John Yarmuth

They have succeeded in making the deficit worse.

We have a deficit problem. We have a debt problem. It must be because of out-of-control spending.

I predicted that the fiscal and budgetary plan of the majority was in two parts.

First, they cut taxes primarily for the wealthy.

I think it is been very helpful today and kind of puts a finishing touch, to a certain extent, on a very productive series of hearings.

What we have in our broken budget process is not a structural or procedural issue as so much as a human issue.

The truth is Congress simply could not function effectively without CBO's budget estimates and analyses.

We still need CBO to be that unbiased scorekeeper.

I have this knack for asking questions that I really do not expect a certain answer to.

The problem of long term forecasting and long term budgeting... we have gotten around it by certain gimmicks.

CBO also provides cost estimates for legislation being considered by Congress, which are extremely important in detailing a bill's potential impact.

In another day, we are going to start a process, Mr. Woodall is part of it, Chairman Womack and I are part of it, a bicameral bipartisan effort to analyze the budgeting and appropriations process and see if there are solutions we can come…

CBO tells Congress what we need to know regardless of whether or not it is what we want to hear.

I totally agree with you on this.

CBO has never claimed, nor has it ever been expected, to perfectly predict the future.

I do not think any outside analysis of the ACA anticipated that so few companies would actually make that decision.

I appreciate your holding this hearing. I am pleased to join you in welcoming our witnesses for Members' Day.

CBO, a nonpartisan agency, has provided Congress with objective and impartial information about budgetary and economic issues.

When CBO scored the ACA, we were talking about something that it affects somewhere around 16 to 18 percent of the economy.

During the debate on the Affordable Care Act, long ago as that was, I called healthcare policy a giant Rubik's Cube.

Now it is still unclear to me if that was the goal of my Republican colleagues or an unintended consequence, but either way, it is critical information for us to have.

I do think it is important to point out that it would have made more sense to hold this hearing before voting on the majority's bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act and gut Medicaid.

My Democratic colleagues and I have grave concerns about many of his policies including massive cuts to healthcare, antipoverty programs, and investments in economic growth.

There is absolutely no way we can responsibly legislate on behalf of the American people without knowing the entire impact of our healthcare proposals.

A huge increase in what we are spending on defense. Absolutely a huge amount of increase.