Max Baucus

We proposed to cut it to $9.7 trillion, and the cost of the way the budget authority plays out slower in the form of outlays, it worked out to about $1.7 trillion.

Everyone wants to reform the Tax Code. I don't know anyone who doesn't.

I think you have a two-to-one ratio of revenue raised to spending cuts.

To raise about a trillion dollars worth of revenues.

But it just kind of sounds like it is what Congress wants to do.

I think the answer to Senator Kyl's question would be about $100 billion for deficit reduction; is that correct?

But if we were to set a cap, then that would be scored?

What if this committee were to establish caps? Would that be scored?

I think that it is up to the Congress, as I said, to designate what it views as related to those operations.

I would like to just focus a little bit on defense spending.

But we do know that there is no limit on the OCO account.

The Budget Control Act, as you mentioned, had two separate caps--for what is it, 2012 and 2013?

This is not an easy undertaking, corporate tax reform. It takes time, and often when we go down this road it is more complicated than we think.

If we have a revenue-neutral tax reform, corporate or individual, and the tax reform, let's say, on the individual side is dramatic, broaden the base, lowering the rate, et cetera, how much growth would result from a very simplified tax…

I am for going down this road. I think we should lower our corporate rates very significantly.

only about 3 percent of pass-through income is affected by the top two rates.

I think there is a lot of fraud and waste in the Medicare and Medicaid, which we don't properly attack.

What role do you and your colleagues want the Government to play in the economy and the society?

We have a duty, I think, to ensure that we approach these cuts in a balanced way that creates jobs.

We are just the hired hands. We are just the employees.

I wondered, Dr. Elmendorf, if you could just again, we discussed a little bit of it already, what changes either let's say in tax policy will stimulate the economy most, if you could rank them somehow?

The world is watching us. They are watching us closely.

We want tax reform in the worst way, all of us do.

The repeal would raise revenue.

Where do we want to go? And do we want to have AMT indexed, for example?