Obama urges bipartisan effort on deficits

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke gives remarks during the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform meeting Tuesday in Washington. AP Photo by Manuel Balce Ceneta

Andrew Taylor
AP Writer

Washington — President Barack Obama said Tuesday Washington must urgently confront unpleasant truths about deficits, while the Federal Reserve chairman said failure to mop up red-ink spending would “ultimately do great damage” to the country.

Obama refused to rule out measures that would fight “exploding deficits.” This signaled that tax increases were options that could be under consideration by members of a panel he told to find ways to reduce federal deficits that threaten to erode Americans’ standard of living.

Obama told reporters in the White House’s Rose Garden that neither he nor his commission members would say what options remain viable.

“We’re not playing that game. I’m not going to say what’s in. I’m not going to say what’s out. I want this commission to be free to do its work,” said the president, flanked by Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson, the two men he asked to lead efforts to reach a consensus plan for the deficit.

It’s a task, though, that even members of the bipartisan fiscal commission admit is an almost impossible chore: produce a deficit no bigger than $550 billion by 2015, an amount equal to about 3 percent of the total U.S. economy. That would require deficit savings in the range of $250 billion or more.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke used the commission’s first meeting as a forum to make his most urgent call yet to get the government’s fiscal house in order. He warned that failing to curb federal budget deficits would damage the U.S. economy in the long run.

Bernanke again urged the White House and Congress to come up with a credible plan to reduce the nation’s red ink, which hit a record $1.4 trillion last year.

Failing to do so would push interest rates higher — not only for Americans buying cars, homes and other products — but also for Uncle Sam to service its debt payments, he said.

“The path forward contains many difficult trade-offs and choices, but postponing those choices and failing to put the nation’s finances on a sustainable long-run trajectory would ultimately do great damage to our economy,” Bernanke said.

The deficit has turned alarmingly worse since the recession that started at the end of 2007. Many projections show it never dipping below 4 percent of the economy over the next decade. Deficits that size are unsustainable, economists said. They would put upward pressure on interest rates, crowd out private investment and ultimately erode living standards.

The quickly growing national debt — the accumulation of years of annual budget deficits — today stands at a staggering $12.88 trillion and Congressional Budget Office officials said they expect the nation to add another $1 trillion a year for another decade. The federal government itself holds a large portion of this debt, some $4.5 trillion, with much of it sitting in the Social Security Trust Fund.

The remaining $8.5 trillion is held by worldwide investors in the form of Treasury bills and bonds. China is the largest single holder of these securities.

Associated Press Economics Writer Jeannine Aversa contributed to this report.