mark zandi, mark "superstorm" zandi, and jared bernstein, thanks, guys. >>> coming up we're countinghe jobs report. the final predictions from a panel of experts ahead. >>> and don't forewet the nail of the number sweepstakes, tweet your payroll predictions for your chance to win a cnbc picture frame signed by the "squawk on the street" gang. back in two minutes. >>> coming up, the campaign to rebuild detroit. bringing in labor to fill job openings, incentivizing workers to move downtown, overhauling derelict buildings. investing in local talent. guest host dan gilbert is at the center of it all. how he's revitalizing motor city next. [ male announcer ] this is steve. he loves risk. but whether he's climbing everest, scuba diving the great barrier reef with sharks, or jumping into the market, he goes with people he trusts, which is why he trades with a company that doesn't nickel and dime him with hidden fees. so he can worry about other things, like what the market is doing and being ready, no matter what happens, which isn't rocket science. it's just common sense, from td ameritrad

. >> susie: mark zandi says "bad things will happen to the economy pretty fast" if lawmakers don't settle the fiscal cliff issue. he's chief economist of moody's analytics. so mark falling off the fiscal cliff means bad things. how bad? >> it could be quite bad, susie. i don't think it's if we get into january and we haven't settled this but if house makers haven't nailed this down by early february, i think stock investors, bond investors will start to get very very nervous, start selling, risky businesses pull back and by the end of february when we start approaching the ceiling for the debt limit, i think we'll be back in recession. it will be a fairly severe recession. so policy makers have a few weeks but not much more than that. they have to get this together. >> susie: some people are saying that today's jobs report is very encouraging and that you can look at this as a way that maybe the economy can handle some stuff belt tightening because things are looking a little bit better. how do you think the various parties, republican and democrats will handle this jobs report in their f

joining us now to talk more about that cliff is mark zandi, reief economist at moody's analytics. mark, is that threat credible? i guess we saw hiring last month, the stock market is hanging in there. what's the feeling on the part i thorporate america? bu well, you know, i think businesses feel like we're going deget a deal. they expect the president and house speaker boehner to come together and get this done. if they didn't, they'd be laying off workers, and as we can see by the data they are not doing nhat. eut they are cautious, and appropriately so. washington can botch this so gtey aren't very aggressive with their hiring. ehey pulled back on their pnvestment on their advertising. wey also realize tax rates are going up next year, so what they're doing is announcing special dividends and pulling dividends forward into this year because they realize that tax rates on dividends next year will be higher. so they're trying to give their shareholders a break. >> dubois: so that's what tsinesses are doing. what are you seeing on ma n street? >> well, you know, howls holds also rea

we've been speaking with mark zandi, analytic. >> tom: still ahead, slow job growth doesn't discourage tonight's "market monitor." mark luchini of janney montgomery scott tells us why. that upbeat job growth in november didn't lead to consumer cheer as december began. the reuters-university of michigan consumer sentiment survey fell in early december to its lowest level since august. the dow rose 81 points, the nasdaq was down 11 on further losses in apple shares, the s&p up four points. a mixed week for the indices, the dow industrials, which does not include apple, gained 1% for the week. with apple, the nasdaq fell 1.1%. and the s&p 500 eeked out a 0.01% gain since last friday. >> susie: one hundred of the small businesses behind the job growth we're seeing, were honored last night in washington, with inc magazine's "hire power" awards. the businesses span the country, and cross an array of sectors. sylvia hall met with three of the winners to talk about their businesses, and the one thing they have in common: success. >> reporter: they work in different states, and in completely di

mark zandi of "moody's "analytics. and our own john dicker sen. captioning sponsored by cbs from cbs news in washington, "face the nation" with bob schieffer. >> schieffer: and good morning again. treasurer treasury secretary tim geithner laid out the emotion's opening offer on how to fix the debt. it wasn't what the republicans want to hear. basically geithner said no waw to cut a deal without raising taxes on upper income americans. even though, he said he's optimistic some kind of deal can be reached by the end of the year, and he said 98% of americans will not see a tax rate increase. here's what he told us when we sat down with him. >> i do think we're going to get there because the only thing that stands in the way of an agreement that's good for the economy is if a group of republicans decide they're going to block and increase in tax rates on the wealthiest americans. i think it's unlikely they will choose to do, that of course, because there's so much at stake. >> schieffer: in all seriousness, i'm told mitch mcconnell laughed when you ha

what do you make of all of this. >> i think mark zandy is the wrong guy to wrote. christian this is good stimul but not how you do stimul. when you give people $300 that center a family and house to support. they have to spend that money and i disagree that americans are apathetic and lazy. they want jobs. you can find aerson who doesn't want a job, you can't say it is it all america. the 3.3 mlion people will slip in poverty. wh they need is jobs that. is it a real stimulus. to argue that this is a stimulus measure i disagree. >>old on. >> we have talked to ceo's time and time on theox business network. we have help wanted signs and people will nolt take the jobs because they don't want to work for minimum wage. is not forever . the notion is to move up and get promoted but people would rather collect 99 weeks of feebie. we are creating the monster and like ham sterse on i wheel and can't get off. hold on >> i just disagree that many americans are lazy. >> we are not saying everyon buthere are enough of them out there that unfortunately put a bad taste inveryone's

ceo of pimco, and mark zandy a is a chief economist with moody's analytics. ou say we're the cleanest dirty shirts, i wonder when it comes to negotiations we are there are republicans who will not accept taxing the marginal income. the income above $1 million and increasing that tax on the rich and you've got some democrats who won't agree to this idea of a chained cpi. bottom line mohammed, there are going to have to be tough decisions, you cannot win budget concessions without tough decisions. when you guys are looking at how the united states solves its problems, what are the obvious ways? >> the obvious way is to get together and recognize that you can only solve a long-term debt issues in the context of high growth. you approach the fiscal problem in a way that makes sure that you also promote economic growth. so that has two implications. one is you can't do it all on one side. you can't do it all on entitlements, nor can you do it all on revenue. you've got to move on both sides, which means political compromise. people don't like it. but that's the rea

. >> the few lawmakers left on capitol hill will get some advice when economist mark zandi testifies, and more fallout according to the treasury secretary. >> his did administration prepared to go after the fiscal cliff? >> absolutely. >> a source tells of president obama and john boehner spoke by phone. >> we cannot negotiate by ourselves. >> the hold up right now is that speaker boehner took a position, i think the day after the campaign, but said we're willing to bring in revenue but not increase rates. >> gridlock, 26 days and counting. >> no word on what the president and speaker boehner discussed, but given the fact that there has not been progress, just the fact they were on the phone represents a small development. >> still to come, he has been through hundreds of deals and no deals, has decided if america has talent, and now he is taking it all. howie mandel joins us about his new holiday game show. >> sunshine. clouds to the northwest. that is what we will watch. watch. is the fastest internet in america. just ask pc mag. [ male announcer #2 ] cable can't touch fios upload s

. >> what happened if nothing happens with mark zandi, jackie calmes. >> politically, the speaker islaying with a weaker hand than the president. the pressure is higher on him, and his critics are louder, too. >> just need boehner to go along with raising the rates and that's it. republican party is finished. >> he is selling out our children right now with these massive tax increases, and that's his starting bid. he is saying here is $800 billion, now will you sit down with, us a obama? >> hashtags with names like fire boehner have become popular. still, where the votes get counting, boehner seems to have more room to maneuver than he did in preelection faceoffs. but it begs the question, even if the republican speaker gets a deal, can he get it passed? joining me now is tom cole of oklahoma, martha blackburn of tennessee, thank you both for joining us, and i think that's really the key question that we keep hearing. they'll get a deal -- they'll get something. but it doesn't matter if the two of them get a deal, it matters if the speaker has the house votes for it. tell me about th

. >>> plus what happens if nothing happens with moody's chief economist mark zandy, jackie comes of the "new york times" and cnn's dana bash. i'm candy crowley and this is "state of the union." >>> politically the speaker is playing with a weaker hand that the president, the pressure is higher on him and his critics are harder too. >> the republican party's finished. >> he is selling out our children right now with these massive tax increases and that's a starting bid. he's saying here $800 billion now will you sit down with us, obama? >> twistill with the votes get counted in his caucus of republicans, boehner seems to have more room to maneuver than he did in preelection face-offs over political matters. even if the republican speaker gets a deal, can he get it passed? joining me now, republican congressman tom cole of oklahoma and marsha blackburn of tennessee, thank you both so much for joining us, that's really the key question, we keep saying they'll get a deal, they'll get something. it doesn't matter whether the two of them get a deal, it matter also the speaker haas the house v

. >>> and mark zandi of moody's joins us.n why he's wrong. >> if you have any comments or questions about anything you see here on "squawk," e-mail us at squa squawk@cnbc.com. >>> markets that are on the move and where you should put your money to work right now. trading block right after this. >>> then a little later, a makeover. we'll have more on that. "squawk" will be right back. having you ship my gifts couldn't be easier. well, having a ton of locations doesn't hurt. and a santa to boot! [ chuckles ] right, baby. oh, sir. that is a customer. oh...sorry about that. [ male announcer ] break from the holiday stress. fedex office. heartburn symptoms causedelieve by acid reflux disease. [ male announcer ] break from the holiday stress. osteoporosis-related bone fractures and low magnesium levels have been seen with nexium. possible side effects include headache, diarrhea, and abdominal pain. other serious stomach conditions may still exist. talk to your doctor about nexium. time for citi price rewind. because your daughter r

mark zandi of moody says better sales, more construction and higher prices. last month, existing home sales rose more than wall street expected, almost 6%, reaching the highest level in three years. >>> more homeowners in trouble may also be getting some help. "the wall street journal" reports the obama administration is thinking about expanding its refinancing program. borrowers whose mortgages aren't backed by the government and who owe more than their homes are worth may be eligible soon. that would be good, not only for them, but also for the economy, as a whole. >>> and rail travel this morning is taking a major step forward in china. that country now has the longest high-speed rail line in the world. more than 1,400 miles. trains between beijing and will travel a top speed of 200 miles per hour. cutting the trip from 20 hours to 8. it may spur domestic airlines to cut their fares. >> impressive. >>> when we come back, a little courtside coziness for a controversial couple. >> the first appearance of rihanna and chris brown. >>> and a little girl's dog s

>> i talked to independent economist, mark zandi, he said if there is no deal on wednesday, expect alow bleed in financial markets, maybe 50 to 100 points lost on the dow per day for a couple of weeks, if in mid-january it becomes clear that even going over the cliff hasn't made a deal more likely, expect a huge selloff, perhaps 800 points rivalling what happened when the first t.a.r.p. bill went down in the fall of 2008 during the financial crisis, kate. >> john harwood, thanks so much. and there will be much more on all of this tight on a live special report on cnbc. it's titled "america's economy held hostage," that's at 8:00 eastern time. >>> overseas, this has been a very deadly weekend in syria, where the civil war has been going on now for 21 months, as fighting raged in a number of cities, activist groups say more than 50 people were killed today and yesterday was far worse, with almost 400 deaths reported. more than 45,000 people have died since the war began. and today, the special u.n. negotiator predicted that 100,000 more syrians could be killed this coming year if the c

biexprs balanced, and we want to help you come to that-- >> schieffer: let me just talk to you, mark zandi. you're our economic forecasters. ent to just go back to the beginning to try to help people understand this. how did this come about? and what happens if they don't reach some kind of deal by the end of the year? >> well, this is almost by design. i mean, policy makers designed the tax cuts to expire. they had spending cuts that were set to kick in. it all came together on january 1, 2013. to a large degree it was by design. the pressure of this generated a desert shield and that's the hooker. >> schieffer: but nobody thought either the white house or congress would be stupid enough to let all of this happen but here we are-- >> no, no, in my view, this is sticking soscript. this is exactly the way i think everybody thought it would go. they come together january 1, 2013 aprosmed, the pressure would begin to mount, wall street would begin to get nervous, presidencies would get nervous. we see groups like maya's group form because they don't want to see us go over the cliff. this is e

mark zandi. we will see if it works out. chigan becomes a 24out state with the right to onrk.i the unions were not happy expressing frustration a tole alienate said governor.for preside wisconsin?re-lec the top fund-raiser forhis president obama and how that affects the mood and tone here in washington. after this. and then treats day afr da.. block the acid with prilosec otc and don't get heartburn in the first place! [ male announcer ] e pill eachmorning. 24 hours. zero heartbur neil: ichigan en roue to be another wednesday? could be jt as devive and could be the 24 #th right to work state, but that created enormous tensions prompting the president the united states to visit saying he's against this measure that governor rick snyder supports, and both branches of republican legislature have already passed. that is to give workers the choice whether they want to be a union or not. union members say it is not that simple, that this is real a trojan horse for dismantling them. don, the adviser to the president of the united states had a big fundraiser for the president hlping g

. >> reporter: mark zandy warned a congressional committee they would have just over a month to negotiate in 2013 before the economy falls apart. >> by mid-february, it will be doing a lot of damage. >> reporter: anticipating the fiscal cliff and massive layoffs that could come with it, democrats called on lawmakers to continue an extension to jobless benefits expiring this year. >> now they're at risk of losing their last lifeline. >> reporter: 25 days left, no deal yet. republicans are worried they may be losing ground on the tax hike debate. and a new poll shows the majority of voters trust the president and democrats on the issue. reporting live on capitol hill, danielle lee, news4. >>> polls show many americans want hillary clinton to run for president in 2016, but that doesn't seem to be on top of her to-do list as she steps down as secretary of state. mrs. clinton is in dublin ireland, today on one of one of her last foreign trips. she admitted she's looking forward to the quiet life. >> i'm, frankly, looking forward to returning to living a life that enjoys a lot of simple pleasur

jenna: mark zandi, well-known economist, as you know, steve, was on our program yesterday. what does 2013 really look like to you? he said, you know, not too bad. he had faith we'll get a deal with fiscal cliff. i'm curious our thoughts on the year ahead, steve? >> so hard to predict. think about this, jenna. we are eight, nine, 10 days away from the new year. think about this, no investor in america, no business, no worker, knows what the tax system is going to be. that is very unsettling. it adds all this kind of uncertainty to the economy. and just a rotten way to run a country. and it's a real black eye for congress and the president. i think if we get this beyond us, if we don't have a major tax increase and get serious about cutting spending, look, i think 2013 could be a positive year for the economy with some really decent growth which we haven't had for four years. but you know what? congress left. they're gone, jenna. they're not coming back until after christmas now. that is amazing. jenna: well then, and will they see the light over the next few days? that will

and, mark zandi, suggested that you do $55 billion, which will not have that much of a retardation on economy. he estimates that at about a point-and-a-half. if we do nothing, we lose 3% of gdp. because you withdraw from the economy over $700 billion. >> chris: let me -- >> that is a problem for america. if that should happen. >> chris: i don't want to get too much into the weeds, though, obviously it is a substantive subject, but after the cliff, the next big step, is when we reach the debt ceiling, which we're now told by treasury secretary geithner will be probably around the end of february. two months. assuming that you get this deal, you turn off the bush tax cuts, for -- bush tax cuts for 98% of americans, will they go every the democrats as part of bargaining on -- and the president said, i will not negotiate on that anymore. >> here's what i will do, if you took every penny on the $600 billion and put it on the deficit, it is 6 or 7% and i don't believe all of it will go on the deficit. when we raised the debt ceiling in august of 2011, we borrowed $2.1 billion. we spent that

that's the view of two of the most distinguished economists in this country, mark zandi, who was a key economic advisor to john mccain in his presidential race, and alan blinder, the former deputy chairman of the federal reserve. here's what they say. without that federal response, we would have had eight million fewer jobs and 16% level of unemployment in this country, and we would have been in the second great depression. they call it depression 2.0. so, mr. president, let's remember where we were when president obama came to to office. the nation was facing the worst economic catastrophe since the great depression. in the fourth quarter of 2008, the economy shrunk at a rate of almost 9%. now, after the federal actions, positive economic growth returned in the third quarter of 2009, and we've now had 13 consecutive quarters of economic growth. now, we've come a long way. this is a remarkable turnaround in a very short time, measured against previous financial crises. in fact, there's been an academic study just completed that suggests typically it takes eight to ten years to recover

mark zandy for example has suggestd that you do $55 billion which won't have that much of a retardation on the economy. he estimates that at about a point and a half. if we do nothing we lose 3% of gdp because you wealth draw from the economy over $700 billion. that is a problem for are america if that should happen. >> chris: i don't want to get too much into the weeds here though obviously it is a substantive subject. but after the cliff the next big step is when we reach the debt ceiling which we are now told by treasury secretary geithner probably around the end of february, two months. assuming you get this deal and you turn off the bush tax cuts, the lapsing of the bush tax cuts for 98% of americans. are republicans going to go after the democrats hard on spending as part of bargaining on the debt deal and the president says i'm not going to negotiate on that any more? >> here is what i will do. if you took every penny of the $600 billion and put it on the deficit that is about 6% or 7%. i don't believe all will go on the deficit. when we raised the debt ceiling in august of 2011

the real concern with the economy now that you're hearing fl folks like mark zandy is that it's not consumers that are not spending, it's employers who are spending. business investment has been down year over year in the last two quarters as people do not, you know, invest in equipment or buy software because they have no idea what's happening to their tax rates in january. that's where people get nervous about what's going on. >> the uncertainty? >> yeah. >> blake, if there is a deal to avoid the so-called fiscal cliff, could these jobs numbers get considerable better? >> i think so, but it's funny. the republicans are in a bit of a box here. their motivation is to say it's not so good. a lot of jobless people out there. we have a real problem. meanwhi meanwhile, we have fiscal cliff negotiations where the president wants stimulus mechanisms including an extension of unemployment insurance. they're like a doctor who diagnosed you with a severe ill sxns won't sign the precipitation to give you the medicine. they emphasize the joblessness problem, and they don't want to give you unemployment

chief economists for moody's analytics mark zandi cautions november may see a downward revision but the numbers are a good sign. >> bottom line, feels like the job market is holding firm in the face of sandy and fiscal cliff concerns, so that's good news. >> surprising exactly no one, the white house and republicans had different spin on the numbers. >> if congress does address the problems that it needs to address, concerning the fiscal cliff, if we have reasonable resolution type of programs that the president has been proposing to support the economy in the short run, get us on a sustainable fiscal path in the long run, protect the middle class we're going to see progress in this economy. >> the risk the president wants us to take increasing tax rates will hit many small businesses that produce 60 to 70% of the new jobs in our country. that's the whole issue here. >> on the fiscal cliff front, no new deals or concessions made public, but "the new york times" reports the dynamic has changed. at the request of speaker boehner, senate leaders and nancy pelosi have been dismissed from th

mark zandi from moody's calculates the number. he says 86,000.t may have been reduced by 86,000 because of hurricane sandy. but there was a good number today which was the ism data when it comes to the services sector. you can see it was up. there's the adp data. but i want to talk about the services sector which was up a bit more than expected. then what you had, business activity was up, new orders were up, employment was the one thing that was down. i don't know if that's a sandy effect. that could be also, by the way, a fiscal cliff effect. zplint vi >> interviewing secretary geithner later today. what's your first question going to be? >> i want to get his response -- we had the president respond to boehner's proposal but i want to get the secretary's response, too, the specific issue of, hey, the republicans looked like they made a step forward, actually got some accolades in some of the press for agreeing to new revenues. where's the administration's response on that side? are they willing to give? i think that's a key question right now i

mark zandi, and many other economists, that we have to keep that in mind. that is to the a reason not to extend but a reason to say how far should the extension go. here's what i think. we should extend and the extension should be tied to some creative way of infusing new skills in people without have particularly the 5.5 million who have been out for that 40 weeks. you know, they are he going to have a hard time getting back in. here is my final point on this, maybe not my final point, of-- . >> brown: we will decide. >> the unemployment rate fell this time by 2/10 of a percent. everybody is happy about that. it fell because we lost 350,000 workers out of the labor force. >> but do you buy the disincentive arguments or do you think things have changed in this economy? >> i any it's different. first of all when you look at those studies it shows a fairly negligentable impact, .4, .5% on unemployment. and a study done by professor rossteen at the university california berkeley last year demonstrated that at least half of that is because unemployment insuranc

. >> if that happens, if there's no agreement, economist mark zandi told a congressional hearing it wouldbad news. >> if we go over the cliff and there's no change after that, we hit the gdp in 2013 will be 3.5 percentage points. the economy is growing two percentage point. subtract 3 1/2 and that is a severe recession. >> reporter: republicans will be blamed if there is no agreement say the president is acting in bad faith. >> i think it's fair to say that the president is not interested in a balanced agreement, is he not particularly interested in avoiding the fiscal cliff and he's clearly not interested at all in cutting any spending. >> reporter: but behind all the public posturing, there is still contact between the president's office and the speaker's people. and between the two men themselves. but everyone else is out of the loop. and there is some confidence, at least here at the white house, that they can find a solution. norah, charlie? >> bill plante, thanks. >>> november jobs report is out. rebecca jarvis is here. good morning. what do the numbers tell us? >> things are lookin

mark zandi, chief economist and cofounder of moody's economy.com. rk, seems like this is the time to talk about some of these big items in the economy but when we look at the fiscal cliff negotiations it seems disproportionate. small negotiations for a very big problem. tell us about that. is it disproportionate? is anything discussed right now going to affect the fate of this economy? >> yeah, i'm more optimistic, jenna. i do think that when it is all said and done, after all the back and forth in the political brinkmanship, we'll probably get a deal that will address long-term, our long-term deficits, scale back 2 1/2 trillion over 10 years. that is not what we need at the end of the day to solve our physical problems that is good step forward and good you have in to keep financial markets happy and recovery moving forward. doesn't feel like we'll get a deal that will be very substantive. but at the end of this process i'm still hopeful we will. jenna: we'll take optimism, mark, absolutely, especially this time of year. we need that hope we'll be i

republican presidents, democratic presidents, mark zandi from moody's it does damage our credibility.e to something like that. i didn't like fiat saying i will handle the debt thing. that would be like letting me run loose in a best buy electronics store. not a good idea. i understand where he is coming from. we do have a find a way we can, you know, not hold our entire government hostage to these debt ceiling issues. but i just don't like what he is doing. i'll take over here. that could be the wolf guarding the henhouse i. lori: i think we're looking at another debt downgrade regardless. not to be a debbie downer. >> i think, no matter what kind of deal comes together here we know it won't be worth the paper it is printed on. lori: spending to your point, you've been on this theme, the spending cuts --. melissa: getting tired of it. >> like she told me she was tired of your book. we all were. but lori, we had to work with it. melissa: i know. you were gracious about it. i appreciate that. >> she sold a lot of books. lori: i bought a lot books. >> washington isn't selling the story.

mark zandi before my committee the other day, and he was very clear that if we can make that work, and wellness type of program, keeping seniors well, it's much cheaper to keep them well than when they are sick, that will save a lot of money and bring down inflationary costs and medicare costs in medicare. we have a number of things we can do. we have to be very careful as senator rockefeller was saying yesterday, we have -- have you medicaid and medicare two very important programs and a lot of people, that's all they have that's medicare and social security, that's it. on the one hand, are you saying people say, okay, let's tax those -- the upper earners, but let's take something away from people who have nothing. so that's not a fair exchange. we have to be very careful when looking at those programs. >> you can't just tax upper earners. you maybe everybody give up something at some point. >> yeah, but it's hard to give up something when you don't have anything, and that's the point. so we've got a -- on the one end, people are trying to survive. say, for example, medicaid, medicare

i think the other thing mark zandy said just yesterday, as you know he was the adviser to mccain, heaid in a hearing yesterday that the affordable care act is having some impact on possibly reducing the inflation rate of medical costs in medicare. and he believes that one of the things we have to do is we have to strengthen the affordable care act so that we are concentrating on keeping people well. it's cheaper to keep them well. far more costly when they get sick. and if we can keep them well, that will bring down the cost of medicare at the same time. so yeah, there are many things that we can do. we can make that medicare system much more efficient and effective. and i believe the president is committed to doing that. i know i am. >> all right. well, maryland democrat representative elijah cummings. good to speak with you, sir. >> good talking to you. >>> still ahead worries about the fiscal cliff in china? why is beijing so concerned? >>> and it's the most livable city on earth. we'll show you why in today's list of number ones coming right up. >>> but now let's go to number two

unemployment benefits, mark zandy has said all along the unemployment benefits are stimulative to the federal budget, but they put money right back into the economy. if you don't have unemployment benefits moving in the economy and you have all these people who don't have this lifeline, 2 million of them as of friday, that could hurt the economy. that's what this whole fiscal cliff debate is all about, right? it's about taking money out of the economy. it's about slowing job growth. it's about the potential for a recession in the beginning part of this year, and 9.1% unemployment by the end of the year because of all the money taken out. so what they're doing here is critical stuff. you heard about how this whole process taking a hatchet in the efforts of budget control, when you should use a scalp peel but congress has shown any willingness. >> christine, thank you very much. we'll get your perspective on the other side of the president's address. it's about 15 minutes away or so. he will speak at the white house addressing the american people essentially about the updates on the tal

. >> mark zandy and kevin haskett testified before the joint economic committee. this is one hour and 40 minutes. >> the committee will come to order. we want to thank everyone for being here today. i did not have a chance to personally greet our witnesses, but i will have time to do that later. i want to thank both of our witnesses for being here. i will have an opening statement that i will make, and then i will turn it to dr. burgess. i know that vice chairman brady will be her as well. we know the challenges that we confront here in congress on a whole range of issues, which are sometimes broadly described under the umbrella of the terminology, fiscal cliff. when we confront those difficult challenges, we have to ask ourselves a couple of basic questions. one of the basic questions we must ask is, what will be the result and will be the impact as it relates to middle income families? what will happen to them in the midst of all these tough issues we have to work out? we know there is broad agreement that going over the so-called fiscal cliff would jeopardize t

that's the view of two of the most distinguished economists in this country, mark zandi, who was a key economic advisor to john mccain in his presidential race, and alan blinder, the former deputy chairman of the federal reserve. here's what they say. without that federal response, we would have had eight million fewer jobs and 16% level of unemployment in this country, and we would have been in the second great depression. they call it depression 2.0. so, mr. president, let's remember where we were when president obama came to to office. the nation was facing the worst economic catastrophe since the great depression. in the fourth quarter of 2008, the economy shrunk at a rate of almost 9%. now, after the federal actions, positive economic growth returned in the third quarter of 2009, and we've now had 13 consecutive quarters of economic growth. now, we've come a long way. this is a remarkable turnaround in a very short time, measured against previous financial crises. in fact, there's been an academic study just completed that suggests typically it takes eight to ten years to recover

. >> mark zandi said returning to clinton-era tax rates would hurt the economy but is necessary to geter control. his comments came at a forum and also bush administration lawrence lindsay and clinton white house chief of staff. >> thank you so much and thank you chairman bachus for turning us and turn it over to peter cook who will moderate our tax panel on tax reform. >> i got a feeling you have to head back to the hill. we hope to come up with some answers and ideas from this panel. we have -- we'll write them down. i'll hand them to your staffer. you hear the mission. we have to come up with some ideas that can pass congress and meet with everyone's approval, so no small task. there are some new faces at the table and again, we want to welcome all of you and go around the table and introduce at least our new faces. we have got the brookings institution who has done a lot on fiscal issues. we have the lindsay group, former economic adviser to president bush. welcome. we have the chairman for the center of american progress. former chief of staff of bill clinton. john has to leave us

that's the view of two of the most distinguished economists in this country, mark zandi, who was a key economic advisor to john mccain in his presidential race, and alan blinder, the former deputy chairman of the federal reserve. here's what they say. without that federal response, we would have had eight million fewer jobs and 16% level of unemployment in this country, and we would have been in the second great depression. they call it depression 2.0. so, mr. president, let's remember where we were when president obama came to to office. the nation was facing the worst economic catastrophe since the great depression. in the fourth quarter of 2008, the economy shrunk at a rate of almost 9%. now, after the federal actions, positive economic growth returned in the third quarter of 2009, and we've now had 13 consecutive quarters of economic growth. now, we've come a long way. this is a remarkable turnaround in a very short time, measured against previous financial crises. in fact, there's been an academic study just completed that suggests typically it takes eight to ten years to recover

according to mark sandy -- mark zandi, without the f.h.a.'s at cyclical part, the housing market would have taken the economy with it. all with providing the backstop. the losses at f.h.a. stem from the now prohibited -- down payment program. heavy losses in the reverse mortgage program and losses and loans made at the height of the crisis to prevent -- of the housing market. while hud has taken some action to prevent the mutual mortgage insurance fund for single family loans from taking federal funds, the f.y. 2012 report suggests that much more needs to be done to prevent such a draw. i want to hear more today about the administration's actions and proposals to manage the risks to taxpayers stemming from -- of business and what safeguards will ensure the quality and sustainability of the new books going forward. the administration's actions and proposals will not be sufficient to restore f.h.a.'s fiscal health. then i plan to work with my colleagues and both sides of the aisle on the banking committee to find a bipartisan way to make that h

that's the view of two of the most distinguished economists in this country, mark zandi, who was a key economic advisor to john mccain in his presidential race, and alan blinder, the former deputy chairman of the federal reserve. here's what they say. without that federal response, we would have had eight million fewer jobs and 16% level of unemployment in this country, and we would have been in the second great depression. they call it depression 2.0. so, mr. president, let's remember where we were when president obama came to to office. the nation was facing the worst economic catastrophe since the great depression. in the fourth quarter of 2008, the economy shrunk at a rate of almost 9%. now, after the federal actions, positive economic growth returned in the third quarter of 2009, and we've now had 13 consecutive quarters of economic growth. now, we've come a long way. this is a remarkable turnaround in a very short time, measured against previous financial crises. in fact, there's been an academic study just completed that suggests typically it takes eight to ten years to recover