now we're trying -- living to rue because we didn't have enough time to try to get it right. if we do this right in this process, maybe before the election, but clearly after the election, this committee could actually come up with a product that could serve as the template for our colleagues in both the house and the senate. and i echo some of the comments my colleagues have made. it's going to take the president involved in this as well. three or four quick, quick last points. i know i'm late in this and other colleagues want to speak.

i do think it's important to remember as we have had this debate, we still are in this period of extraordinary -- an extraordinarily lucky time with interest rates at their all-time low. it's important to recall every 100 basis points increase in interest rates adds $1.3 trillion to the debt over a ten-year time frame. so the notion of getting $4 trillion to $5 trillion off of the debt if we end up running against a period where the bond markets no longer wants to -- thinks we're the least ugly girl on the -- let me see. how do i rephrase that, senator portman. cleanest dirty shirt. much, much better way to rephrase that. we could be in a heap of trouble. i would again recall my colleagues, if there's one thing

i keep drilling down on, you know, federal spending at 25% of our gdp. all-time high. revenues 15%. 70-year low. it seems to me that -- senator conrad and senator portman will correct me if i'm wrong. the only times we've been in rough budget balance in the last 70 years has been when revenues and spending have been between 19% and 21%. somewhere in that range. doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out you've got to cut spending and generate additional revenues. i hope as we go forward on this discussion the three things that i would hope that we would work on beyond kind of moving off this frame and updating it, one would be, and i would give enormous, enormous credit to senator crapo and senator coburn on this, is that if we were able to put together a long-term plan, you got to have a real enforcement mechanism. so if the economy recovers both on the spending side and on the

revenue side, there's no way to, you know, wave those budget points of orders or slip in things late at night. and i would argue for -- or offer for the committee's consideration the very, very good work that with the assistance senator conrad put in on as tight of straight jacket as you can imagine on making sure spending caps are not done away with. including a 67-vote threshold. i'm not even sure lindsay graham could get 67 votes on most items. so real spending enforcement. second, i have to tell you, you know, i disagree with the president on the idea that -- that if we are going to deal well on the revenue side, that we can solve this problem with only getting more revenues from the very top 1% or 2%. i believe that this is a national crisis of such that we all have to step up. i think i have to step up in a much more responsible way as somebody who's in that -- not

even the top 2%. maybe even a little higher percent. i think there's something wrong when 47% of americans don't pay any federal income tax. and there needs to be at least . and there needs to be at least an amount for folks above some level of poverty to be paying in so we've all got skin in the game. i understand they pay sales tax, gas tax, others, in terms of supporting our national defense, supporting our crisis, we've got to have a tax reform system that's going to have more americans have skin in the game. and i know this is an area that we had spent a lot of time on. i think simpson boles did some great work, but i think there's more to be done in the entitlement area. particularly around health care. we have to be more open to ideas that are a big more

controversial. the one i think that simpson boles had that none of the other subsequent plans included just because it was too -- too radioactive but i'm still all in with the budget plan that would include get a fix on social security as well on this. senator johnson have talked about the fact in terms of fixing it, one of the easiest one there's no blame other than blaming the doctors that we're all living too long ark lot of this is just about math. so i commend the chairman and the ranking member. i hope they'll lead us in a way that this can become a productive discussion and wouldn't it be great if this budget committee rolled up its sleeves and we weren't going to have to be called a gang and we came up with a product that might end up being the framework of how we get this great national -- potential national tragedy off our backs and the country headed back in the right direction. with that i yield. >> i thank the senator.

senator portman's recognized for statement. >> thank you, mr. chairman. let me start by saying i respect the work that you and the senators did on the gang of six and continue to do. and you've done so with some political risk. yet you're not the budget committee. and you don't have the ability to be able to do as we could do in this committee take something to the floor for an up or down vote. under the 74 budget act we can do that. we can actually report something with just 12 of us in this table. how many do we have right now? can we count you guys? we had 12 earlier. and then it's the mere majority because again the budget act provides for this special expedited and near majority conversation of a budget

proposal comes out of this committee. i think that's what we've got to be doing. and i actually think senator begich and senator warner following him made the case as well as anybody iabout why it'se a budget. although senator begich isn't here to defend himself. i think he was kind of saying that bca provides some of the budget discipline that is necessary and discretionary spending. he talked about the need for a long-term plan and a blue print for the future. you think about it. over 60% of the budget this year is mandatory spending and interest on the debt. just looking at it in those terms hard to say that with bca even if it was a ten-year plan not a plan for a year and then look at it again next year is a plan that gets at our problem, but happens to be the fastest growing part of our budget, the

mandatory side. it's been noted here it's been 1,000 days since the senate enacted a budget. $4 trillion here we are. not the only reason we're here $4 trillion later. but it would be nice to have a plan. more than $33,000 in new debt for households in north dakota, ohio. all of our states. listened to everybody arguing for a blueprint. i commend the chairman moving through the process. i liked your comprehensive presentation this afternoon. charts and all. i didn't agree with everything you said. i think you laid out the problem well. and i think senator sessions did the same thing. i think you all agree with the problem. and yet a little different ideas on the solutions. i will tend to agree with more

senator sessions on some of the issues. we should have the debate and have this amendment process in this committee and take it to the floor. i like the tax reform proposals. i think it's a step in the right direction. the tax increases. as part of tax reform i actually as i analyze it is closer to $3.5 trillion. you say it's about $2.4 trillion. that's a debate we ought to have and a discussion we ought to have. like simpson boles i'm concerned it doesn't get at the health care spending costs and the costs incured because of our new federal health care legislation that's going to cost trillions more over the next ten years and we see higher numbers seems like every other week now. senator whitehouse talked about that earlier. his concern that we aren't really getting at the core issue with spending when you include medicare, medicaid and the cost of the new health care bill for

the federal government. that being said, i do have some concerns. if this is a proposal that the chairman's putting forward, i think we ought to use it as a starting point for the committee. and go ahead and mark it up. and again, we need 12 votes to get it to the floor. once we get it to the floor, people talked about the vote and how that could be political. well it's always political in this place. but ultimately we have to vote. we'd have to come down one way or the other. so with a $15 trillion national debt on course to add about another $10 on the decade with the president's budget about $11 with 10 tho of us americans retiring a day now and moving into social security and medicare systems that are heading toward bankruptcy if we don't make these reforms, it's time to act. people talked a little bit about

what's going to happen at year end. we had this confluence of sequestration and $4.5 to $5 trillion tax increase and debt limit again the saektary of defense has called the tax cuts catastrophic. it would hollow out the force. the senate budget committee should provide some physical direction with the blueprint and we should do it now because it is such a critical time. the house did do its job. there's been a lot of talk today. some members on the house side criticized the house budget. that's their right to do it. they should also acknowledge that they wrote a budget, voted on it. a lot of amendments on the floor. it's interesting they had several budget proposals. i think they had seven that they voted on. and they covered the political spectrum and there was debate, there was argument. people disagreed with each other. but in the end they called the votes and they passed a budget

for the united states of america. if we would do the same and get something into conference we would have that blueprint. we missed the deadline on april 1st and for our committee april 15th for the full house. that's meaning that we've already missed our statutory deadlines. that's okay, we can still move forward. and i think it's time for us to do it. we need to be sure that as we're doing this we think about its impact on the economy. i think we have some disagreement on that. some folks on this committee have made the point we can't cut much now because it will slow the recovery. it's the weakest since the great depression when you look at the lack of jobs. i would argue the opposite. all the more reason to do it to be able to give our economy a needed shot in the arm through some needed reforms including tax reform which is one of the

few ways economists agree that we could help simulate economic growth. senator begich talked about that at length. it's true that there are things we can and should do in the context of the budget that don't involve setting caps they have to do with policy. we need that fiscal blueprint. i think the chairman's budget could be a first step. i urge him to move forward with it. let us have the debate here in committee. let us see if we could find 12 votes take it to the floor and challenge the senate to stop abdicating its responsibility. >> i thank the senator. senator widen is recognized for a statement. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman, and to you mr. chairman, ranking member senator sessions and colleagues. i feel badly about coming so late. we just had a hearing on global trade opportunities as a key part of our jo