development reorganizations and the like that represent a kind of unmeasured investment. during periods of investment, during periods of downturn. so i would be more inclined to atribute more of the productivity shortfall to the consequences of the downturn on the demand side than robert is but i agree with him that there is a puzzling pattern of surprisingly weak productivity growth which has audiences -- has odd conncomitants. if i told you just in the

abstract that productivity was going to slow down for an unexplained odd reason, that you didn't know what it was, i think you would be inclined to expect that what you would see at the same time would be some ten tense tensesy were towards higher prices as lower productivity growth reduced labor costs relative to the path you expected so you would expect to see inflation surprising on the high side. and you might also expect to see profit margins squeezed a bit and so there's something odd about aproductivity slowdown that goes with disinflation and goes with a significant increase in capitals share.

those -- is disinflation in particular leads me to think a little more about the demand side. it's the oldest bit of economic reasoning that when the quantity of apples goes down and you're trying to figure out whether it's demand or supply you look at what happens to the price and if the quantity of apples goes down and the price of apples goes down you tend to think something's going on on the demand side rather than on the supply-side and you also have the puzzle of rising profitabili profitability two ideas that haven't been mentioned yet and are out there in the discussion that may be relevant to all of this, although i don't think the evidence is overwhelming, is

well short of overwhelming on either are the possibility that the level of monopoly power has increased in the economy which would account for a rising profit share a rise in the prohibition of willingness to invest and might, because of output restriction contribute to in reduction pressure contribute to a slowdown in productivity. that's one hypothesis worth exploring. the other thing that i think is worth exploring for which there's substantial anecdotal evidence, including, i have to confess from my own behavior which is that one aspect of the internet the that people at work spend less time working. [ laughter ]

and more time being distracted. and if we are now mismeasuring hours at work because there are more hours at leisure that are called hours at work, it would tend to explain robert's anomaly of employment strong and productivity weak and there's, you know, people who -- whatever one thinks about this, the bits of anecdotal data from people who monitor during-the-day use of face time and the like from employer domains, that type of information is fairly supportive

of the hypothesis -- of this hypothes hypothesis. >> can i pick up on one thing? larry's tensioned a couple of times this pattern where you see low inflation, low real interest rates, weak investment, in particular private investment. my conjecture -- i'm not certain about this -- is that the common source of all these things is the idea of elevated disaster risk. and that that was particularly reinforced by the great recession, 2008/2009. what that would do, of course, is dramatically lower the real rate on safe assets because there would be this flight to quality kind of idea. it can explain maybe low inflation despite dramatic monetary expansion because of

the willingness to hold staggering quantities of safe assets, in particular depository institutions holding remarkable amounts of excess reserves at the federal reserve and, of course, to go along with weak investment so even though the cost of credit looks low in terms of real interest rates, the underlying force which is the higher disaster risk would shift back investment demand so my conjecture is that this is a key element in this explanation but i don't have this completely certain in my mind. >> i think all views have anomalies so i don't want to be completely dismissive of robert's view but i think the -- a difficulty with that line of thought it seems to me is the robustness of the stock market and the fact that you have a fairly direct measure of this

which is the price of out-of-the-money puts. which are exactly a direct insurance policy on these things. and it would be more like right to say that price is abnormally low than it would be to say that that price is abnormally high at certain periods and so i think i would be -- what would convince me that you were right would be some evidence that the price of buying a security where essentially you can price the following on a financial market, i give you x today and you give me a thousand dollars if within the next three months the dow jones average has fallen by more than 5,000 points or fallen by

more than 30% and it's my understanding that you could not make the case that there has been a dramatic increase in that price and certainly over the six or seven years since 2009 and 2010 that price has dramatically declined and that's why i think it's difficult to make that case as a store -- particularly difficult to make that case in explaining anything that haas changed between 2010 and 2016. >> i'm really sympathetic with that argument because i'm doing a lot of research along the lines that larry just sketched. and the price he's talking about peaked dramatically in 2009.

it has come back up a bit from where the bottom was in between there but that force is exactly why i am hesitant about pushing -- >> look, robert, let's do it the other way, if things were terrific, if we'd had a terrific seven years you would be explaining that unlikely disasters look phenomenally likely in 2009 and 2010 and that the broad trend was for it to be way down if 2009 and 2010 to 2016. >> i'm similar pa thet wick that, actually. i'm hesitating about pushing this line. that's what i think is the major discrepancy. >> but robert you doctor has insisted just because of your age you need to take statin and that's good for us because you've kept active. but one of the supply-side factors at work is demographics. in 2008, two big things happened

in this country, lehman failed and the first baby boomers started collecting social security and this is another thing you see across the entire world. so that you probably can't explain the synchronized nature of the slowness of output demand. populations are aging everywhere. so you get declining labor force growth and can companies are less likely to invest if their work force is shrinking over time, larry yesterday you were citing this fed working paper that suggests demographic factors can explain all of the decline in trend gdp both and trend neutral interest rate since 1980. it's a persuasive bit of evidence and if there's right is there much we can do as a policy matter to change that other than like to tell people to have more children and wait for 30 years? [ laughter ] >> well, let me just clarify what the effects of demography are and i think the things i'm

about to say about policy robert will not, i suspect agree with but i think he will agree with these analytical observations, so the first effect is if a population grows less rapidly than the labor force -- the labor force grows less rapidly so output grows less rapidly and just look at per capita output and i think robert and i both did that in the statistics we cited and productivity growth has been slower. the second observation is that the reason societies invest is in significant part to provide capital for now workers and to provide housing for new family. and so if the growth rate of new workers and families slows, one would expect the share of gdp

devoted to investment to decline and that has happened and i think demography is a significant part of the reason why and that is i think a significant part of the explanation for why real interest rates are so low and it's part of the reason why i think people who look at the interest rates and say they're extraordinarily lowly historical standards therefore policy is highly expansionary are making a mistake because relative to the proper benchmark policy isn't so expansionary. however what we have been emphasizing in this panel is that productivity defined as output per bit of labor and capital has declined substantially and there is no obvious and natural reason why

productivity as defined by labor -- per unit of labor and capital should go down just because the labor force is growing less rapidly and if anything when the labor force grows less rapidly you might expect some tendency towards increased capital intensity which would lead to a higher growth rate and productivity. so invoking demography as an explanation for slow productivity growth actually is not terribly plausible idea at least from the point of view of economic theories. i do think we would be better off with more rapid gdp growth coming from a more rapid growth in of a more effective labor force and there are things that can be done to affect that.

i do support more generous and expanded family leave policies because i believe they are likely to raise labor force participation and that is likely to lead to more rapid growth in the labor force and it seems to me there's a fairly clear market failure as to why the market will not in and of itself generate enough of that which is that if i'm the employer who competes by offering the best family leave policy, i will be the employer who gets the most people who take advantage of my family leave policy and so therefore everyone can benefit from everyone offering family leave but any one firm who innovates is strongly disincentivized. i also think there is a quite

strong case for immigration reform which, done in reasonable ways, would expand the growth of the labor force and particularly if done in ways that affected high-skilled workers would i think offer the prospect of entrepreneurship that would bring some increases in productivity. >> robert, what do you think? >> i agree with your importance observation that the productivity slowdown is something common across a group of countries and that pushes you in the direction of saying your explanations for this phenomenon should be something that works in common across the countries rather than being country-specific so one thing that pushes you toward is this view that technological progress, growth rate, is weaker

than it had been. that's certainly something that affects the countries in common. i agree with larry that the tendency toward diminishing population growth is not promising, in fact, it's well known that diminishing fertility rates, which have been quite pronounced, are a source of positive per capita gdp growth and that's very strongly confirmed empirically. it might be the case that age structure going up and more retired people could be a drag, although i've never been able to find empirical evidence for that across countries. that part maybe, the fertility should go the opposite direction. i wanted to say briefly something about public infrastructure investment which larry mentioned before. i'm basically sympathetic to that if one can concentrate on things that enhance productivity. and in particular if you want to do something like building a bridge or highway you have to think about what does that do to

productivity so you wouldn't focus on the jobs program aspects of these projects. you wouldn't be focusing on the expenditure side which would be a contributor to aggregate demand. you'd be focusing on the productive i have the-enhancing effect effect was in place. so something that makes me skeptical is what i understand about the experience of japan. i think they've had a tremendous increase in infrastructure over the last couple of decades and it certainly has not helped economic performance, including economic growth and i was also told that basally they'd gone so far in terms of infrastructure investment that the marginal return is probably negative so it's not a good model for the u.s. to follow. >> i want to pick up on that with you because you've been emphatic that it's a no brainer and it is an issue on which

there isn't a lot of disagreement. both presidential candidates want to the do more on infrastructure. my question is can it move the needle on the problems we've been discussing? you said we're 12% below trend gdp. public infrastructure is 2% of gdp. how much would you have to spend to change that number? you yourself have written about a bridge over the charles river that's hundreds of millions of dollars over budget. it's very heart to do infrastructure efficiently and quickly. what do you say to those two problems that the magnitudes and logistics are different to make this a practical solution to this stagnation you've talked about. >> first, there's a substantial amount of maintenance investment that almost certainly has a high payoff. and i think there is a tendency when people talk about infrastructure to envision

megaprojects of one kind or another, complex private/partnerships and the like and i think the ed is most compelling on the desirability of maintaining the infrastructure we have, i agree with robert, i don't think that it's either or between creating jobs and raising demand and doing things that are efficient in terms of augmenting the economy's capacity. i don't see why you have to choose between those two things but i agree completely that the right focus in choosing projects should be the ones that will have economic benefits and my read is that the highest payoff stuff, much of the highest payoff stuff involves maintenance. who knows whether their estimate is precisely right, but the american society of civil

engineers estimates that the average american pays the equivalent of a 75 cent a gallon gasoline tax in extra repairs on their car because of unnecessary potholes in america and roads, in american roads and highways. i also think there's another argument that needs to be factored into the infrastructure discussion, particularly when you talk about maintenance. and that is that we measure the national debt. we do not measure the national deferred maintenance liability. both are burdens that this generation is placing on our children and i would argue at current interest rates the cost of deferred maintenance compounds substantially more

rapidly than the cost of paper debt so even apart from any economic benefits in the form of higher gdp, simply doing deferred maintenance more promptly is a good thing. is a reasonable program of infrastructure investment going to be the silver bullet that eliminates a 12% of gdp gap? no. i think it would be a very ambitious target for growth policy to raise the growth rate of the economy by 1% from its current level and if you raise the growth rate of the economy by 1% it would obviously take substantial time to fill any gap and i think infrastructure investment is best viewed as one

important component of a program that might have that aspiration but i don't think there are silver bullets that add 12% to the gdp so i think the right task is to try to find strategies and -- strategies that will generate benefits and increase the growth rate. i do think it's a little bit misleading also to frame the debate entirely in terms of gdp. when i putter around town doing the things i do on saturday my life is is better if there's less congestion and i can get where i'm going faster. but that benefit doesn't show up in the gdp but that doesn't make

it less real so i think i would want to frame the argument for infrastructure in terms of carefully constructed cost-benefit analysis rather than in terms of the benefits just as measured in the gdp. >> but, larry, i would say from personal observation is that i've noticed that your output of blogs goes up dramatically after you've had a flight that passes through jfk. so there might be a case that it probably works in the other direction. that said, robert, how would you respond to that? >> i'm glad that larry and i can agree that fixing potholes is the most productive activity of government. [ laughter ] more generally, the question of deferred maintenance is that when you think about government debt and people have often supplemented that to think about prospective payments, for example, on pensions, that you'd also want to include the value of the public capital stock

which would have to be properly depreciated and the deferred maintenance would be part of a general framework looking at a net position in terms of what the government owns and owes. i can't resist saying something about what larry said earlier about amnesty because he missed the obvious optimal amnesty program with respect to his library book thing. the optimal amnesty program there is you announce if you bring in your illegally held books that you'll not be punished and you won't have to pay fines but after people bring it in you're supposed to say "i was only kidding." [ laughter ] and in fact you have to pay the full amount and that accomplishes two things. you get the revenue and you provide credibility that you're not going to do this again. so it's -- that's the optimal amnesty program. >> robert, you're dating yourself. if memory serves -- which i think it does, it was 28 years ago that you published that idea

in the "wall street journal." >> i think most people didn't notice or had forgotten. [ laughter ] >> i think -- i don't know if this is a more recent idea, robert, but you recently observed -- 45 minutes ago -- that no great idea was ever come up with by somebody wearing a tie so i'm tempting to take my tie off. >> like wise. >> but that goes to the idea that anything we can do to generate more ideas is probably an unambiguously positive thing. nobody has come up with a formula for that. but in the area of policy you want to do things that sustain risk taking and idea creation rather than restrain it. i think there is where the debate over regulation comes in. it's not so much it's the cost-benefit, we have to pay more to fill out these forms, you sometimes wonder whether regulation discourages risk taking. if innovation is about yields, you know, like 5% -- only 5% of good ideas produce a good outcome, you basically want to

do whatever you can to raise the denominator so you get more good ideas. but you certainly hear -- certainly i hear this all the time from business folks in big business and small business. the burden on risk taking has grown but no where are near to go to your point is that our fear of a macroeconomic disaster has put a high premium on any sort of risk taking. is that a problem? could that be part of the explanation going on here? can we do something to fix that? >> we need to sort out two different things. i don't know whether there it's a problem of yuan foreigns or not but every fifth harvard student who comes into my office has some kind of an idea to

start a startup of some kind. you look out at what's happening in the financial technology sector and there are literally thousands of firms trying to innovate in one source or other of financing so the ideas that defining -- that an importantly-defining problem of the american economy is that people can't start companies based on new ideas seems to me to be at the edge of absurd. i mean, i said 15 years ago that a great strength of the united states was with that it was the only country in the world where you could raise your first $100 million before you bought your first suit and it seems to me that that is more true today than it was when i said it 15 years ago and i detect no

evidence that that has been crushed by regulation, if anything i think that there's a real question of whether some of what holds itself out as technological innovation is actually a kind of regulatory arbitrage, that because we're doing things in the silicon valley way, we're not covered by the traditional laws and the advantage comes more from the regulatory arbitrage than it does from the technological innovation. i think's a different question about what the inhibitions are or aren't on big banks contemplating big syndicated loans and the like, but it seems to me that in terms of entrepreneurial fundamental technological innovation, i find

the argument that that's being crushed by regulation to be a very difficult one to see any evidence for. >> in terms of incentives for risk-taking type investments, i think there are two important forces that come into play there. one is kind of standard property rights issues which brings in the role of patents, taxes on success, those kinds of standard issues. with regard to patents there's a standard tradeoff that has been understood at least going back to thomas jefferson, that there's an vantage to rewarding people who come up with new ideas but once things are there you want to have them freely available and accessible so there's a kind of tradeoff there. but the other force which i think has become much more permanent recently has to do

with scale, so the kinds of activities that larry was referring to, if you're successful at something like facebook or whatever, the scale in which you can use that is so much bigger than things used to be and that, of course, is going to go the opposite dooex in terms of motivating more risk-taking activity compared with the inhibitions that might relate to things like regulations, taxes, lack of patent protection so i think you see a lot of kinds of risk taking activity that are prominent now because of the scale phenomenon that basically there's a fixed cost to figuring something out but then you can operate in terms of almost an arbitrary scale and that can produce great rewards. >> well this has been great and i have lots more questions but i would like to bring some of you into it so if you can put your hand up i'll try and get to you. for those watching on the remember, if you go to slido and enter the code aei event your

question may or may not show up here. >> there's an incentive. >> i'll start with you, sir. state your name and affiliation. >> i'm doug carr with carr capital. dr. summers, you talked about the importance of investment for both stimulating growth and increases in productivity but since we went off bretton woods, the old model that i was taught of the accelerator multiplier that government spends money that stimulates investment, that's reversed and there's a very strongly negative relationship between government spending and investment and that's both secular as well as cyclic cyclical. similarly, government deficits are strongly negatively correlated with investment. ultra low interest rates strongly negatively correlated with investment. now in the u.s. when we're

ostensibly near full employment -- >> is there a question here? >> yes, absolutely. how do you stimulate demand? >> it's for you. >> how do you stimulate demand and boost investment if all these tools for stimulating demand -- >> i don't think the -- i wouldn't subscribe to -- i think a substantial part of your analysis suggesting all these things that are negatively correlated with investment i don't think has the causal significance that you attach to it. it will be generally found that in the presence of more oncologists there's more cancer. but that is not usually taken as evidence that oncologists cause cancer. and in the same way, it will be discovered that interest rates are lowered and budget deficits tend to be increased at times when investment is weak, but it would be a serious mistake to infer from that that lower interest rates and budget deficits are necessarily causes

of low investment and so i think that relatively standard economics involving a role for the multiplier, involving a recognition that investment is sensitive to cost of capital continues to be the right way to think about economic policy twortsds investment. at other points i would have found it highly plausible, as i did, for example in advising president clinton in 1993 to believe that high capital costs associated with budget deficits and perspective, budget deficits were a significant impediment to investment and that fiscal restraint, which reduced those costs, could contribute to lower capital costs and contribute to increased investment. i think that was a plausible view in 1993 and a plausible view in many places and many

times. at the current moment when the 10-year real interest rate is zero and price earnings ratios are at extraordinarily high level, very high levels, not extraordinary by historical standards i don't find that line of thought to be particularly compelling as a way to understand fluctuations and investment going forward. >> yes, over there. >> bonnie walktell, i'm in the investment business. to mr. barro, this is to some extent a variation on this question and that link that was with mr. summers i think is provided by by alan greenspan on the subject of confidence. you mentioned simpson bowles and that's why i'm addressing this to you. so i think what alan greenspan would say is if you look at the lack of investment.

it's all in long-term assets not the stock market which is perceived as a short-term investment. long-term investment. then he says when you look at the situation with the budget deficit and projected budget deficits which are in order of magnitude higher than they have ever been before and are pretty scary, put those together it's very difficult to have confidence in the future to make long-term investments. maybe we should be flipping this argument around. if we could fix that long-term problem it might help with productivity and growth and i'm wondering -- i know it's all politically impossible but is part of the reason why it's politically impossible because economists don't convey the message yes, we really have to focus on this and do it? >> i agree with that sentiment that uncertainty about the long term fiscal situation is

probably a drag on investment. so that particularly involves taxes and on the spending side the main thing would be entitlement programs in terms of the projection looking unsustainable and in terms of the current situation. it's something that has to give and that was the whole point of the simpson-bowles commission which delivered its report in 2010 and i thought they had a lot of sensible ideas, gradual kinds of changes that try to cement the long-term fiscal situation of the u.s. government and this went back to some packages, particularly in the 1980s, that have been put into place and went further in some regards, eliminating some deductions on the federal income tax as another example, especially home mortgage interests, it seems that every now and then the government can get to a situation where it has a serious discussion of those kinds of matters and sometimes

delivers results so it hasn't been since 2010 -- i think that commission report could have been pretty much implemented if the situation has been interested in it at that point in time so we may get back to that kind of thing but i agree with your implicit argument that that's important with respect to investment and other things. >> we've stayed out of politics here pretty well but you just crossed the line. [ laughter ] >> it wasn't much of a line. >> it was. you just crossed the line by blaming the administration on simpson-bowles. let's just be clear that there were three members of the simpson-bowles panel from the house majority, all three opposed the report. it was a non-starter in the house of representatives that was controlled by the republicans. the one thing that would have made it more of a non-starter would have been barack obama's

endorse system. barack obama did what made it more likely to happen, which was stay away from it and see if the process could be restarted later. so whatever you think about simpson-bowles, somehow blaming that failure on the administration when the administration's representatives supported the recommendation and house remembers did not i think that was unworthy of you. >> oh! >> and that i think is -- that part of it i think of it is not fair. >> i thought the democrats were in charge of congress at that time. i don't understand this argument. >> no, they weren't. no. they weren't. it came after the 2010 election. so staying on non-controversial subjects, i'm going to ask -- [ laughter ] we have a question about corporate tax reform from the online audience which is pretty

importance because once again thinking about the next president's term it does seem to be one area of common ground between democrats and republicans, although getting there is obviously the challenge, the question is how much growth will come from tax reform itself versus just resolving the uncertainty that surrounds the corporate tax system? >> i think both matter i think the uncertainty has a certain tendency to -- until i know what the rules are i'm not going to make my investment plans so bringing clarity to the subject would make a positive contribution, particularly on the aspect that i referred to in termings of the return of foreign capital, obviously bringing better clarity to it will produce results that are better with a better package than with a less-good package. i think there is -- i want to say something that's very important in thinking about what

may happen over the next nine months. i think there is a rather -- i am for, as i made very clear, both infrastructure investment and corporate tax reform. and there are many people who are saying that those two things should be twinned because they're both good and democrats like infrastructure and republicans like corporate tax reform and business likes corporate tax reform and corporate tax reform will pay for infrastructure. there is a -- there are some laws of arithmetic that are constraining here which is the kinds of corporate tax reform that businesses like tend to be corporate tax reforms that mean that business pays less. just kind of the way the world is and tax reforms where business pays less are likely to

be tax reforms that need to be paid for rather than tax reforms that pay for other things. and so the idea that you can do a tax reform which both in a genuine sense improves president government's budget position and provide money to pay for a new spending priority and makes business better off, there is a real arithmetic problem there that is underappreciated by many of the tribunes of bipartisan agreements. and people tend to is want to square the circle with a budget trick which is we'll only count the revenue in the short run and we'll do something where business pays more in in the

short run but gets promised long-run benefits whose impact we won't take account of in our calculations. that's one way of squaring things but i think it will be somewhat more difficult to both genuinely pay for infrastructure and give business what it's hoping for in terms of a reduction in the amount they pay than a fair amount of the commentary suggests. >> yeah in terms of simpson-bowles in particular, i think a central idea was that we were already in trouble with entitlement spending in terms of the projections and then we're trying to do things with revenue that are in that context so it's not particularly providing additional monies for other kinds of program which is, larry, i think was indicating

would have been problematic. but in terms of uncertainty versus the overall package and rates they clearly came together in that context and i'm not sure how to say how much of importance is one piece versus the other but i think it was an attempt to make the overall package sort of sustaining over a long period in terms of squaring entitlement spending with revenues but at the same time i think it was trying to make the tax rates more favorable for things like investment, including things on the corporate side and things on the income individual tax in terms of eliminating deductions most people think are unproductive. >> there was a lot that i think was good in simpson bowles, particularly on the tax reform side. but i want to come back to this. the uncertainty idea is appealing but the kind of thing i was saying a little while ago does apply, look, new buildings

are pretty good substitutes for old buildings. a new office building competes with an old office building. and so if the environment is somehow such that it's discouraging the creation of new office buildings if environment -- that same environment by the same logic should be reducing the value of old office buildings. and if you look at commercial real estate prices now, people are discussing whether they're a bubble. i have no idea whether they are a bubble or are not but commercial real estate prices are not depressed the greenspan theory that we're not having investment in real estate and structures because of all the uncertainty has a pretty clear testable implication, namely, that the structures that

substitute for new invest ment, existing structures, should be declining in value or should have seen their value go down or should have their value depressed or you should be able to see some impact of all of this uncertainty in the value of existing structures and all you have to do is look at raeits prices to test that idea and the data go very much in the opposite direction. so i think if you want to make that argument you at least need some explanation for what's happened to the price of existing assets. >> so do you have a story about why elevated commercial real estate prices would go along with weak private investment? >> yeah, i think if -- i think that there are a set of issues around regulation and zoning,

rules on land, rules on land use, difficulty in permitting that would operate in exactly that direction, it would make it harder to build new structures and that would tend to raise the value of existing structures, i think that line of thought is a much more plausible one than the one that emphasizes new generalized uncertainty. >> i think we have time for one more question. ye, at the very back. >> greetings, i'm thomas warden. first i want to state that last week there's two great programs here at aei, one on innovation, what plays all into the growth aspect and one on infrastructure i would recommend everyone look at. my big question goes back to the issue of underlining growth. how do we get growth when we have a couple issues going on. we have third quarter growth that came out at 2.9% i think it is. overall we may not have 1%.

>> time is short so if you have a question, quickly. >> two things come into play. we have to look at back in 2013 in august -- >> question. >> the change down 3%, the price. so is the growth really that number? also in depression of the pricing if we have these taxes and everything else taking money out, how do we ever get growth if we're only going to be looking at taking money out of the economy instead of trying to get it into the economy. >> will higher taxes hurt the long-term growth outlook? >> you know, i'm sympathetic to the idea that marginal tax rates, applying to individuals who or businesses matter for things like investment and economic growth so i'm more sympathetic to the idea that the kinds of tax cuts that were in place in the 1980s actually worked and disencourage economic growth. that's not to say that that's all that matters and you

certainly had growth in the 1990s without having those kinds of cuts in tax rates but i think it's a part of the picture if you're thinking about growth and invest. >> you're going to have a tough time here because you're basically making robert's -- you're reaching robert's kind of conclusion with my kind of argument because -- >> that sounds perfect. [ laughter ] >> you're basically making an argument in keynesian terms about the impacts of tax increases, i don't think the imperative right now should be i think the imperative should be raising the growth rate. i do not think that fiscal restraint is plausibly a major growth promotion strategy at a moment when interest rates are effectively zero. and it was reasonable to think of fiscal restraint as a central

growth strategy in 1993 when capital costs were high and what was holding back investment. i think there's a very good debate to be had about the representative role of public investment and reduction of barriers to private investment. i think obviously one has to pay attention to long run fiscal sustainability but i would tell you that i think if we are successful as a country in raising the growth rate to anything like 3% there will be a strong tendency for these fiscal problems to melt away as the economy grows out of them almost regardless of what we do in terms of fiscal packages and if we are not successful and the underlying growth rate of the economy remains in the 1.5% to

2% range i think we're likely to be preoccupied with questions of long run fiscal health almost no matter what fiscal fiscal packages we're able to adopt. so i think there's a need in washington, which i think is substantially happening, for the frame of big picture economic debate, which has been for 15 or 20 years framed in terms of long-term budget plans to be reframed in terms of growth acceleration. and i think that reframing from the long-run budget issues to the question of growth ought to be something that people can agree on whether they come at it from a more progressive perspective or from a more

conservative and incentive oriented perspective. >> thanks. we as a country and i personally tend to obsess way too much over the short term and never more so than four days before a presidential election. so i am very grateful to both of you for this wonderful interlude, where we thought a lot about the long term. thank you both, robert and larry, and thank you. [ applause ]

a look now from outside the white house where president obama and president-elect donald trump have been meeting today. the president's press secretary josh earnest was scheduled to brief reporters today at about 12:30. obviously, that is running a little behind. when it does get under way, we'll have live coverage of that for you here. we do expect the reporters to ask about some of the questions that were posed and some of the topics that were discussed during that meeting between the president and president-elect trump. again, white house briefing set to start shortly, and we'll have it for you live right here on c-span3. while we wait, a short time ago, president-elect trump and president obama did hold a briefing with reporters, and here's a quick look at what they had to say.

>> i just had the opportunity to have an excellent conversation with president-elect trump. it was wide ranging. we talked about some of the organizational issues in setting up the white house. we talked about foreign policy. we talked about domestic policy. and as i said last night, my number one priority in the coming two months is to try to facilitate a transition that insures our president-elect is successful. and i have been very encouraged by the, i think, interest in president-elect trump's wanting to work with my team around many

of the issues that this great country faces. and i believe that it is important for all of us, regardless of party and regardless of political preferences, to now come together, work together, to deal with the many challenges we face. and in the meantime, michelle has had a chance to brief the incoming first lady, and we had an excellent conversation with her as well. and we want to make sure that they feel welcomed as they prepare to make this transition. and most of all, i want to emphasize to you, mr. president-elect, that we now are going to want to do everything we can to help you.

>> well, thank you very much, president obama. this is a meeting that was going to last for maybe 10 or 15 minutes. and we just got to know each other. we had never met each other. i have great respect. the meeting lasted for almost an hour and a half. and as far as i'm concerned, it could have gone a lot longer. we discussed a lot of different situations. some wonderful and some difficult. i very much look forward to dealing with the president in the future, including counsel. he's expressed some of the difficulties, some of the really great things that have been achieved. so mr. president, it was a great honor being with you, and i look forward to being with you many, many more times in the future. >> thank you.

>> and that meeting with reporters wrapped up just a short time ago. we'll find out more about what the president and the president-elect had to say, how their meeting went during today's white house briefing with press secretary josh earnest. that will start soon. we'll have live when it gets under way. right now, a conversation from this morning's "washington journal" about what we should expect for donald trump's relationship with congress. >> bob cusack is editor in chief of the hill for the first time in ten years, there's a republican in the white house. republican house and senate. smaller numbers for both the house and senate, but who has

the advantage? asked a caller about this earlier. in the early stages, who has the upper hand? >> certainly, republicans have this surprising amount of power. on election night, a lot of republicans were bracing for big losses. definitely the white house. probably the senate. and a number of house seats. and they did lose house seats, looks like in the range of nine or ten, but the senate obviously stays in republican hands. as we move forward, next year is -- could be a big policy making year because republicans have all three. they don't have 60 votes in the senate, but through this reconciliation process, they can move things with just a majority of republican senators voting for it. >> let's talk about speaker ryan. he spent the campaign campaigning for some 75 members of the house and senate, spending money for those numbmes and keeping his distance from donald trump. yesterday was a different look at paul ryan, trying to bridge that divide.

and donald trump set to meet with the house speaker today. how do they bridge that divide? how big of a divide is there, first of all? >> i think there's less of a divide than there was before the election. before the election, paul ryan and donald trump as well as mitch mcconnell and donald trump, there was never any photo op, there was never any joint press conference, which is highly unusual. it's because of controversial things donald trump said and ryan and mcconnell didn't know kind of how do we handle it? it's a very difficult, awkward position for ryan and mcconnell to be in. it all ended up with a good ending for the gop. so now, remember, before the election, donald trump suggested that paul ryan would be in a different position after the election than speaker. because he was upset at ryan. they had been feuding. now, i think that now that donald trump has this historic win, i think they're going to bury the hatchet. i don't think anyone else can get to 218 votes to become

speaker other than paul ryan. the party has to stop bickering with one another, so ryan did talk to the trump, and do think they're going to bury the hatchet. and ryan will -- in all likelihood, is going to be the speaker of the new congress. >> we have been asking the viewers throughout the morning trar priorities for the trump presidency. the first meeting between donald trump and president obama. certainly, in his last days, donald trump has been talking about investing in infrastructure spending, et cetera. go back to the 2009 bill. $830 billion was approved, but republicans spent a great deal of time then and afterwards criticizing the effectiveness, the amount of money spent. it's likely that certainly a big chunk of money is going to be spent on infrastructure. how does donald trump convince them on spending that money? >> it's interesting because no matter who won on election night, hillary clinton or donald trump have both targeted

infrastructure as a big part of their agenda. i think this will be part of trump's first 100 days. nancy pelosi, the minority leader in the house, has suggested she's ready to deal on transportation. it all depends on how they do it. there could be some tax provisions in there. those are always controversial. so i do think that before the stimulus in 2009, you mentioned, transportation was a bipartisan issue. republicans and democrats basically agreed. and were able to reauthorize the highway bill pretty regularly without just punting it down the road. after the stimulus, because of the stimulus, it really poisoned the well. i do think that has changed now. however, there's no doubt about it. the freedom caucus and the conservative movement are not going to want some big, as they would say, bloated transportation bill moving through congress. so but i do think there's enough republicans and enough democrats to get something done in the first 100 days. >> bob cusack is our guest, we

look forward to your comments, too. republicans, 202-784-8001. send us a tweet if you would like to. let's look ahead to next week. it seems like with the election of donald trump, a whole lot less drama perhaps than in the lame duck. >> i think this lame duck is not going to be a lot of business getting done. the first order of business and the biggest priority is funding the government. they must do that by i believe it's december 9th. and they have talked about maybe doing some mini appropriations packages called minibuses. it's going to be very difficult to do. honestly, conservatives, they don't want a lot done now. they want to have more power next year. so now, the president is going to be pushing for his agenda, and that includes the tpp. that is highly, highly unlikely to move in the lame duck. it's something that both hillary

clinton and donald trump, and he opposed it vigorously, so it's going to be tough to almost impossible to get that done in the lame duck. >> a reminder of our coverage, the house returning on monday. live coverage here, the senate coming in tuesday on c-span2. calls for bob cusack. let's go to the independent line first. good morning, steven. >> caller: hey, thanks for taking my call, c-span. congratulations, president-elect trump. there's a couple things president-elect donald trump promised in the debates that i want to see if he can do. one is child care. child care in new england is prohibitively expensive. and that is so important that we get child care through for us up here. another one is carried interest, tax reform. that's something that could help pay for child care. now, if he can get some form of

carried interest tax reform, i think it will be a tremendous thing. but he made his bones as a builder. if he can stick to rebuilding america alone, i would be very pleased with that. >> all right. child care and tax reform. >> well, child care is not something that was more on hillary clinton and nancy pelosi's radar than donald trump's. they talked about it a lot. clinton and pelosi. that's not going to be at the top of donald trump's agenda, at least i think for now. as far as carried interest, donald trump has -- usually, democrats will criticize republicans as for wall street and for the health care industry. donald trump has said that he's going to go after wall street. he's also criticized drug companies for drug prices and gone after the hmo industry. so on tax reform, carried

interest, he is actually for that. that's something that he and some republicans on capitol hill disagree on. and that's something that i think democrats are going to be i think homing in on. i think there's the chances of a tax reform bill, which is very difficult, the last one in the country was done in 1986, have gone up because that was not a top priority for president obama through his two terms, but it is a top priority for donald trump. he says the tax system is unfair. but it's so hard to get it done, i'm not sure he will be able to get it done, but there will be a lot of talk of it. >> a headline says pence may be powerful vice president in truffle's liaison to congress. what do you see as the role of former congressman now governor, now veept vice president-elect mike pence? >> one of the best things donald trump did throughout his campaign is number one, picking mike pence.

mike pence mobilized the conservative movement. mike pence is a fiscal and he is a social conservative. and the base loves mike pence. so now, mike pence served in the house for a number of years. and he took on president bush on medicare drug legislation. he was kind of tea party before the tea party. he has great relationships with paul ryan and mitch mcconnell. i think he's going to play a huge role in getting the details. donald trump not a big detail guy. mike pence can be the detail guy on capitol hill. it's all about relationships in politics. mike pence has great relationships not only with republicans on capitol hill, but mike pence is very media savvy. he's going to be a major player. >> on those details, president-elect trump short on a lot of the details for his programs but will begin to get a sense of those as the budget is developed for the next year. when does that process start for a potential trump employees, trump appointees, i should say?

>> now the transition is number one. they have to decide who is going to fill these key positions. there's already chatter about who is going to fill his cabinet. after he does that, and they try to move quickly. they nominate people and try to get them approved in january. then you've got to come up with the budget. and that's going to have -- that first budget is the most closely scrutinized document in basically since the last president's first year. that's going to be big. people are going to look at, okay, what are the details? is the proposal to build a wall along the southern border of the united states in there? what's the cost? you have to have cost in there. he said mexico is going to pay for it. there's a lot of work to be done between now and inauguration. >> good morning to charles on the republican line. >> caller: yes, good morning. the first thing, i'm a black republican, and i have said that many times. a black man in america. what donald trump has really

done is more than any white candidate that i have ever seen done. he actually approached the subject of doing something for the inner cities and black people. there's several subjects i want to hear. in two years we have the midterm elections. i'm satisfied with donald trump. in two years we have the midterm election. in four years, most republicans were lining up for 2020. now, donald trump will be the incumbent. and many of those republicans that had an idea about 2020 can just about forget about it. the third thing i would like to talk about this, what you people keep saying about black people vote for, and who do black people like. you have all these people on televisi television, black individuals saying black people want this. black people want the same thing donald trump is talking about. it reminds me of the 1960s.

i'm very sad to say this. i'm not a muslim, but i'm a christian. my religion starts in matthew and jesus christ. let's get that straight first. but malcolm x said something that really, really reverberated with me. asked who were the black leaders in the black communities, this guy asked malcolm x. he said, well, we're tired of singers and dancers and clowns and people like that considering themselves the leaders of black people. and you know, when you look, really look at it, i think about who are the black leaders? phil jackson led about all basketball teams to championships. i'm so sick and tired of black individuals running around to

calling themselves black leaders. >> all right, charles in richmond, thank you. >> you mentioned phil jackson, a knicks fan. he hasn't done very well with the knicks. overall, donald trump did not do well with minority voters. however, the early data suggests, like everyone was wrong, the pollsters, the pundits, the media, nobody thought donald trump would run, but the early data suggests that, yes, hillary clinton won the black vote overwhelmingly, but african-americans did not come out as much, not nearly even close to when barack obama was elected in 2008 and 2012. and if you look at it, mitt romney and john mccain got more votes than donald trump did, but hillary clinton did not have the turnout that they expected. and that's going to be a challenge for donald trump, is uniting the country because a lot of minorities did not vote for him. and he's going to have to worry about that in two years with the midterms and in four years. remember, like when george w.

bush and barack obama got elected, their teams worked very hard behind the scenes to avoid a primary challenge. that's what trump team is going to have to do about 2020. not necessarily to beat donald trump but to weaken him. so both bush and obama avoided a primary challenge unlike bush one, and they both won re-election. >> bob cusack is our guest, editor in chief of the hill. >> this health care law is collapsing under its own weight, so to your specific question about repealing and replacing obamacare, this congress, this house majority, this senate

majority, has already demonstrated and proven we're able to pass that legislation and put it on the president's desk. the problem is president obama vetoed it. now we have president trump coming who is asking us to do this. so with unified republican government, we can fix this. we can fix these problems. look, it's not just the health care law we can replace because we now have shown the willingness and the ability to do it. there's so many more things that i'm excited about. think about the laid off coal workers who see relief coming. think about the farmers here in wisconsin who are being harassed by the epa. think about the ranchers in the west getting harassed by the interior department or the laid off timber workers. there is relief coming. this is good for our country. this means that we can lift the oppressive weight of the regulatory state. we can restore the constitution. think about the conservative constitution respecting judges that will be nominated. this is very exciting. >> saying there's relief coming.

>> yeah, certainly obamacare is at the top of their agenda, to repeal it, and they can do that with a majority of votes in the senate. so they just have to keep their guys in line, and of course, this is something that unites the republican party. if you think about obamacare, it survived some major challenges. two supreme court challenges, the 2012 election where mitt romney vowed to eradicate it. now it's being targeted again and now republicans appear to have the vote. however, they have to replace it. replacing it is very difficult. it's not really been able to coalesce behind one legislative proposal that has been scored by the congressional budget office. repealing it is easy. replacing it, very difficult. >> of all the things donald trump said in the campaign, the platform, where do you think he'll get the most pushback from a republican congress? >> one of the things that has not been on the agenda on really either candidate is cutting government spending. that is something that is big for the conservative movement. it was big on the agenda in

2010. and that's what happened in 2011. obama really -- as he said, he got shellacked, his party got shellacked in 2010. 2016, donald trump has not said let's raise the retirement age for medicare, social security. those are things that republicans on capitol hill do believe in and note that medicare and definitely medicare is headed for bankruptcy earlier than social security. we have to do something. democrats say that' sotsolution. i think the growth of government and the debt is something that conservatives want trump to really take seriously and to focus a lot more on. >> warsaw, new york. the independent line. welcome. >> caller: good morning, c-span. i'm so behind in my sleep because i stayed up all night long tuesday night. and i really am so excited about this whole thing because when you're in new york state, you have to stay up all night long praying because we're fighting the electoral college besides

hillary clinton. and i was just praying and praying and praying. and now, my major -- i'm not as generous as donald trump and the giuliani and all of them. my major objective, and i think an awful lot of people in this country, we're so disgusted with washington, d.c. and donald promised us he was going to clean up the swamp. for all of those republicans, i would start right there with ryan. and with mitch mcconnell, and with lindsey graham and john mccain, and i would make their lives so damn miserable that they would quit their jobs and go home and plow the fields. because they are not for america. they're not for anything except themselves and their paychecks. they're a total bunch of turn-coats and i have no use for any of them. like i said, my candidate

originally was ben carson. and i hope that donald gives him a very important job in his cabinet. giuliani, some of the ones that really stood by him. because donald is going to need a lot of help, but he's not going to get any real help from all of those hangers-on, those worthless republicans. they're even worse than the democrats. >> okay, paula, we'll let you go and hope you get some sleep. bob cusack. >> you mentioned the popular vote. it's interesting after the 2000 election, which gore won the popular vote, but george w. bush won the electoral college, after the supreme court decision was final, clinton called for the end of the electoral college. and she ended up winning the popular vote. a couple things there. drain the swamp is actually a phrase that nancy pelosi used in 2006. and it helped them win the house majority. donald trump is now saying drain the swamp, whether it's

congressional term limits, popular outside the beltway, not popular inside the beltway. hard to get that done because members of congress don't like that. ban on lobbyists in his administration. i think ben carson is going to have a prominent role. he's a top adviser for donald trump. i think he will be in the cabinet, maybe hhs secretary or something along those lines because he is a doctor. as far as the anger at republicans, sure, that continues. if they're able to get stuff done, if ryan is working with trump, and i fully expect that to happen, they'll be able to get legislation passed. that might help congressional approval ratings. democrats are not, if they target obamacare and other things obama has done, they're going to fight very, very hard. >> the election that donald trump put into a tough place some of the senators, john mccain, lindsey graham, jeff flake. >> puts them in a very difficult position. you think of 2020, most of this town and the pundits were thinking about 2020 republicans

running and we were thinking -- >> bob cusack. you can watch the rest of this online at c-span.org as we take you live to the white house daily briefing. >> i do not haany announcement. do you want to start? >> president obama described -- i was wonder if you could tell us if there was anything president-elect trump told the president about how he plans to govern the country that led to -- >> well, i had an opportunity shortly before coming out here to visit briefly with president obama about the meeting. and there are many details of their discussion they'll keep between the two of them. a couple things i can share with you, obviously, the president indicated during the pool spray that they had an opportunity to discuss foreign policy and domestic issues. some of those foreign policy

issues came up in the context of the president's upcoming trip overseas. the president described to the president-elect some of the issues he expects to come up with some of our allies and partners and other world leaders he'll meet with on the trip. it was an opportunity to talk about some of those issues in advance of the president's trip and in advance of some of the conversations he plans to have with world leaders. there's also an opportunity for the two leaders to talk about staffing and organizing a white house. that's complicated business. and any white house is expected to be structured in a way to deal with multiple challenges or even multiple crises at the same time. and the president-elect indicated a lot of interest in understanding the strategy of staffing and organizing the white house. obviously, that's something president obama has thought about extensively during his eight years in office.

they spent a large portion of the meeting discussing the importance of properly staffing up and organizing a white house operation. look, other than that, what the president heard from the president-elect is a clear commitment to the kind of effective, smooth transition that president obama has been vowing to preside over for the better part of a year, and the president tends to make good on the promise in the 70 days ahead. >> did the president leave the meeting any more reassured that president-elect trump will not try to dismantle all of the work that you and your colleagues have done over the last eight years and did president obama make any pitch to trump, for instance, not to get rid of obamacare or any significant policies? >> i'm not going to get into all of the details of their meeting. i think that president obama came away from the meeting with

renewed confidence in the commitment of the president-elect to engage in an effective smooth transition. that obviously is what president obama believes, serves the american people the best. we're committed to doing what's is required on our part to make sure that that happens and the president was pleased to hear a similar commitment expressed by the president-elect. >> do you know if the president got any reassurances from trump about whether he plans to pursue what he discussed during the campaign about trying to incarcerate hillary clinton? >> listen, i'll let president-elect -- let the president-elect read out his end of the conversation. but as i mentioned yesterday, the president was -- found reassuring the kind of tone that the president-elect conveyed in his election night remarks. as i mentioned yesterday, these were remarks that the president-elect delivered not just to his supporters in the

ballroom but to the citizens of the country that were tuned in to this historic election, and also to people around the world. and given the intensity of scrutiny of his remarks, it's notable that he chose that kind of tone. i think we saw a similar tone just in the oval office 30 minutes ago. where he was indicating his commitment to working closely with the outgoing administration to insure a smooth, effective transition. it doesn't mean they agree on all the issues. they obviously have deep disagreements. but what they do agree on is a commitment to a smooth and effective transition. that's a good thing for the country. >> did president-elect trump talk about looking forward to meeting president obama's council in the future? did they agree to meet again?

are they expected to continue the conversations they had today in additional format? >> i'm not aware of any addit n additional meeting, but i wouldn't rule out additional consultations. over the last eight years, president obama has benefitted from the kinds of conversations he has been able to have with previous presidents. i wasn't surprised to hear that president-elect trump indicated that he feels like he would benefit from those conversations over the course of his presidency as well. >> was it awkward at all given all of the rancor that the two men exchanged with each other on the campaign trail and even before that? was the meeting awkward at all in terms of getting past that? was there a moment -- >> to be as specific as possible about this, roberta, there is no staff in the room when president obama and president-elect trump sat down in the oval office for 90 minutes. so i think it's probably a question you would have to ask

the two of them. i feel confident in telling you that they did not resolve all their differences. i also feel confident in telling you they didn't try to resolve all their differences. what they sought to do was lay the foundation for an effective transition from the obama presidency to the trump presidency. and this administration at the direction of president obama has been preparing for this moment and this meeting for the better part of a year. and this obviously was an important early step, having the president sit down with the president-elect to discuss that transition. and you know, based on the kind of agreement that was evident about the priorities that they both placed on a smooth transition, it sounds like the meeting might have been at least a little less awkward than some might have expected. >> you said it was just the two of them alone, no staff in the room? >> that's correct.

that's correct. >> and the pool waiting to go into the oval had seen some other officials on the south lawn. i was wondering if you could tell us about what other officials from the white house may have met -- who was in those sort of discussions and meetings going on at the same time? >> i know that the president-elect's spokeswoman, ms. hicks was here. i had an opportunity to meet her. while the president-elect was meeting with president obama. you noted that she also had longer meetings with some of the members of my colleagues in the communications team. you noted that mr. kushner was here and had an opportunity to visit with the chief of staff. those are the only two staffers from the president-elect's team i had an opportunity to meet today. there might have been others who came with im. i will clarify there is a more formal process that we would

expect would guide the interactions between the president's team and the president-elect's team for the two months between now and the inauguration. but there will be a formal process for that kind of consultation to insure a smooth transition. the kinds of conversations today were much more informal in nature. >> president-elect trump mentioned that some high flying assets. i wonder if you know what he was referring to when he talked about that. >> i'm not sure what he was talking about. >> michelle. gr as far as slenls goes is talking about a smooth transition and having a good tone. i mean, that's all that excellent means in this? >> well, i think when you consider the profound differences between the two gentlemen, when you consider the fact that they have never met before in person. and when you consider the high priority that the president places on a smoot and effective transition, i think that

qualifies as excellent. >> donald trump mentioned that this was originally supposed to only last 10 to 15 minutes. is that true? why would it go on so much longer than that? >> the president had allotted more time on his schedule for that meeting than just 10 to 15 minutes, but they did end up spending about 90 minutes talking about a range of issues including what i described to josh earlier. i think that would be an indication of a pretty robust, valuable meeting. >> talking about the president still having deep concerns, obviously, and everything he said on the campaign trail about donald trump was true. this meeting, i mean, considering all of that, it was a brief meeting. did it did anything to assuage any of those concerns? >> listen, as i mentioned yesterday, the president campaigned vigorously across the country, making a forceful case in favor of the candidate that

he supported. and he did nat right up to the night before election day. on election day, the ballots were counted. and the american people decided. the president was never in a position to choose a successor. the american people chose his successor. the president vowed to work with whomever the american people chose, so no, they did not re-create some sort of presidential debate in the oval office today. they were focused on doing the work of the american people, fulfilling their institutional responsibilities, and on president obama's part, that means laying the groundwork so that the incoming president-elect can hit the ground running. after all, as president obama said in the rose garden yesterday, we're all rooting for his success when it comes to uniting and leading this country. >> the president still has concerns is what you're saying. >> what i'm saying is that the forceful case that the president made on the campaign trail

leading up to election day reflected his authentic views about the stakes of the election and about the candidate that he went all in to support. >> obviously, there was nothing in this meeting that would change any of that? >> well, i guess what i'm saying is that the meeting was not convened to try to resolve the various concerns that president obama had raised on the campaign trail. the meeting was focused on the transition, and it went well. >> do you think that some of trump's advisers have just prior to this meeting talked about looking for all of the ways or wanting a list of all the ways that they could roll president obama's policies back starting on day one, does the president fully expect that to happen? >> well, listen. i'm not going to prejudge what their transition process is. obviously, our goal is to make sure that the incoming president-elect can hit the ground running and can enjoy success when it comes to uniting and leading the country.

that's what the president promised yesterday. convening the meeting in the oval office today is part of the process. what priorities they choose to set for their earliest days is something you can ask trump. >> what do you expect? >> the president's expectation is the incoming president will set his own priorities and pursue them accordingly. and again, our goal is to provide them the kind of advice that would give the president-elect and his team the opportunity to succeed in uniting and leading the country. that's what he's indicated that he has made his priority. and we certainly are prepared to do everything we can over the next 71 days to support him in that effort. >> does the president now have any reason to believe that donald trump is fit to be president of the united states? >> the two men did not relitigate their differences in the oval office. we talked about them quite a bit

in here leading up to the election. we're on to the next phase. >> if there are meetings, further meetings set up with senior staffers in the white house since donald trump won the presidency, especially national security or economic team? >> my understanding is that the broader formal process has not yet commenced with meetings. there were a number of meetings between white house personnel and members of both candidates' transition teams in the months leading up to the election. and i know there have been a number of consultations with the president-elect's team and the white house team. but the formal meetings i don't believe have started just yet. >> i wanted to ask about press access. the meeting with the vice president-elect pence and the

vice president, was a break, and carol reported that the obamas cancelled a photo op. >> that not true. >> okay, can you talk about then why we didn't have a photo opwhen we have had them in previous administrations and why there's no presidential access, and particularly if this is -- >> first of all, justin, you were just in the oval office with the president of the united states and the president-elect. it's not acretto say there was no press access. over the last eight years i enjoyed the opportunity to have many of you in by office advocating for greater access to the president and the work he's doing in the oval office. motthat typically means is you coming in and advocating for the opportunity to see the president of the united states sitting in the oval office, photograph him sitting next to the person he's meeting with, and then hear from both people about the meeting. that is the -- that's the priority that has been conveyed to me in countless meetings with all of you over the last eight

years. that was exactly what was provided today. that was not provided in 2008. i wasn't part of designing the press access for 2008, so i can't account for all of the reasons for that, but the press access we put together today was based on the guidance we received from all of you over the last eight years about what the priority is. we were pleased to be in a position to provide that today. it's an indication of the commitment we have to transparency and an indication that the president has to building public confidence in the shared commitment to a smooth and effective transition. what better way for the american public to understand that the president-elect and the outgoing president of the united states share a priority of a smooth and effective transition than to allow you all into the oval office to hear them talk about their commitment to that effort. >> one way to demonstrate that you guys are committed to that, i guess, effective transfer of power, would be to show the vice

president or the first lady w k walking their successors into the white house. >> but i think we would all agree that would be lower in priority than what was provided today. what was provided today is unprecedentsed in terms of the access granted to previous white house press corpses. there's also going to be back and forth. >> the reason i'm asking the question is, while the president has come out and sort of put on a cheery face, we know obviously many people here are disappointed. the first lady spoke compassionately about how she found donald trump to be a bad choice. should we read anything, the reason there wasn't press access to either of those events is because the first ledo or vice president didn't want to be photographed -- >> absolutely not. in fact, i'm not aware that the first lady's office was consulted about the press arrangements for today. i certainly didn't consult with

them. what we can do is we can go back to the white house photographer and see if there are any photos from the greet so that you all can get some incite into how that went. we'll follow up with you on that. >> number of foreign governments from top allies of the united states, turkey and the united kingdom, mexico, said their leader leaders -- president-elect, the last 24 to 48 hours. beyond sort of congratulatory calls, is there concern among you guys as you're trying to pursue your foreign policy agenda over the next two months that allies could be getting mixed messages on the united states foreign policy goals? >> i'm not aware of any concern about that. it is not uncommon for countries that have important relationships with the united states for them to call and offer their congratulations to the president-elect. some of that -- some of those

conversations are facilitated by the state department. in other cases, you have foreign governments going directly to the president-elect's office. that's kinconsistent with past practice. i'm confident it happened in 2008 as well. >> first, i'm kind of curious as an hr professional. did he say you need to get a great chief of staff, did he say there's one job you never heard of but it's vital? or is it just, you know, obviously, donald trump knows he has to staff the white house. how much precision is the president offering in his recommendation? >> well, i'll be honest with you. i didn't have a detailed conversation with president obama about this, but knowing how he has approached thee issues himself, i think he has built an organization at the white house with an eye toward surrounding himself with capable people and putting them in positions where they are given the authorities that they need to make decisions.

also, he's insured that they are given the authority that they need to elevate decisions to him if they need to be. so structuring -- structuring the organizational chart effectively is not an insignificant matter when you're talking about life and death decisions that have to be made on a regular basis in this building. so the president will be taking some questions over the course of the next week and maybe somebody can see greater insight on that. >> i'm looking overseas to the operations against the islamic state. the president recently sent 1700 more american troops there. you have long insisted they don't have a combat mission. these are combat troops. why did they go? are you saying they needed 1,700 more troops worth of advice? we're starting to see social media of americans who look like

they are in front line operations, not in supportive roles. >> what we made clear is our service members when they go to iraq, they're trained for combat. they're equipped for combat because they need to defend themselves in a dangerous country, but they're not given a combat mission. that is an important distinction because the president does not believe that american troops should be in a situation in which they're expected to be at the tip of the spear, to go and take and hold ground. the idea of the u.s. military being an occupying force in iraq is not one that has yielded success for our country. it's not made our country safer. what the president envisioned and the mission they had been given is a dangerous one. it's one that in which american service members are asked to assume great risk. so that they can be in a position to in some cases train iraqi security forces. in other cases, so they can

operate advice and assistance as iraqi security forces undertake important military objectives. there are even some situations where if some of those trainers or advisers end up in a dangerous position, then there are additional u.s. forces that are mobilized to get them out. it's dangerous work. this does put them in harm's way, and it does put them in a situation where occasionally, they have to use their combat training and their combat equipment to defend themselves. but that is much different than being in a situation in which they are asked to take and hold territory. that's just a different strategy and it's a different mission. both of them are dangerous. both of them require courage and professionalism and skill and sacrifice. and that's what we have seen from our men and women in uniform. >> the point about occupying, but the kinds of troops you're sending now are actually the kinds of troops that take

grounds and hold it at least briefly. >> well, again, i recognize that the service members that president obama has sent to iraq do have extraordinary combat capabilities. they have expensive training. they have the kind of combat equipment you could see in a theater of war, that you would expect our service members have when they're operating in a dangerous place. but the mission they have been given is different than the mission they were given by president bush that involved occupying a foreign country. that didn't work out well, and president obama believed we need to try a different strategy. that is yielding important success. in iraq alone, we have taken back more than 50% of the occupied populated territory that isil previously held. now, with the support of these advisers and trainers and other u.s. forces that are offering assistance. iraqi security forces have isolated mosul and beginning the important, painstaking work of ejecting isil from mosul.

we're making progress based on the strategy the president has put forward. this is a strategy that requires our service members assume great personal risk, but it's a strategy that is yielding progress and making america safer. john. >> what was the president's message to thousands and thousands of people across the country protesting this election? some of them carrying signs saying "not my president." >> well, john, i think the first thing the president would say is that we've got a carefully, constitutionally protected right to free speech. and the president believes that that is a right that should be protected. it is a right that should be exercised. without violence. and there are people who are disappointed in the outcome. the president's message in the rose garden was, it's not surprising that people are disappointed in the outcome, but it's important for us to remember a day or two after the election that we're democrats

and republicans, but we're americans and patriots first. that's the message that the president hopes that most people will hear. but are there some people who are going to be disappointed and are they going to express those views in public? i think we have seen that's the case. they have constitutional rights to do that, and those rights should be protected. but the president would obviously want them to hear his message as well. >> given all that's been said, were you surprised to hear donald trump say the president is a very good man who he respects? >> listen, i think the kind of tone that we heard from the president-elect in the oval office today is consistent with the kind of tone that he used in his remarks on election night. and that's the kind of tone that you heard president obama welcome in the rose garden. it certainly is something that the president was pleased to hear. >> he did say he would seek the president's counsel and there would be many more meetings. is president obama open to meeting again with president

trump including after he -- i mean, when he becomes president trump? >> of course, look, the president has benefitted from the kind of consultation he's had with former presidents. and president obama is determined as he mentioned yesterday, to do as much as possible to insure that president trump can have success in uniting and leading this country. as president obama himself said, he's rooting for his success as he takes on the important work of uniting the country after a divisive election and leading our country forward in a way that is consistent with the best interests of many generations of americans. >> i know you said they didn't relitigate the campaign, but want to ask what the president's thoughts are. he said just on monday that donald trump is temperamental temperamentally -- said on monday, donald trump is

temperamentally unfit to be commander in chief. uniquely unqualified. does he still believe that? >> look, the president's views haven't changed. he stands by what he said on the campaign trail. he had an opportunity to make his argument. he made the argument vigorously. he made that argument in states all across the country. but the american decided. the election is over. the president didn't get to choose his successor, the american people did. they have chosen president-elect trump, and president obama is daerc determined to preside over a transition that gives the incoming president an opportunity to get a running start. major. >> just this line of questioning, the president assured president-elect trump that he would do everything he can to make a swift and sure transition. did he ask of president-elect to have his backing for anything he may do in foreign policy while he's still president? get assurances from him there would be no criticism, either through back channels or publicly of what he's still trying to accomplish while he

retains the power? >> i didn't ask the president if he sought that assurance from the president-elect so i can't say for sure what was discussed. the thing that i am sure of is that everybody understands we have one president at a time. and president obama is president of the united states until january 20th. and he will exercise the authorities of the office consistent with his view about what's in the best interest of the about kraecountry. on january 20est, it will be the president-elect's opportunity to do that. >> the president-elect doesn't understand or appreciate that? >> well, listen, i think you would have to talk to the president-elect's team about whether or not he would object to the principle i just laid out. >> the russian government said today there were contacts between it and the trump campaign and the clinton campaign during the course of the campaign. does the white house find any reason at all to be concerned about that or would it fall into the category of normal embassy communications between two

campaigns, one of which may become the president of the united states? >> i can't speak to the nature of those conversations, obviously, so it's hard to judge them in the abstract. >> the conversations during the campaign, does it raise a higher level of anxiety or alarm? >> listen, what i know based on my own personal experience is i know there were, when president obama was running for president, there were occasions where members of his team did consult with representatives of other governments. i don't think there's anything inheritly nefarious to that, but i can't speak to the conversations that may have occurred, so i don't think i can pass judgment one way or the other, but i don't think there's anything inherently nefarious about it. >> the president-elect mentioned difficulties on the foreign policy stage were discussed. did the president going into the meeting wanting to convey anything in particular about what's going on in mosul and iraq and perhaps convey

information that he might not be aware of or not be sufficiently appreciated. i don't need to tell you. in the last two weeks if not longer, the president-elect describing what is going on in mosul as something approaching an abjackect disaster, which i w is not your presentation. did the president saying here's stuff you might want to know because you're going to inherit what this is on january 20th. >> the president did feel obligated to touch on some important foreign policies. i know the campaign against isil in iraq and syria are important foreign policies. i don't know to what extent it was discussed. >> thanks. >> ron. >> you said that the president stands by everything that he said on the campaign trail. about donald trump. >> that's right. >> then the president must be very concerned about the future of the country. >> well, listen. the president right now is concerned on the most important institutional priority that he

has right now, which is presiding over a smooth and effective transition. >> again, if he still feels this way about the president-elect, he must be concerned about the future of the country beyond this transition. >> look, ron, the president had an opportunity to make a very forceful case in public in states all across the country in support of the candidate he endors endorsed. the american people chose someone else. he's committed to working with that person, the person he did not support, to insure a smooth and effective transition. there's a long tradition in our democracy of presidents doing that because they have a responsibility sooput their own political views aside and perform the functions of the presidency. one of those functions is to insure a peaceful, smooth, and effective transition because america is going to do its best when its presidents are performing at its best, and president obama is determined to do everything he can to allow the president-elect and his team to hit the ground running. >> i can understand that, but the question, after the transition, what does the

president intend to do? is he going to become something of an opposition figure? he's got to be concerned about the direction that the president-elect has said he will take the country. f >> as all of you have heard, the president's plans to take a long vacation have not changed and he's looking forward to that as much as ever. over the longer term, you know, i don't have any commitments to make on the part of the president. one thing that i can share with you is something i have heard him say. i know in private, i assume he's said it in public, too, which is the idea that he deeply appreciated how a president george w. bush after leaving office gave the new president running room, gave him space. wasn't back seat driving in public offering up all kinds of critiques with every decision that president obama was making in the earliest days of his presidency. i'm confident that george w. bush didn't agree with every

decision president obama was making, but he was extraordinarily respectful of the democratic process. president obama admired that. but look, i can't make any promises now for what exactly president obama will do once he leaves office. >> in the next 70-some odd days is there a strategy that the white house has, the president has, to try to preserve and protect certain aspects of what he's accomplished here? what are the priorities? >> well, i think the first priority is insuring the smooth and transition. but there's also the priority that the president places on making sure as the chief of staff likes to say, is we run through the tape. that the president and his team use every moment that's remaining to do the work of the american people and to effectively implement the kinds of policies that president obama has priorized over the course of his presidency. >> what are some of those priorities now, given the change of administration, given the fact that donald trump has won

the presidency. what specifically is the focus? what are the priorities? >> i don't know that i can give a comprehensive list of some of the priorities that come to mind are the priorities that would be in place regardless -- you know, regardless of the outcome of the election. whether or not mr. trump had emerged victorious from the election, we could be focused on the implementation of the affordable care act and maximizing the opportunity that is currently available for millions of americans to go to healthcare.gov and sign up for health care. for those individuals who already have health care, they can shop around. many will find there actually is a comparable health care plan available that will cost them less money. so making that a priority is something we would do regardless of who had won the election, but that certainly is a high priority right now. obviously, when it comes to counterterrorism and homeland security, that's always a priority. that was true before the election and that certainly is true after the election.

and we certainly wouldn't want any of our adversaries to be confused about the fact that america might somehow be uniquely vulnerable in this transition. that's not true. this administration is strong, and our homeland security efforts are as vigorous as they have ever been. we're going to continue that effort. you made reference, or somebody made reference to the ongoing work against isil in iraq and in syria. the united states is leading a coalition with 67 partners to degrade and ultimately destroy that terrorist organization. there are some consequential decisions that have been made recently by leaders on the ground both in iraq and in syria to focus on the significant strategic objective of defeating isil in their two declared capitals in iraq and syria. that effort is under way. it's dangerous business, but it's a high priority. if successful, stands to advance

our objectives to make the american people safer. those are three priorities at the top of everyone's mind around here, and the truth is that would be the case regardless of the outcome of the election. >> this is the first time these two men met. >> that's correct. >> the old cliche, first impressions. what was his first impression of donald trump? >> i didn't ask that question before i came out here. maybe you will get an opportunity to ask him, but i will keep you poised on that, but the -- look, the overriding impression, i don't know if it's the first one, but the overriding impression is his positive assessment about the commit mment of the president-elect to a smooth and effective transition is going to maximize the likelihood that we'll achieve that objective. >> donald trump's adviser said today that the president-elect doesn't view settlement as an obstacle to peace, which is a

different position than the president has, and the president has been looking at perhaps doing something on this issue before he leaves office, to put it in a different place than it is now and a trajectory to now the next president would -- is he considering doing something like that still, and is he of the view at this point, we have a president-elect, taking steps like that when you have such wide disagreement is not the proper thing to do? >> well, my first reaction is that the concern that you have heard president obama express about the expansion of settlements is not just a paul ace of this administration. it was the policy of previous democratic and republican administrations that expressed concern about that. the view is trying to push back from the ground puts a negotiated settlement, a resolution of differences

between the two parties further away. the president views that kind of continued settlement expansion as counterproductive. and again, that's consistent with the policy that democratic and republican administrations have expressed. more generally, i don't have anything to preview in regard to additional steps president obama may consider before leaving office. the principle that we have articulated is that it is really important for the israelis and palestinians to sit down in the context of face-to-face negotiations and resolve their differences. and president obama has expended enormous effort. secretary kerry probably more than anybody else, to try to bring those two sides together. thus far, they have not yielded the progress we would like to see. but, you know, our belief that that's the only way that the differences will be resolved is, you know, continues to be true.

>> does the president have a philosophy on the issue when you have a president and a president-elect who differ so much on the different foreign policies, does he believe now is not the time to take steps that would be at odds with what the next president might want to do for guantanamo bay, for instance, or other things. what's his general view? >> his general view, again, i think this is the view of o outgoing presidents in both parties, which is that there is one president at a time. and president obama has the authority of the office of president until january 20th. and he will make decisions consistent with his view about the best way to advance the interests of the country. in the afternoon of january 20th, that awesome responsibility will be transferred to the president-elect, and then he will be given that awesome responsibility. in this interim transition

period, what president obama has committed to is doing our best to coordinate and communicate with the president-elect's team. when it comes to exercising that authority, that authority rests solely with president obama. until january 20th. april. >> josh, a couple questions. one, did you get any kind of read out of the first lady's office about her meeting with melania trump? >> i didn't hear from them. the first lady hosted mrs. trump in the private residence of the white house for some tea and a tour of the private residence. part of that tour included stepping out on the truman balcony. i think all of you have heard the president and first lady talk about the quality of time that they have spent on the truman balcony. and mrs. obama took the opportunity to show it off to mrs. trump. there also was an opportunity for the two women to walk

through the state floor of the white house with the curator, bill ullmann. some of you had an opportunity to viz with him. he's essentially a walking encyclopedia of knowledge about everything at the white house. so mrs. trump had an opportunity to hear from him. they also had a discussion about raising kids at the white house. and you know, obviously, the first lady's two daughters spent their formative years of their childhood here at the white house. and mrs. trump's son will also spend some important years of his childhood here at the white house. and that's a unique childhood. and the two of them had an opportunity to talk about that experience and being a good parent through that experience. and then after their tour concluded, the first lady and mrs. trump walked over to the oval office and the two couples

visited again before they departed. >> the first lady and mrs. trump walked over after that? >> that's correct, yes. >> now, the next thing. going back to justin and the pictures of the transition. i recall when george w. bush was president-elect, then-president bill clinton walked him down to the oval office and the press were there. i remember years ago, george w. bush and mrs. bush, laura bush, first lady laura bush, greeted this then-president-elect barack obama at the diplomatic door, and they also did the walk. what happened? i mean, i understand you said you wanted us to see them, you wanted to give us more access. but the precedent has been set for the walks and pictures. what happened?

>> well, we went over and above the precedent by providing access to the oval office. you and i talked about this many times over the last eight years, the priority you place is getting access to the oval office and hearing directly from the president, and the person that he's meeting with, about the meeting that just occurred. that didn't happen in 2000. when president clinton welcomed president-elect george w. bush to the white house. it didn't happen in 2008 when president bush welcomed president-elect obama to the white house. i'm not criticizing the previous two white houses. i'm stating that the access provided by this white house is entirely consistent with the kind of request that we have been fielding from all of you over the last eight years. >> i hate to repeat this, but just understanding that initial picture, the initial meeting. the arrival, seeing the body language. a picture speaks 1,000 words. the first glanls, the first

moments speak 1,000 words. i guess that's what we're talking about. >> listen, i understand that. we'll consult with the white house photographer and see if there are photos he was able to capture of that moment and share them with all of you. it certainly is not just your right but your responsibility to advocate for more access, and i respect that. >> thank you. lastly, can you give us a construct of what it looks like when a former president counsels a current president? i know that bill clinton counselled george w. bush. as you said, the president has taken the counsel of other presidents. what are some of the issues and what does that look like, if you could tell us that? >> we have gone to great lengths to keep that private. that consultation between presidents and former presidents is private. and there's a special