Summers: Deficits ‘Likely to End up Greater’ than Biden Budget Envisions

During an interview broadcast on Friday’s edition of Bloomberg’s “Wall Street Week,” a Harvard professor, economist, director of the National Economic Council under President Barack Obama, and Treasury Secretary under President Bill Clinton Larry Summers stated that while there are many The “good ideas” in President Joe Biden’s budget, including a focus on the “single most important issue” of health care costs, “will likely end up running a bigger deficit than the administration imagines unless there are substantial policy measures.”

There are “a lot of good ideas in the budget,” Summers said, but I think, for a variety of reasons, the deficit trajectory is likely to end up being larger than the administration imagines unless there are substantial policy actions. And I think we’re back at a point where, with interest rates going up, Where it’s going to be very important to think about the long-term behavior of the budget deficit. In many ways, the picture is much more negative than it was a decade ago when the Simpson-Bowles process was launched. So, I think we need to have this as a bipartisan conversation. I welcome the Chairman. Which presents the budget blueprint and I ask Republicans to present their policy blueprint as a basis for discussion and debate.I’m glad to see an increased focus on containing health care costs, because that’s probably the most important issue in long-term budget thinking.Although I have to say that’s my opinion is that ultimately necessary expenditures on national security will be far greater than the president’s budget.”

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