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How to pronounce irresponsibleness in English?

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indeed helping the machinery of local
governments get up and running
states and localities can rely on relief
money that's available instead of
resorting to painful budget cuts
congress rightly designed the state and
local program with flexibility in mind
i think many of us knew the recovery
could run up against some unforeseen
challenges
and we wanted communities to be able to
devote resources
where and when they saw fit
i want to note that this flexibility is
paying off now
especially with the spread of the delta
variant
harris county texas for instance is use
this funding to boost its immunization
rate offering a hundred dollars to each
person who gets their first vaccine dose
for the relief dollars not yet out the
door treasury is doing everything it can
to expedite their delivery
the emergency rental assistance program
is one example
prior to the pandemic there was
essentially no national infrastructure
to get money from government coffers to
renters and landlords
building that infrastructure has been a
massive undertaking for states
localities and tribes
the program is scaling up quickly with
1.4 million payments made to help
struggling renters keep a roof over
their heads
still too much of the money remains
bottlenecked at the state and local
levels
that's why our treasury team has worked
to eliminate every piece of red tape
possible in order to ensure more
payments can get to renters and
landlords
but states and localities must also work
to remove barriers that can speed up
distribution of rental assistance funds
i'll end my remarks there except to say
this
it is imperative that congress address
the debt limit if not our current
estimate is the treasury will likely
exhaust its extraordinary measures by
october 18th
at that point we expect treasury would
be left with very limited resources that
would be depleted quickly
america would default for the first time
in history
the full faith and credit of the united
states would be impaired and our country
would likely face a financial crisis and
economic recession as a result
we must address this issue to honor
commitments made by this and prior
congresses including those made to
address the health and economic impact
of the pandemic
it's necessary to avert a catastrophic
event for our economy
representatives the debt ceiling has
been raised or suspended 78 times since
1960 almost always on a bipartisan basis
my hope is that we can work together to
do so again and to build a stronger
american economy for future generations
thank you and i'm pleased to take your
questions
thank you secretary yellen chair powell
you are now recognized for five minutes
to present your testimony
thank you chairwoman waters ranking
member mchenry and other members of the
committee for the opportunity to discuss
the measures we have taken to address
the hardship wrought by the pandemic
since we last met the economy has
continued to strengthen
real gdp rose at a robust pace in the
first half first half of the year
and growth is widely expected to
continue at a strong pace in the second
half
the sectors most adversely affected by
the pandemic have improved in recent
months
but the rise in covet 19 cases has
slowed the recovery
household spending rose at an especially
rapid pace over the first half of the
year but flattened out in july and
august as spending softened in covent
sensitive sectors
additionally in some industries
near-term supply constraints are
restraining activity
as with overall economic activity
conditions in the labor market have
continued to improve
demand for labor is very strong and job
gains averaged 750 000 per month over
the past three months
in august however gains slowed markedly
with the slowdown concentrated in
sectors most sensitive to the pandemic
the unemployment rate was 5.2 percent in
august and this figure understates the
shortfall in employment particularly as
participation in the labor market has
not moved up from the low rates that
have prevailed for most of the past year
factors related to the pandemic appear
to be weighing on employment growth
these factors should diminish with
progress on containing the virus
the economic downturn has not fallen
equally on all americans and those least
able to shoulder the burden have been
the hardest hit
in particular despite progress
joblessness continues to fall
disproportionately on lower-wage workers
in the service sector and on
african-americans and hispanics
inflation is elevated and will likely
remain so in coming months before
moderating
as the economy continues to reopen we
are seeing upward pressure on prices
particularly due to supply bottlenecks
in some sectors
these effects have been larger and
longer lasting than anticipated but they
will abate and as they do inflation is
expected to drop back toward our longer
run two percent goal
the process of reopening the economy is
unprecedented as it continues
bottlenecks hiring difficulties and
other constraints could again prove to
be greater and more enduring than
anticipated posing upside risks to
inflation
if sustained higher inflation were to
become a serious concern we would
certainly respond and use our tools to
ensure levels that are consistent with
our goal
the path of the economy continues to
depend on the course of the virus and
risks to the outlook remain the delta
variant has led to a surge in cases
causing human suffering and slowing the
recovery
continued progress on vaccinations would
support a return to more normal economic
conditions
the fed's policy actions are guided by
our dual mandate to promote maximum
employment and stable prices along with
our responsibilities to promote the
stability of the financial system
in response to the crisis we took broad
and forceful measures to support the
flow of credit and to promote the
stability of the financial system
our actions taken together helped unlock
more than two trillion dollars of
funding to support businesses large and
small non-profits and state and local
governments between april and december
of
2020. this helped keep organizations
from shuttering and put employers in a
better position to keep workers on and
to hire them back as the recovery
continues
these programs have served as a backstop
to key credit markets and help to
restore the flow of credit from private
lenders
we have deployed them to an
unprecedented extent our emergency
lending tools require the approval of
the treasury and are available only in
unusual and exigent circumstances such
as those brought on by this crisis
many of these programs were supported by
cares act funding those facilities
provided essential support through a
very difficult year and are now closed
the fed completed its sales of assets
from the secondary market corporate
credit facility on august 31
where we were able to wind down the
facility rapidly and efficiently with no
adverse impact on credit conditions
we also recently closed the ppplf to new
lending
and are managing the pay down of assets
in our other cares act facilities as
they wind down
we continue to analyze their efficacy
and to review the lessons learned
the fed's actions affect communities
families and businesses across the
country
everything we do is in service to our
public mission
we will do all we can to support the
economy for as long as it takes thank
you i look forward to your questions
thank you very much chair paul
i now recognize myself for five minutes
for questions
secretary yellen
your department reports that as of
august 20
1
7.7 billion in emergency rental
assistance
have been allocated to households
assisting approximately 2 million
renters although spending has increased
over the past several months i think
we're all concerned that the pace of
delivery of this critical assistance is
not happening quickly enough can you
talk about the challenges you have faced
after taking over
oversight of era one from the trump
administration
what do you believe are the most
significant improvements to the program
guidance you have made and what impact
have you seen
well thank you for that question this is
a critically important
program that treasury has been
very focused on expediting the delivery
of these rental assistance funds to
those who need it
as i mentioned in my opening statement
getting these funds out has involved
creating a national infrastructure where
none existed before
and
that's been a very difficult and slow
process
treasury has done everything possible to
facilitate getting these programs up and
running
around the country in particular we have
tried to give states and localities
flexibility to administer the program in
ways that are appropriate for different
communities to reduce the
paperwork requirements while also making
sure that we
have accountability and transparency
we've provided technical assistance and
working to provide more technical
assistance and i do think we're seeing a
payoff
as i mentioned
we've had a 1.4 million
renters helped by this assistance and
the pace at which it's flowing out is
increasing also i would note that the
act requires treasury to begin to
reallocate funds on september 30th from
those localities that are either are not
effective in getting
assistance out or
have less need for the funds and to
reallocate them to those that are more
effective and have demonstrated need
well thank you very much and i want to
thank you and your team for working with
me on hr 5196 the expediting assistance
to renters and landlords act
which would make it easier for both
renters and landlords to apply for
assistance and provide
for the deeper involvement of treasury
to support grantees to get the funds out
the door
are there particular provisions that you
think would aid treasury's efforts
to make the rental assistance program
more successful you've given us
quite a bit of information about what
you've been involved with is there
anything else you would like to share
well chiron woman waters were very
supportive of your efforts to try to
put in effect changes that would
expedite the delivery and effectiveness
of this program and
we look forward to continuing to work
with you i think we've offered
substantial technical assistance and
absolutely want to work with you to make
sure this this program is as effective
as possible
thank you very much the gentleman from
north carolina mr mac henry who is the
ranking member of the committee is now
recognized for five minutes well thank
you um
so uh chairman powell um
i know it's the the policy the federal
reserve to not comment
to not comment on
fiscal policy
but fiscal policy does impact the fed's
economic projection does it not
yes it does we make assumptions about uh
fiscal policy and then once it's enacted
we would put that into our models okay
but your public models are a statement
about current law rather than proposed
policies that is that largely correct
well when we we don't really publish a
forecast as the federal reserve
individual participants published their
forecasts in the summer of economic
projections but that would that would
include their personal assessments of
likely fiscal actions okay
so about these fiscal actions um
you know
secretary yellen i i said this uh in the
in my opening statement and i'll say
this to both of you again
i am grateful as an american
that you both are in the seats that
you're in right now
uh because we're in a special
circumstance here in the fall of this
year it was a foreseeable slow-moving
disaster but here we are
uh but your credibility of your relative
agencies and the credibility of you
two individuals
uh is of substance right now very
important to us as an american
government
so
um secretary yellen you said in july
right before the debt limit was
reinstated the cbo
said treasury would probably run out of
cash sometime in the first quarter of
next year
or the fiscal year most likely in
october or november
secretary yellen you began exercising
treasury's authority to take
extraordinary measures to prevent a
default back in august is that correct
yes the debt limit
this suspension
expired on august 1st and we began using
extraordinary measures to remain under
the debt ceiling but those extraordinary
measures are just a band-aid for a
period of time right well as i indicated
we expect them to be exhausted on
october 18th
and it would be a disaster if we did not
it would be a catastrophe of congress
phil to
raise the debt ceiling so
here's the deal for for republicans um
democrats control the house and the
senate and the white house
um and since january 20th the approach
of this congress is that they do not
need republican votes to do anything
that's been the approach
um
and
now
they want the political cover
in the midst of this massive amount of
new spending to have republicans raise
the debt ceiling that's really the
request so here's my question to you
secretary ellen for
for the seat you sit in
do you care whether or not the debt
limit is raised with republican votes
or do you just care if it's raised
i think it's important that this be done
on a bipartisan basis
i think it should be bipartisan in
recognition of the fact that
both
republican
administrations and congresses and
democratic ones have run
budget deficits for
most of the post-war period with only a
few a few years serving as an exception
um and that requires on a regular basis
raising the debt ceiling it is not about
uh the need to do so has nothing to do
with future
spending or tax plans that haven't been
enacted in the circumstances necessary
to pay our bills i understand secretary
that's something that republicans and
democrats need to share that
responsibility yellen as i said to you
on the phone last week
i've been a part of every single debt
ceiling increase for the last decade
every fiscal consequence of congress and
some of them have been very bad but i've
tried to make things better i've been a
part of the solution for the last decade
and the call that i received from you
last week was the first outreach i've
had from this administration to do
something on a bipartisan basis and you
called me to raise the debt ceiling
not with a plan not for a fiscal plan
not for my buy-in but simply for my vote
and that to me speaks volumes now i'm
grateful for the outreach from you but
it speaks to the larger issue for the
administration and i don't envy the
position you're in i don't because the
bad strategy from this white house and
the leadership of this house and the
senate is showing they don't want
republican votes we did bipartisan bills
last congress last congress
in the midst of covet bipartisan bills
major bipartisan bills
we can work together in a in a
responsible manner but to ask for my
vote
the week before it comes up in a house
is is
it's not in keeping with the realities
of the situation well we have the tools
we have the votes to get this thing done
through congress it's just a question of
who votes for it
i would like to point out that in 2017
when the white house and both houses of
congress were controlled by republicans
and a reconciliation bill was in
progress that led to the 2017 tax cuts
the debt ceiling was raised and it was
done in a bipartisan basis 11 and 13 i
voted for a bill that president obama
signed so i'm willing to participate in
a bipartisan way it's just a question
who votes for it in the circumstances of
seven trillion of new spending this year
the gentleman from new york mr meeks who
is also the chair of the house committee
on foreign affairs is now recognized for
five minutes thank you madam chair and i
i gotta just say initially i'm kind of
shocked at the ranking member
uh mchenry saying that
because he wasn't asked for a vote
something it's
to determine whether or not american
people democrats and republicans
will suffer
if we don't raise this debt ceiling
and i've been here for 22 years
between whether it's democratic or
republican administrations and each time
when it came to the credit of the united
states of in our economy it didn't make
a difference to me
whether or not the administration was a
democratic or republican or whether or
not someone called me to ask me for my
vote i'm here to try to do the best
thing for the american people not play
politics
and when it comes to the credit
the the for the united states and the
economy moving over moving on
it's not about who's the president
or who called and asked me for a vote
it's about doing the right thing for the
american people
democrats and republicans and then and
moving up this debt to making sure that
we don't default on our debts is
essential to that and it's essential to
our responsibility as members of
congress and not to say oh nobody called
me for a vote
that's simply not our responsibility
now
madame
secretary
there are consequences
if we don't pass and increase the debt
ceiling
i mean like
the increase in the cost of borrowing
for a home or a car or through one's
credit cards
of which folks will say on the other
side i don't have to deal with that but
then it's going to be you know play
politics with it so i was wondering
as we are recovering from this economy
what setbacks will a default on debt
cost american households be there
democratic
republican
independent non-voters what cost
would it cost us
well i think it would be catastrophic
for the economy and for individual
families
nearly 50 million seniors could stop
receiving social security payments or
see them delayed
our troops would not know when they
would get their next paycheck
we have 30 million families who rely on
the monthly child tax credit and they
would not receive that relief at least
on time
and as we saw in 2011 when the debt
ceiling
came
was raised at the absolute last minute
and investor in consumer confidence was
shaken in the run-up
we saw a marked increase in interest
rates a marked drop in the stock market
and when u.s interest rates go up and
the credit rating of the united states
was downgraded
that means higher interest payments for
everyone who has a loan whether it's a
small business a homeowner with a
mortgage a credit card payment
anyone who borrows would see uh higher
interest costs if they're debt
we must raise the debt ceiling for the
benefit of the american people i don't
care what party they're from
let me go to uh chairman powell
now the fed is rightfully focused on
controlling inflation
while boosting employment with the aim
of guiding our economy back to its
pre-pandemic normal
and at the european central forum you
mentioned that it's urgent for the fed
to resolve the tension between these two
policy goals since taming prices by rise
by raising interest rates would weaken
our labor market
as the fed considers its monetary policy
how will you manage the trade-offs
uh between controlling prices and
ensuring full employment and how do you
plan to resolve the tension between the
two that you spoke on on wednesday
that's the very difficult situation we
find ourselves in it almost all of the
time
inflation is low when unemployment is
high and so interest rates work on both
problem problems now so right now we are
we're far away from we think away from
full employment so that gives us an
incentive to keep
accommodative policies strong
to keep accommodative policy in place
inflation is well above
target and uh you know we have an
expectation that
that high inflation will abate uh
because we think the factors that are
causing it are temporary and tied to the
pandemic and the reopening of the
economy
and um what we say is we just have to
balance the the two but i would say our
expectation is that inflation will come
down and we won't ultimately face
that difficult trade-off of having the
two goals in tension
thank you the gentlewoman from missouri
mrs wagner is now recognized for five
minutes
i uh thank you madam chairwoman and
secretary yellen
thank you for finally taking the time to
appear before this committee i know that
the ranking member has
formally requested your presence at
least twice within the last few months
with
no response
last week treasury released the latest
data on its emergency rental assistant
assistance programs
as you know
46 billion dollars was made available to
supposedly help covet impacted
low-income families pay off their
back rent and to help make mom-and-pop
property owners whole
hold in missouri's 2nd congressional
district and beyond after more than nine
months and an entire summer of
republicans pushing treasury
your own data
still shows more than 83 percent of your
funds remain
unspent
while millions of renters and property
owners remain stuck in limbo it
certainly doesn't sound ma'am like it
has been a in your words expedited
program
now i have a series of yes
and no
questions
and because my time is limited i would
appreciate and will insist upon a simple
yes or no ma'am
first madam secretary do you consider
treasury's emergency rental assistance
program to be a success yes or no
yes
amazing are you aware that in december
of 2020 when congress appropriated the
first 25 billion dollars for emergency
rental assistance program funds were to
be used by december of 2021 yes or no
yes
do you know why
congress set that initial deadline
to get to get make sure that funds get
to those who are in need to get it out
the door to renters and landlords asap
madam secretary are you aware that just
this past march democrats extended the
time frame for emergency rental
assistance program to the years 20 22
and are you ready for this 20 2025
for the two respective programs yes or
no
yes there's significant need and it will
continue in
2025 ma'am i continue does extending the
program's deadline incentivize grantees
to get funds out by extending this does
it does it incentivize grantees to get
funds out the door yes or no
we're doing everything we can in the
states and local it's not fast it's hard
to get it to get it out the door as i
indicated in my opening statement or in
response to a previous question the
infrastructure to do this had to be
built and the pace at which there was
plenty of time for the infrastructure to
be set our fed our fed programs our ppp
programs all of those expeditiously got
money to people who needed them this is
a complete and abject failure i'm sorry
i want to read a quote to you from a
treasury official to journalists on
september 24th and i quote
to simply take the amount of money that
has gone out in the first five or six
months and then compare that to what was
allocated
for four or five years is just a
meaningless
number
meaningless
number secretary yellen is getting money
out the door as soon as possible
a meaningless gauge particularly when we
are talking about a pandemic related
eviction crisis yes or no our objective
is to get the money out well it hasn't
gotten out the door 83 percent of it is
still sitting i'm sorry
1.4 million ma'am because my
constituents in st louis and i do not
find it meaningless when we are talking
about emergency assistance meant to keep
individuals and families in their homes
today during a pandemic not years and
years later out to 2025.
moving on
chairman powell
with spiking energy prices and
bottlenecks and supply chains around the
world there are concerns that there is a
rise in inflation may not be as
transitory as you originally predicted
given our current economic situation and
the fact that democrats want to pass
trillions and trillions more in spending
what makes you believe we will not see
more sustained higher inflation
especially when we've seen significant
consumer price increases uh et cetera et
cetera
so as i mentioned in my opening remarks
we do think that inflation will remain
elevated before these supply bottlenecks
supply-side bottlenecks are resolved and
we think that it will then move back
down toward our
toward our goal time frame
well it's you know these are not things
that we control we don't control that
very transitory sir it seems pretty dug
in i well i would say that this is
remember this is a function of of supply
side bottlenecks over which we have no
control but i would say that we do
expect uh in the first half of next year
to see some relief depending on the
bottleneck in question and inflation
should move down over the course of not
a time to spending trillions and
trillions of dollars i yield that
the gentlewoman from new york ms
velazquez
was also the chair of the house
committee on small business is now
recognized for five minutes
thank you uh chairwoman uh secretary
jillian i would like to pick up with
what chair waters
miss velasquez we can't hear you
can you hear me now you seem to be
unmuted but the sound is not coming
through very well
can you hear me now
no we can't hear you
would you try it again please
okay can you hear me now
yes
okay thank you uh
chairwoman uh secretary yellen i would
like to pick up with what chair waters
uh was asking on era
can you please explain the type of
resistance the treasury department
continues to face from some state and
local governments
how is the treasury department trying to
expedite this
to generals and landlords who needed the
most despite these challenges
well in cases where states and other
grantees launched their programs late
they faced an array of complications
the most significant involved obtaining
the necessary authorizations
from a grantee's governing body
and there were procurement challenges
that arise when grantees
have to engage outside
partners and contractors
we've received
a lot of feedback indicating that the
guidance the treasury has released
really does give state and local
programs the tools they need to move
forward expeditiously
and i'd also note that we've been
partnering with hud to send out
technical experts who can help grantees
accelerate their programs and help them
document best practices
thank you
so
early on new york was one of the lowest
performing states in distributing europe
funding but significant progress has
been made and the state now works ranks
first nationally with more than 1.2
billion dollars in payments made or
obligated unfortunately more assistance
is needed so the treasury department is
required to start relocating
excess first round funds at the end of
september can you tell us how this
process will unfold
well thank you for that question our
objective will be to maximize the number
of eligible households that are served
by ensuring that the resources of the
program
are appropriately aligned with each
grantees needs and ability to deliver
re-assistance
and
reallocation will be really critical in
achieving that objective
our framework
we will identify
localities that need
have excess funds we'll use clear
expenditure benchmarks that increase
over time
we will strive to keep reallocated funds
within the same state when it's possible
and
afford a venue for voluntary
reallocation among grantees
thank you
thank you uh under the american rescue
plan secretary yellen democrats
reauthorized the state small business
credit initiative providing 10 billion
dollars in federal funds to support up
to 100 billion in new loans and
initiatives for small businesses through
state territory tribal and local
governments under the program potential
grantees must submit a completed
application by february how is the
treasury department conducting outreach
and working with local governments to
ensure completed applications are
submitted on a timely basis well thank
you this is a very important program our
staff have contacted each state
individually to follow up on the
application notice uh see if there are
questions or if help is needed we've
set up webinars
we're assisting in program design
in
helping
to develop programs
and
in with respect to tribal governments
we've been conducting extensive outreach
thank you and
chair powell
uh would you agree with what secretary
yellen is saying regarding
raising the debt
limit the debt ceiling
yes i think it's essential the debt
ceiling be raised in a timely fashion so
we can pay our bills and i think uh the
consequences of that failure to do so
would be potentially severe
thank you chairwoman i yield back
thank you very much
the gentleman from west virginia mr
mooney is now recognized for five
minutes
thank you madam chair uh secretary ellis
do you believe that president
biden's reconciliation package proposal
the one with the 3.5 trillion dollar in
total spending
will cost zero and be fully paid for
yes i do
um we have a
full program
that the president has proposed
to raise revenue that would
cover the costs of the program
it in in the president's budget of
course
there are changes under consideration as
this goes through
congress but there are a host of
revenue raisers and i do believe it will
be actually deficit reducing beyond the
first 10 years of the program
okay thank you i mean yesterday speaker
pelosi claimed the same thing that the
democrats reconciliation proposal would
cost zero that would be paid for
president biden said the same thing in a
tweet earlier so call me skeptical but
given the record of the democrats in
congress here on runaway spending i just
don't believe it and i'm not the only
one the washington post
uh called president biden's claim that
the bill would be budget neutral
misleading and gave it a score of two
pinocchios we're passing bills out of
committee i understand without even cbo
scores congressional budget office
scores so we don't really know and that
we've not done that before that's a
change in our policy the truth is we're
spending an alarming rate in this
country since the covet 19 pandemic
began last year the federal government
has spent more than
5.3 trillion dollars on relief that's
roughly 16 thousand dollars for every
american
our ballooning debt is not some abstract
problem out of control spending proposed
by biden and being rumor stamped here in
congress will leave a mess that our
children and grandchildren have to clea
clean up and pay for um this is this is
uh these there's decisions we make today
uh 20 or 30 years from now our children
and grandchildren have to pay this money
back
so i'd like to move to a different
aspect of the package and one of the
attempted pay fors in the package uh
that's alarming to me
is tax increases will make our economy
less competitive so again so secretary
ellen my question is if the proposed
corporate tax rate in the house
reconciliation bill is
26.5 percent
this actually moves us higher than
communist china's corporate tax rate of
25
we're gonna have a higher tax rate than
a country that has been taking our jobs
and his communist ideology
can you explain why raising our
corporate tax rate above china's is a
good idea if you think it is and and do
you think this would hurt our
competitiveness with china and around
the world
our companies are the most competitive
and profitable in the world
the effective tax rate that they pay
is very low and
recent studies suggest that among
advanced countries the united states has
an effective tax rate that is among the
lowest of countries around the world
we can certainly afford to take the take
the corporate tax rate up
to 26 and a half percent as in-house
ways and means without negatively
impacting a
firm's performance and we propose to do
that in the context of an international
agreement that has been vote has been
support received the support of over 130
countries worldwide to establish global
minimum
tax rates that will apply to other
country other countries firms right now
the united states is the only country
with a global minimum tax rate on its
multinational corporations we propose to
raise that but at the same time other
countries will raise theirs much more
and that means that the competitiveness
of american firms will be enhanced and
we will be reducing the incentives that
exist in our tax law right now to export
jobs and profits
thank you i don't know how much time i
have left but thank you secretary ellen
one thing we've learned over the last
several years is we need to take the
threat from china more seriously here in
america making america less competitive
and despite what you said raising our
corporate tax rate uh makes us less
competitive and our economic adversaries
like china uh it's too high of a cost
for all this spending
running up these massive debts that our
children will have to pay back uh for
this spending is just not right so
despite what what we're hearing and what
many are saying this reconciliation
package will be expensive in terms of
dollars and frankly to the future of our
competitive competitiveness in this
country
uh racking up this debt and i just fear
we're going to pay for this for years to
come so thank you madam chairman back to
balance thank you very much the
gentlewoman from ohio mrs beatty
who is also the chair of the
subcommittee on diversity and inclusion
is now recognized for five minutes
thank you uh madam chair and thank you
to uh our witnesses uh today uh
certainly as i've been listening a lot
of descriptive uh words were
used everything from dysfunctional to
meaningless
uh to irrational
well i could think of a lot of uh other
words that i could use but certainly
those words are appropriate to describe
what democrats inherited from the last
administration uh whether that's the
irresponsibleness
of the past administration whether it's
all the debt that was occurred because
of the trump administration
uh i think those words are appropriate
just
madam chair by my colleagues were very
misdirected uh in my opinion you should
look at your own house in home before
throwing uh stones and especially when
they're not appropriate now with that
said to
our two witnesses who've been very
responsive i say thank you and let me
get in uh quickly to my first question
on the federal reserve
certainly you know mr chair we've had a
lot of conversations about diversity
i want to thank you for
responding and continuing to
increase your diversity
but as you know
there are
recently there's been two federal
reserve presidents who have left quit
retired bottom line uh immediately
leaving or gone from the bank of dallas
in boston uh so my question is
uh you know where i'm going with this
i would certainly be hopeful that we
could increase our numbers and diversity
uh beyond uh rafael bostic uh by asking
that we use the
beatty rule pattern after the rooney
rule to do as we did with the atlanta
federal reserve president and make sure
in that interview process
uh we have a
african-american or female do you have
any comments on that
i do uh thank you miss beatty so
i can absolutely guarantee you that uh
we will work hard in both of those
processes to find and give a fair shot
to
uh
diverse candidates for those two jobs as
we do and it'll be a big focus of both
both of those processes
thank you
secretary yellen you will recall back in
2016 secretary lew made his historic
announcement
that harriet tubman would be the face on
a twenty dollar bill i sent you a letter
in july uh early july
along with my uh colleague congressman
catco requesting the committee to move
forward with the obama administration's
plan to put her on the face of the 20.
i understand your staffs have been in
discussion on this issue
and i was i'm hoping to get a high level
overview and to ask you if there's any
comment you can make on this
well thank you for that question
representative betty we
believe it is very important that um our
notes reflect the history and diversity
of our country and i couldn't couldn't
possibly think of a better way to honor
uh harriet tubman's legacy uh and her
courage in fighting for
the freedom of enslaved people and
women's right to vote than uh seeing her
on the on the 20 bill
um issuing notes as you know is a very
lengthy process it involves
collaboration among a number of
different agencies and
it's necessary to design new security
and counterfeit
features and unfortunately that means
the lead time to redesign new bills and
ensure their security is long
um when uh secretary blue announced
um the announced uh madam secretary
madam secretary i'm gonna go to my
rental question because the clock is
down and we will follow up with your
staff
just prior to the new administration
coming into office the former
administration rushed the regulations
and questions for the rental assistant
program those regulations were so
unworkable that states like my state
ohio and others were
telling me that they weren't even sure
if they would be able to distribute
rental assistance funds under those
guidelines isn't it true um that
uh secretary yellen isn't it true that
the secretary under the new
administration had to spend weeks going
back and redoing uh all of that to make
sure that the funds could actually be
distributed that's correct
uh thank you i want that to go on the
record some of my colleagues wanted to
drill down and make um our uh secretary
you answering those questions so thank
you thank you the last the gentlelady's
time has expired the gentleman from
mr davidson is now recognized for five
minutes thank you madam chairwoman i
think our witnesses and uh our
colleagues i appreciate this hearing
chairman powell you have extensive
private sector experience and of course
as chairman of the federal reserve you
have a role in bank regulation
in your experience do banks or lenders
increase lines of credit unconditionally
isn't there some level of underwriting
involved wouldn't banks have problems
with their regulators if they did no
underwriting for a line of credit yes no
of course they're very careful in the
lending they do well i submit that it's
perfectly rational for congress to
expect something in exchange for an
increased line of credit the plan
presented is atrocious it will maneuver
balance it doesn't even propose to
balance in 15 20 30 100 years there's no
plan to quit bankrupting america madam
secretary
now
thankfully
under the federal reserve's leadership
and
13-3 authority
we had some facilities in place to
prevent
real financial calamity
so
recently uh
recently the subcommittee on national
security uh international development
and monetary policy held a hearing to
discuss the federal reserve's lending
facilities under section 13-3
and how those facilities were utilized
prior to and since the passage of the
cares act
you know some of my colleagues i fear
you know don't understand even how some
of the products like bonds or margin
calls work as they've criticized
programs where there is literally no buy
side in the market and of course the
federal reserve stepped in to create a
buy side and support the markets i've
heard colleagues say well there were
only two loans under the municipal
liquidity facility for example while
there were
hundreds of loans hundreds of billions
of dollars
of credit extended how important are the
thirteen three provisions
uh you know to the financial stability
of our country
they're very important but they're
reserved for real uh economic
emergencies financial emergencies and as
you point out they they functioned i
think very well in the crisis as
backstops that we put them in place in
the private capital markets started
working
and and really that's uh that's success
that's what success looks like
do you think 13 3 should ever be used
for a political goal or
uh something to fulfill a dual mandate
rather than an emergency i actually no i
don't i think the current institutional
arrangements are are very good i think
we need the approval of the treasury
secretary realistically we work with
treasury and and we're constrained for
very specific circumstances unusual in
exiting circumstances there are a number
of tests in the law and i think it's an
arrangement that works thank you
chairman um you know recently federal
reserve governor michelle bowman gave a
speech in which she discussed the
evolution enhancement of bank
supervision particularly during the
covid pandemic and in that speech she
stated that the fed avoided overreacting
and instead approached supervision in a
more measured way that allowed banks the
flexibility to work with their customers
there are a range of topics she's
addressed and others have uh with bank
regulation i'll just share this from her
paper she says the goal of this
initiative is to ensure our supervisory
approaches accommodate a much broader
range of activities while ensuring we
don't create an unlevel playing field
with unfair advantages or unfair
disadvantages for some types of firms
versus others and for that reason i'm
working on a bill that would study the
evolution of consumer finance and the
viability of updating our pre-prudential
regulatory structure through
consolidation of bank supervisors of
course there's some level of
coordination the fed
does but could either of you give an
opinion on scenario
where the united states consolidates
banking supervision
i
that's something we'd have to look at i
know it does something that does tend to
get looked at over
over intervals and it hasn't happened i
think
each each institution has a different
role in our society i know we have more
bank regulators in other countries but
we do seem to work pretty well together
thanks for that um secretary yellen
obviously there are a lot of provisions
and a large void in the digital asset
space
in your opinion what is a digital asset
for purposes of tax reporting
for purposes of tax reporting
i believe the irs is issuing um we'll
issue detailed regulations that will
answer that question for the purposes of
tax reporting
thank you our law hasn't really kept up
with this and frankly it's real
led to regulation by enforcement of
course with the sec
uh and in a host of others but you know
i appreciated when you were chair of the
fed the faster payments initiative that
got launched a lot of this involves
payments but so much in the digital
asset space isn't a currency or a
payment system there are a gazillion use
cases and it'd be a shame to see the
regulatory framework curtail that and i
look forward to seeing fintech flourish
in in the future i yield
thank you the gentleman from florida mr
lawson is now recognized for five
minutes
uh thank you madam chair
uh and ranking member mchenry
uh
sherman powell
floridians
unfortunately have seen firsthand the
impact of climate change and
the impact of
only becoming worse
as we experience more severe and
frequent hurricanes and risks of rising
sea level
i'm glad
to see greater attention given to how we
can better
assess their managers manage
climate-related arrests
it is my understanding many financial
institutions conduct scenarios analysis
to assess credit market liquidity
and operate risks related to transition
rate transition risk
took us physical risks like hurricane
flooding wildfires and drought
it's a power is scenario analysis a good
tool and assessed in climate related
financial risk could you please discuss
the difference between
scenario analysis and stress testing
what other tools does the federal
reserve have to assess climate-related
risk
financial risk
thank you so uh our role of course is to
make sure that the financial
institutions we regulate and supervise
understand and can manage their risks
including the risks
uh from climate change the financial
risk from climate change scenario
analysis is is
almost certainly going to be one of the
principal tools for doing exactly that
and it's it's very different from the
stress test scenario analysis
at this point is is about institutions
really understanding what these risks
will be how they will develop over time
what are the channels through which they
will develop
and it's it's sort of early days in
understanding how those risks will
interact with the economy and with the
financial system scenario analysis is
meant to help do that
and we we at the fed are working on
developing a program of scenario
analysis
many of the large institutions are doing
so as i mentioned uh quite different
from stress tests which are which have
consequences for distributions and that
kind of thing i think overall we see our
job as i mentioned as as making sure
that these financial institutions
understand the risks and can manage them
and that's just a lot of basic
supervisory tools understanding what
they're doing
and and have the processes in place and
the analytical tools in place and the
focus and and that's what we'll be doing
okay thank you
uh secretary yellen i am concerned a
small business particularly with family
communities of color will have lasting
economic damage
uh coming out of this pandemic the
american rescue plan
extended assistance to small business by
authorizing a 10 billion program called
the state small business credit
initiative
with 2.5 billion of these funds set
aside for minority owned business
the florida department of economic
opportunity is waiting
for the treasury to release applications
our requirements and program guidance
when can we expect the guidance to be
released and can we share
our treasure plan to ensure that the
system goes to small business that we
highly be highly impacted by the
pandemic
it's the state small business credit
initiative is an extremely
important program and we're in the
process of implementing it we will
absolutely make sure that it reaches
small businesses that have been very
severely affected by the pandemic and
certainly in underserved areas and
communities of color
i think you know that congress
required that treasury provide funds to
states
based on the extent of job losses that
had been suffered and
it sets aside significant funds for
businesses
that are owned by socially and
economically disadvantaged individuals
so
um we will make this for these this
funding available and provide technical
assistance um working with communities
to make sure that it it's used as
intended
okay thank you very much and with that i
yield back
the gentleman yields back the gentleman
from north carolina mr bud
is now recognized for five minutes
thank the chairwoman and thank the
witnesses
the federal government's spending and
not even talking about debt but just the
spending here it's expected to reach
record highs this year 2021 and
democrats are trying to dump trillions
of what i believe is very reckless
spending into an already inflationary
economy
so as a percentage of gdp
our public debt has reached 125
in the second quarter
secretary ellen very briefly do you
believe that there is a level of debt
that is unsustainable in our economy
and if so what is that number and you
can share that with me either in dollars
or
as a percentage of gdp
well i believe that the debt held by the
public relative to gdp
is around 105
and um
that's
a number that is
higher than we have had
during most of the post-war period in
the united states
but it is not a number that i think is
fiscally irresponsible
or unsustainable
interest secretary do you have a number
that is
the threshold that is irresponsible
either in percentage or in dollars well
one way that i would judge that is by
looking at the interest burden the real
interest burden on the debt
that really is the burden a better
measure of the burden it places on our
economy and
this year that interest burden has
actually been negative
interest rates have been exceptionally
low this dates back to
before the financial crisis in 2008
and most economists believe that there
are deep structural reasons why low
interest rates are likely to continue um
even if nominal interest rates move back
toward um
normal levels that interest burden just
because i want to be
aware of the time constraints thank you
uh secretary the uh if the interest rate
was zero
what is irresponsible in percentage or
dollars
well i think that if the real interest
burden stays um
as if it's as oracle norms
what i'm sorry if interest rates are
zero if it's let's say zero let's say as
is pick one of those and let's say what
is irresponsible as a for as a
percentage or total dollars of debt
well if interest rates are zero um and
negative in real real terms
certainly we could have a substantially
higher burden although there are always
risks pertaining to the path of interest
rates that need to be taken account of i
understand thank you let me shift gears
of it one of my recent telephone town
halls i asked a poll question to those
who were able to join me it said have
you or your family noticed a sharp rise
in prices for food gas or electricity
and 94
of the respondents and it was a good
sample size they said yes
inflation is eating away at the buying
power of every single north carolinian
bottom line inflation is a tax
on working americans so chairman panel i
know that you've called the inflation
that we're dealing with transitory and
boy i sure hope you're right
but what would you tell people back in
my district especially those on fixed
incomes
when they are struggling to make ends
meet right now what would you tell them
i would say that we are dealing with a
very unusual event that's really part of
the cove the broader covet event that
the economy is now reopening that we're
hitting supply side bottlenecks for
example it's hard to manufacture cars
without uh without semiconductors which
are in short supply so car prices are
going up and lots of prices are being
affected by supply side constrictions we
expect that those will abate that
they'll lessen and over time inflation
will come back down exactly when that
will happen is not possible to say but i
would say we should be seeing some
relief in coming months and over the
course of the first half of next year i
hope you're right the folks i talked to
back in north carolina are doubtful of
that but i do hope you're right the
chairman powell next question so in a
july hearing before this committee you
were asked about um cbdc or the central
bank digital currencies and their impact
on stable coin and other
cryptocurrencies and you stated
and i think i quote uh you correctly
here you wouldn't need stable coins you
wouldn't need cryptocurrencies if you
had a digital us currency so mr chairman
as a matter of policy is it your
intention to ban or limit the use of
cryptocurrencies like we're seeing in
china
no and and i i immediately realized i
had misspoken there i didn't mean to
take the word cryptocurrency out of that
sentence and i would say it's fairly
widely understood that
central bank digital currencies could
perform some of the some of the uh could
make but no intention to bans less uh no
intention no intention to ban them but
they're you know the stable coins are
are like money market funds they're like
bank deposits but they're to some extent
outside the regulatory perimeter and
it's it's appropriate that they be
regulated same activity same regulation
thank you i yield back
thank you the gentleman from illinois
mr caston
who is also the vice chair of the
subcommittee on investor protection
entrepreneurship and capital markets is
now recognized for five minutes
thank you madam chair and uh thank you
so much to our witnesses we are truly
fortunate to have you at the home of
steering us through some
past and future crises um i want to talk
about those but before that i want to
just talk about manufactured crises
which i'd like to avoid um
congress everybody on this call in some
fashion has voted to approve our
spending
congress everybody on this call in some
fashion has voted to decide how much of
that spending will be paid with tax
revenues and then somewhat uniquely we
give ourselves the authority to decide
how much of the residual which is paid
with debt we are going to pay for it's
political suicide i am a
co-sponsor and supporter of my friend
mr foster's bill h.r 3305 to end the
default act and take that tool away from
congress because congress has proven
that we cannot be trusted with that
responsibility um
secretary yellen without getting into
the specifics of mr foster's bill would
you support
simply eliminating the debt ceiling
so that we don't have to deal with this
in the future and can focus on real
crises
yes i would because i believe
when congress legislates expenditures
and um puts in place uh tax policy that
determines taxes those are the crucial
decisions congress is making and if to
finance those
spending and tax decisions it's
necessary to
issue additional debt
i believe it's very destructive to
put
the president and myself the treasury
secretary in the situation where we
might be unable to pay the bills that
result from those past decisions
thank you i'm glad to hear it and we'll
hopefully try to get that through
congress
moving on to past crises
um
chair powell we
i think all of us in all of our
districts are hearing about labor market
tightness and um i think a lot of people
are explaining that labor market
tightness to justify pre-existing
political biases as as you know and
we've talked about
we saw unemployment go from three and a
half percent almost 10 percent and back
down to 5.2 but i'm much more concerned
that workforce participation
went from 63 to 61 and has stayed low
can you can you just explain for the
committee briefly
what is driving the reduction in
workforce participation and what if
anything we can do
to get that number back up to make sure
that employers have access to
to folks who are ready and able to work
i'd be glad to so the two biggest parts
of that are
caretakers uh and retirees so that that
makes up
a lot of the um shortfall from where we
were with labor first participation
before the pandemic crisis and within
caretakers some of that is going to be
connected to schools not being opened
or
people who are afraid to um to go into
an unvaccinated workplace and are afraid
of covet and things like that and and
other reasons so that that's a that's a
part of that and that should abate over
time
in terms of the retiree piece
it it uh it's not clear about that i i
would say
uh
the the lure is that people don't come
out of retirement except i would say all
during the last few years of the very
long expansion that ended with the
pandemic we were constantly surprised to
the upside on participation including
older people staying in the in the
workforce longer so i i think um my my
prior would be that we will get back a
big chunk of the the so-called retirees
and that we should be very open-minded
about how much labor force participation
can go up the united states has low
labor force participation compared to
our advanced economy peers and this is
this is not something that has to be
that way it's it's not something that's
that's good
well thank you for that certainly when i
talk to folks in the district it's
everybody kind of acknowledges that it's
the it's the boomers who retired who are
creating a lot of their skills gap and
that's a harder challenge um
going back to you secretary yellen um i
think subsequent to your your first fsa
caring when you identified climate
change as an emerging threat
president biden
issued an emergency order on climate
financial risk directing agencies
including yours to analyze and mitigate
risks
that climate change poses to the
financial system and the little time
we've got left can you give us any
updates on
status milestones and deliverables that
the treasury department has in response
to that executive order yes we we're in
the process of
completing the report and we expect to
issue it in late october or early
november within 180 day
time frame and what we'll be doing is
i'm looking at the work of individual
regulators
to incorporate climate change risks into
their uh regulatory and supervisory
activities and
describing some of the
challenges that they
face in carrying that out
uh well thank you i'm out of town i will
i will clear my calendar to allow some
time to read that week and i yield back
to the chair
thank you very much the gentleman from
tennessee mr kustov is now recognized
for five minutes
thank you madam chair for calling
today's hearing and thank you to the
witnesses for appearing
secretary yellen if i could
there was an article in the wall street
journal dated september 15th the
headline is
yelling irs push democrats to require
banks to report taxpayer
annual account flows
i want to read the first two paragraphs
just briefly
treasury secretary janet yellen an irs
commissioner charles reddick pressed
lawmakers wednesday
to give the internal revenue service
more information about taxpayer bank
accounts as the biden administration
tries to sabot salvage its struggling
tax compliance proposal in letters to
lawmakers the administration officials
again asked congress
to require banks
to report annual inflows and outflows
from bank accounts with at least six
hundred dollars or at least six hundred
dollars worth of transactions a proposal
aimed at letting the irs target its
audits more effectively
it would generate about 460 billion
dollars over a decade
to cover the cost of democrats planned
expansion of the social safety net and
climate change policies according to the
administration those are the first two
paragraphs of the story
that's an accurate reflection of what
you've what you've done correct
yes we have proposed both augmenting the
resources of the irs so that it can hire
qualified auditors and augmenting the
information flow so that the irs gets
insight into opaque sources of income
and both together we believe can serve
to greatly
address the seven trillion dollar uh
estimated tax gap that we'll see in this
country and madam secretary you would
tell my constituents that they should
not have any privacy concerns about what
you're trying to do well they should not
because um it this is
um a simple matter for banks
that already file
1099 int
forms
the
irs information about taxpayers to pro
publica
that was published their entire tax
returns their entire tax information
on the record
you tell my constituents and all the
other members here their constituents
that they should have no privacy
concerns about banks reporting
600 or more in account value to the irs
what we've asked to have reported
is the aggregate inflows and outflows
from these accounts each year in an
annual basis two additional pieces of
information not transaction level data
and look
every wage earner in this country this
is what bank of at least 600 is that a
correct statement
well we want to make sure that uh this
this candidate's different transactions
by expanding those are values of six
hundred dollars
there's wall street journal's accurate
correct
excuse me the wall street journal report
is accurate
we did propose that i don't believe it's
an invasion of privacy and look the irs
gets a great deal of information
that it needs in order to make sure the
taxpayers comply with the tax code it
receives individual in individual
information on wages and salaries that
are received on dividends on
transactions on property
received this information from the irs
about the individual taxpayers excuse me
how did propublica
publish and obtain the information from
your agent from the irs
about taxpayers independent agencies and
law enforcement are currently looking
into that and attempting to figure out
how that occurred that is clearly your
crime and an utterly unacceptable thing
and it will be prosecuted um when it's
um
understood
your proposal purports to give more
information to the irs drilling down to
accounts of six hundred dollars
we want to make sure
that um individuals can't game game the
system by opening multiple accounts uh
in order to
evade the and that you give the irs all
this other information about individuals
last question madam secretary do you
support a move
to the department of treasury from
homeland security
of the united states secret service
i haven't taken a view on that thank you
i yield back my time
the gentleman from new york
mr torres is now recognized for five
minutes
uh thank you madam chair um i'm appalled
by the republican gameship around the
debt limit i heard a republican
colleague on this committee complain
about
not receiving a phone call from the
administration or complaining that we
the democrats are too partisan
the republican argument seems to be the
following that since the democrats have
been mean to us
we are going to sabotage the full faith
and credit of the united states
to exact revenge against those who have
slighted us
and that kind of pettiness has me
wondering are we in high school or the
united states congress
now it has to be said as
that the debt limit raising the debt
limit would not authorize new spending
it would simply pay the debts of
previous administrations
including the trump administration
so the republicans cannot pass
two trillion dollars worth of tax cuts
and then refuse to pay back the debt
that made those tax cuts possible in the
first place that to me is worse than
fiscal responsibility that's fiscal
hypocrisy and i support congressman
foster's legislation
abolishing the debt limit so that we're
no longer at the whims of
bruised egos
slighted by unreturned phone calls
suppose for a moment it is october 18th
the use of extraordinary measures is
exhausted
what happens on october 19th
we're simply in an impossible situation
in which it will be
impossible for treasury um on that day
or a few days thereafter depending on
the you know we'll have very limited
resources that will be run down quickly
we won't be able to pay all of the
government's bills
the treasury has been directed by
congress to pay all of the government's
bills um to use the tax revenues that
have
are available and without that to issue
debt and the debt ceiling will make it
impossible for us to do that and the
damage could be irreparable
well yes and we we got a taste of that
in 2011 in 2011
when uh the debt ceiling wasn't raised
until the last minute um the
fact the fact that congress might not
raise the debt limit and call into
question
whether or not
what is regarded as the safest asset in
the world
dollar-denominated
u.s treasury debt will actually be
repaid
uh is simply a catastrophic event i want
to follow up on an exchange you had with
congressman bud who asked you about the
debt to gdp ratio
the u.s debt to gdp ratio is over 100
percent um what is japan's debt to gdp
ratio excuse me what is japan's debt to
gdp ratio it's about 250
it's the highest in the world yes it is
and japan is regarded as a successful
economy
it is and japan also has low interest
rates and um he's not
is not fair and i agree with your
premise that the cost of servicing debt
is a more reliable measure of debt
sustainability than the debt to gdp
gdp ratio
and if we were to breach the debt limit
as republicans would have us do
it would actually raise the cost of
borrowing it would raise interest rate
payments yes which would make our debt
burden less sustainable not more
that is absolutely correct um
you know it would be regarded as riskier
we might suffer again a credit downgrade
and coming out of that we could expect
to see higher interest rates on treasury
debt and on the debt that private
individuals have mortgage debt credit
card debt auto loans and everything else
i want to quickly ask you about a title
4 loan under the cares act during the
trump administration the largest
recipient of the title iv
national security loan was a trucking
company previously known as
yrc worldwide and presently known as
yellow corporation
do you think a nearly bankrupt trading
company whose conduct is the subject of
a doj lawsuit for overcharging
should have received the national
security loan from the trump
administration
uh i'm afraid i don't know the details
of that and i'd be glad to have um our
staff get back to you on that and i want
to be clear that this loan is
the subject of scrutiny from the
bipartisan congressional oversight
commission and the select subcommittee
on the coronavirus
um you said that at the end of september
the funding for the emergency rental
assistance might be reallocated up to
how much funding might be reallocated i
can't give you a dollar estimate but the
objective would be
to shift it to
areas where there's need and proven
success in getting it out and if the use
of extraordinary measures is exhausted
on october 18th
what does the federal reserve do on
october 19th what actions do you take in
response if any
and that'll be my final question
i i guess i would just say no one should
assume that we can really do much to to
um
if there were to be a default on our
obligations no one should assume that
the fed or anyone else can shield fully
shield the uh the american people
the consequences of that
my time has expired so
the gentleman from indiana mr
hollingsworth is now recognized for five
minutes
well good morning i'm going to ask most
of my questions to secretary yellen
first and foremost i want to associate
myself with the comments that mr kustoff
made
i love serving on this committee i have
a great time working on the policies
that emanate from this committee but
rarely does something that this
committee do
lead to questions in the grocery store
questions at convenience stores and
questions around my district but i have
to tell you the proposal that has been
put forth about expanding the amount of
information that the irs is going to get
on private bank accounts
has been something i've been asked about
at parks at grocery stores at
convenience stores around the district
this has people deeply afraid
about the emergence
of an apparatus that can be used against
them so i want to better understand with
specificity what is being proposed
because what i saw in the proposal as
circulated by treasury was extremely
generic and somewhat incongruent with
what i heard today
you said to mr kustoff that the only
things that will be reported to the irs
under your proposal is the gross inflow
and the gross outflow from that
particular account in a given year is
that accurate or inaccurate in what you
have requested
the uh proposal put forward by the
administration requested a bit more
information than that but what is under
consideration now in reconciliation
would be limited to those two pieces of
information and this would um be
what what you should tell people who ask
you about this in the park is that right
now much of the
audit time of the irs is devoted to in
to taxpayers that have relatively low
incomes
and we know that the tax gap um is
something that um comes from opaque
sources of income and from high income
individuals i need to tell my audit
rates on individuals earning less than
hundred thousand dollars would not
increase this would wait a minute wait a
minute wait a minute
they're not worried about the audit
right reclaiming my time they're not
worried about the audit rates they're
about yielding their privacy
yielding their transaction history to a
federal government
transaction
reclaiming my time to a federal
government that has shown itself
time and time again mobilizing that
information against individuals
against organizations and against
businesses has shown itself incapable of
protecting that data
from
nation states through breaches excuse me
reclaiming my time
this is deeply concerning to them so
forgive me if i won't go back to them
and say don't worry despite all evidence
to the contrary about their past history
the federal government really means at
this time when they say they're going to
respect your privacy when they intend to
build firewalls around this enormous
database of personal information to them
and by the way which you brought up
we're doing it for a really good purpose
we're doing it for a really good purpose
forgive them if they don't believe that
the government is showing up on their
doorstep to ask about the inflows and
outflows from their personal accounts at
a very de minimis level and that is
going to be used for only their good
purpose there is no transaction level
data being um
report that would be reported to the irs
clarify what you mean by a bit more data
then when you said i asked is it just
these two things and you said it's a bit
more what does a bit more mean
the um proposal by the administration
that was originally put forward um
requested some additional information
particularly about businesses and
partnerships
but there is no transaction level data
for individuals
being considered by this congress i want
to point out
you know
why is it okay to that we have
businesses report um wage and salary
income or companies report dividends i
think we're
i think there's some real concern about
growing the amount of data the federal
government has proven itself incapable
of handling correctly or at some point
ethically to the irs i heard testimony
two years ago about how china was able
to apprehend many of the protesters in
hong kong the way that they did that was
mining financial data not by virtue of
great law and enforcement work and
investigatory work but instead by mining
financial data about who was scanning
their credit card in order to buy subway
tickets to those particular locations
this
worries americans who are rightly
concerned about a federal government
that does not have their best interest
at heart but is telling them that for
the greater good they need to yield more
privacy more of their privacy more of
the things that they do in their
personal accounts because they might be
able we might be able to close the tax
gap for other people who are cheating
with that i'll yield my time
the gentleman's time has expired
the gentlewoman from iowa ms axne who is
also the vice chair of the subcommittee
on housing
community
and development and insurance is now
recognized for five minutes
thank you madam chair and thank you
secretary yellen and chair powell for
being here it's great to see you uh
listen we've heard a lot about inflation
of course but i want to dig a little bit
into this
chair powell you recently mentioned that
price increases are relatively
concentrated in particular areas and yes
i think most folks can understand that
things like airlines and hotels etc
industries that took a hit during covid
um you know because people weren't
really traveling you know this could be
an issue there however i want to get
into some other areas where we've seen
price increases one of the biggest areas
is in cars both new and used um and i
wanted to touch base about this
secretary yellen one of the key causes
of the shortages um and the prices of
the increase in our cars is because of
shortages of semiconductors and
production issues is that correct
yes that is correct there have been
significant semiconductor shortages
particularly affecting
cars
thank you
and i hear regularly from businesses in
my district about supply chain issues uh
coming off of the pandemic that are
unfortunately holding back our companies
one recently told me that their sales
are down 120 million dollars really
because they can't they're they're
producing to supply chain
so sarah powell um we see that elsewhere
too with ships waiting offshore on both
coasts difficulties moving goods uh back
and forth etc is is that correct
yes it is
very correct it's it's hard to see how
long that will take but it will it will
resolve itself in time
and that shows us also that the prices
of shipping goods from china uh to the
u.s has gone up and i think that's gone
up 400 percent from pre-pandemic so
that's going to of course add to the
cost of anything we buy from china so
while we've got you two here i guess
what i'm wondering about are what are
the solutions uh chair powell if we have
issues with our ports or with the supply
semiconductors or other components
does it make much sense for the economy
to pull back on investments in the
bottlenecks or would we do better to
expand that capacity
i think that's really a question for
fiscal policy i will say these are uh
these are tangled supply chains right
now and it's it's a combination of a
bunch of factors which should abate over
time but in terms of obviously
investment in in supply chains would
make them
more efficient over time
thank you and so one you know i want to
point out here that most of the things
we produce do require workers um and i
spoke to you chair powell about this in
february but secretary yellen you've of
course studied labor markets throughout
your career so when we have constraints
on our supply chain does it make sense
to limit the numbers of people able to
work or should we instead invest in
policies like child care that help get
people into the workforce well
absolutely i think over the longer term
we've had a problem with declining labor
force participation of prime age workers
and
we're proposing paid leave
child care support
early childhood education
supports that would help expand labor
force participation in the short run of
course dealing with the pandemic to make
sure schools
can operate on a normal schedule get
people back to work will help as well
and then there are other countries
around the world that obviously have
some of these pieces put in place like
uh you know
better child care early childhood
education in your studies with them do
you see economic growth coming as a
result of putting these practices in
place yes it's been an important source
of growth
in the united states and elsewhere
once upon a time the united states just
with respect to women's labor force
participation had about the highest in
the world and that's changed radically
in recent decades um as we have failed
to expand and provide the level of
support for female especially for
women's labor force participation we've
fallen behind other developed countries
absolutely and thank you so if so what
i'm hearing it sounds like to me that
democrats what we're proposing is
actually a solution to some of these
inflation concerns and that doing
nothing will actually exacerbate issues
and make it worse uh you know i'm for
one not in the business of telling
people what they can't buy what i'm
hoping that we can do is find solutions
like child care like paid family leave
like lowering the cost of prescription
drugs to keep money in people's pockets
so that we can stop artificially
limiting the capacity of america's
economy and get people back to work to
help create
more products and move move products
around our country um so things like
child care paid leave and other policies
will actually help expand the workforce
thank you so much
gentlelady's time has expired
the gentleman from tennessee mr rose
is now recognized for five minutes
thank you chairwoman waters and ranking
member mchenry and i want to thank uh
chairman powell and secretary yellen for
being here today
i'm just going to just drive dive right
in i do want to follow up uh
on a couple of things that have been
talked about quite a bit this morning
the debt limit first of all i i feel
like you know there's a lot of
misinformation that circulates about
this so to be clear
if we suspend the debt limit that's to
in in to allow for the enlargement of
the debt yes some of that for programs
that have been in place historically but
much of that for
uh that would likely facilitate new
spending and i learned a long time ago
from my dad not to sign blank checks and
so uh it seems to me that if we suspend
the debt limit that's kind of like
signing a blank check and uh frankly i'm
not willing to participate in signing
that blank check if we had assurances
that
uh that increase would go simply to
cover the the current built-in costs of
operating the government then that might
be a different discussion but that's not
the one we're having and then uh
secretary ellen i want to follow up just
for a second about the irs reporting for
bank account information and i wonder in
the administration's proposal is there
any allowance
in that proposal to defray the costs
that banks and financial institutions
would incur from reporting from the
added reporting expenses of providing
this additional information to the to
the irs
i don't believe it was in the
administration's proposal but um if
appropriate we would be glad to work
with congress um on on that to defray
any expense well i certainly know that
the existing reporting requirements that
banks face is uh to be to be short on
onerous and
expensive and of course ultimately their
customers end up bearing that cost i
want to shift gears now in may the
treasury department published an interim
final rule to implement the coronavirus
state and local fiscal recovery fund
although the guidance was much needed
i continued to hear from cities and
county mayors across my district many of
which many of whom are here in in town
today
across my district asking for additional
clarification and flexibility i wrote a
letter to you in july requesting this
additional flexibility in the final rule
secretary
yellen can you tell us when we can
expect this updated guidance and if
there will be increased flexibility
included
we've tried to provide a great deal of
flexibility
in the guidance we have provided
there is an interim final rule that's in
place and states and localities can rely
on it
it was
out for comment we have received a very
large number of comments that we're
working through carefully and
will work to produce a final rule but
any any choice when that rule might be
available
um later this year but um the interim
final rule um is quite permissive in
terms of flexibility and
we look forward to seeing that
reclaiming my time
secretary and earlier this month the
committee reported the chairwoman's
partisan bill that will have the effect
of slowing down in my opinion the
distribution of emergency rental
assistance funds punish landlords and
expose taxpayers to fraud part of her
bill would replace having grantees
determine if a household was in fact an
eligible low-income household as
congress intended with the
self-attestation
that requires grantees to accept any
attestation of that of the of the
household as true secretary ellen are
you concerned that requiring grantees to
accept all self-attestations
attestations of applicants who want to
get free rental assistance money will
increase the likelihood of fraud
we're working carefully with
chairwoman waters and
want to make sure that we get money out
in the most effective and rapid way
possible while maintaining adequate
controls to prevent fraud and abuse
and secretary ellen we've had several
hearings regarding the emergency rental
assistance program that is disbursed
through treasury and yet you haven't
appeared a single one
and for that matter you failed to appear
at the small business committee hearing
as well so i'm going to yield the
remainder of my time to my good friend
mr luca meyer the ranking member of the
small business committee thank you mr
rose secretary ellen
i'm also the ranking member of the small
business committee as mr rose indicated
and last december congress passed a
bipartisan bill that required you to
testify and from the small business
committee on the paycheck protection
program
that deadline has now passed 157 days
ago and you're still not there
you have willfully refused to come for
the committee and willfully
uh refuse to obey the law so my question
is very simple
why can you a cabinet member of the
biden administration pick and choose
which laws you choose to follow
um i hear please close your vendor and
please respond off the cuff
why do you why can you pick and choose
which laws that you respond to i have
testified 11 times before congress
during never in front of small
businesses
i have agreed to do so we have not been
able to
find an appropriate date that works i
have offered a half mile i'll show you a
kitty list of your time has expired
i yell back the gentleman from
massachusetts mr lynch who is also the
chair of the task force on financial
technology is now recognized for five
minutes
excuse me mr lynch please turn your
microphone
i apologize to miss adams
uh first
first of all as someone for the past 20
years has worked with both republican
and democratic administrations
to
to allow our government to meet our
obligations to our senior citizens and
social security pay our troops and pay
our bills
uh i view this latest
threat
to to default on our
our debt as a
as a direct attack on the american
people and on our government itself
never has it been a good time to
to destroy the full faith and credit of
the united states and i
i fully support mr foster's bill house
3305
uh which would
would change the whole dynamic of
uh raising the debt limit uh i would
like to ask you about the rollout of the
cares act and uh madam secretary i know
that was a joint program between
treasury and uh the sba
uh as as chairman chairwoman waters
pointed out i chair the uh task force on
fintech
and uh
while there were very little connections
between most of the fintech firms and
the sba
uh prior to the pandemic once we gave
them
about 330 billion dollars in the second
phase of uh
of the ppp program
the fintechs engaged
they were able to put out i think 15 of
the funding
through fintech lenders
to people who needed it unfortunately
however about 75 percent of the fraud
that we detected was from that 15
percent
that went out through fintech lenders
and in these were either these were even
some of our best uh cabbage which
previously had never
uh never handled a an sba loan
uh you know they they were one of the
one of the companies that had
difficulties i'm just wondering if there
were any lessons learned
about that rollout i know we were rushed
you know we were pushing to get
especially
uh
the first phase the banks
took care of their their favorite
customers i understand that
and and those were known entities
uh and then we in congress encouraged uh
further reach out for the sba for people
who were not met uh and were not
addressed in the initial uh phase but
are there any i mean we had the rushed
aspect of it there was also i'm not sure
what the api interface is between uh
between
the sba and these fintech lenders i know
the relationships are new but did we
learn any
any lessons from that interaction in
getting money out to people who need it
through the fintech
companies and lenders that we
we used
well
certainly there are oversight and review
processes that are taking place
um i can get back to you i don't have
details on what we've found about
fintech lenders and i guess the sba is
probably doing much of that review of
the paytech paycheck protection program
but
in every aspect of developing
programs that have been assigned to
treasury
we've worked right from the outset with
our offices of inspector general
and others to make sure
that we have appropriate reporting and
fraud control
in place to um minimize fraud in the
programs and make sure that we have
controls in place
okay
uh chairman powell any thoughts on that
or would you rather take a pass
i'll i'll follow up and also see if we
have anything on that for you of course
the ppp was administered by the sba we
did the liquidity facility okay happy to
on in that part i would be happy to
check and come back to you that would be
great
and and uh
madam secretary
would you again
talk about what happens upon default and
what that means for the american people
it's a catastrophe
we can end up with we're likely to end
up with a financial crisis surely a
recession
and
millions of
individuals who are counting on checks
from the government
not receiving those in a timely fashion
and long lasting consequences of higher
interest rates for everybody who borrows
thank you very much i yield back madam
chair thank you
the gentleman from wisconsin's mr style
is recognized for five minutes thank you
very much madam chairwoman uh chairman
powell uh secretary yellen thank you for
being with us here today um out of the
gates secretary ellen i'd just like to
note that the proposal for bank account
reporting uh that you do not believe to
be an invasion of privacy i'd just like
to be on the record that i believe that
this would be
an invasion of privacy and i remain
concerned with it i'd like to jump over
to to debt to gdp
in a previous question uh you noted that
crossing the threshold of 100 of debt to
gdp in the united states now roughly 105
percent was not fiscally irresponsible
is that correct
in in in a in a comment to to mr torres
we were he was examining uh
i believe we're we're in a place where
um
we we can certainly bear the burden of
the debt now and in the future and you
believe that because we're currently in
a low inflationary environment with low
interest rates is that accurate
that's right but it but i'm assuming
that interest rates as the economy
recovers will move up to a more normal
level in line with the forecasts of
many professional forecasters in in if
in the in the event that the
inflationary rate increased beyond that
that current forecast by the the experts
that you're speaking with that would
increase the the burden on the debt
would that then become fiscally
irresponsible to have a debt to gdp
ratio over 100 percent
well it depends what happens to real
interest rates in the economy if they
were to rise significantly that of
course poses a risk that we need to take
into account um i think we should
absolutely take it into account i'm very
concerned with the spending proposals
from the biden administration and the
impact that that would have in the event
that we enter a a more inflationary
period where interest rates increase i
want to make clear that the proposals
from the biden administration are
neutral with respect to
the debt path that the projections that
we have shown
display essentially a level that path
over the next 10 years and
beyond 15 years substantially reduce on
the outstanding debt to gdp ratio i
remain
very concerned about the death path debt
path that the biden administration is
taking us on a whole array of spending
proposals that we're seeing let me let
me shift gears slightly uh over to you
mr chairman powell if i can
and build on this topic as it relates to
inflation it's something i've spoken
with you many times about in particular
in this committee uh in july last
december of last year uh and in those
times you've suggested i think you've
continued to state the fed's not ready
to take action to head off inflation
yet we're continuing to see prices to
increase
we saw uh consumer prices increase 5.4
percent year-over-year uh more recently
and continuing and regardless of what uh
the white house press team says i think
people are really seeing the impact of
higher prices uh day in and day out
now i know that you've said many of
these you believe to be transitory that
you think they'll come down but here's
here's my concern is that individual and
the public expectations are beginning to
change as people truly see the price
increases when they go to fill up their
car with gas when they go to grocery
store when they go back to school
shopping in a recent poll we saw 87
percent of americans said they're
concerned about inflation a new york fed
report uh reported that consumers expect
to see higher inflations over the medium
term and so could you provide a little
color as to what you think the how the
fed's going to respond to consumers
expecting to see inflation
well
um
essentially what what would need to
happen for inflation to remain high year
upon year upon year is we'd have to have
a new inflation regime in which people
began to begin to enter their psychology
and they began to think that it was
coming and expect that it was coming but
but don't we do with aldershot don't we
don't we see that evidence and some of
the the fed the the fed report that
showed that people are expecting
inflation or no well we we don't measure
these things precisely but we do measure
them a lot and there are many many
different measures and broadly speaking
those measures are at levels that are
consistent with our two percent uh
inflation goal not for the near term but
for the medium and longer term but
nonetheless you're that's the right
issue i mean we we monitor that care
very carefully
uh and uh to the extent we were to see
expectations broadly drifting up and and
the regime changing you know we would
certainly use our tools to
to make sure that inflation is
consistent with our goal i can i
appreciate you tracking this because i
believe as americans are looking at the
runaway spending here in washington dc
without a long-term plan to pay for it
that these expectations of inflation
will continue to increase and as the
expectation plays out as you as you
noted i think we'll see real inflation
the future having a significant impact
on the debt burden that the debt to gdp
ratio holds recognizing the time i yield
back thank you for being here
thank you the gentlewoman from north
carolina ms adams is now recognized for
five minutes
please unmute
uh thank you madam chair
um secretary yellen chairman chairman
powell thank you both for being here i'd
like to follow up on the question that
senator brown posed to both of you on i
think tuesday
uh he raised an excellent point that no
black woman has ever served on the fed's
board of governors and you both
indicated that you want diverse
viewpoints represented at the highest
levels of our economic policy-making
bodies and last year we had our own um
omni
uh omwi uh directors testify before us
about their efforts to diversify your
entities but i'd like to hear directly
from you both what are you doing and
your respective organizations to
encourage appointment and hiring of
black and brown women at all levels of
seniority and have you considered
recruiting on the campuses of hbcus and
other msis
well i can start off and
say that um
we have a very active program
um at all levels of the treasury
department including political
appointments at uh recruiting a diverse
workforce and leadership and i think if
you look at the appointments that we've
made or proposed that we've made good on
that commitment and continue to give it
the highest priority with respect to the
federal reserve
you know i and others will provide
invites on
nominations to the president will be up
to him to
um make um
to nominate individuals to serve
at the fed board and we certainly will
ensure that he has a diverse slate of
candidates to
consider in making these appointments
thank you um
we work very hard to recruit diverse
talent diverse people to the board
and we work very hard to keep and and
make sure that the people that we do
succeed in recruiting have good
opportunities are included in
opportunities to learn and have as many
opportunities as they can have so that
they can have a career at the fed it's a
very high
profile focus for us
thank you secretary yellen it's always a
pleasure to have you before us
in case you don't know like you i was a
professor for over 40 years and i tell
folks all the time that i might not be
in the classroom anymore but i still
enjoy educating those of us here in the
congress and so if you don't mind i'd
appreciate it if you take us back to the
classroom and help educate us a bit uh
so do you believe economic recovery is
strong enough to handle the withdrawal
of current pandemic relief efforts well
i think the relief efforts have been
very important in stimulating a strong
recovery and i mentioned in my opening
remarks that
we're outperforming the united states as
outperforming most other developed
countries in the strength of our
recovery due to those efforts
that congress has made and there will be
fiscal drag
next year namely
we had a good deal of impetus or
stimulus this year and it will diminish
substantially next year nevertheless
most forecasters and the administration
believe that the recovery will
continue and that private spending will
be sufficient um to have us pass the
baton to it and keep the economy growing
you know we've proposed we're in the
middle of as you know of reconciliation
and the programs under consideration
there
are really on
spread out over 10 years
provide some modest stimulus
in each of those years but at a much
lower levels than the rescue planner
oriented towards structural uh issues in
the u.s economy
thank you so now we know our mission
here is to ensure that the economy
continues to recover for all americans
so if congress fails to raise our
statutory debt limit by mid-october what
would the effect be to the economy
it will be devastating to the economy
we'll be unable to pay our bills for the
first time in american history
it could provoke a financial crisis in a
recession and it will harm uh every
every american
thank you you know it's uh irresponsible
i believe that my colleagues in both the
house and senate would risk our recovery
from this pandemic for political points
i'm glad that that you hear
uh that you i'm glad to hear that you
agree and i look forward to this body
protecting all americans by doing the
right thing and raising this debt
ceiling stay on your back thank you very
much uh the gentleman from south
carolina mr timmons is now recognized
for five minutes
thank you madam chair and uh secretary
yellen chair powell thank you for being
here with us today
just yesterday speaker pelosi gave
oxygen to the idea that president biden
has the ability to mint a trillion
dollar commemorative coin made of
platinum
deposit in the federal reserve and then
use that to pay our bills a number of
other members have adamantly promoted
this proposal to include congressman
nadler and uh just tuesday uh my
colleague across the aisle tweeted
mint the coin
chair powell please tell me you think
this idea is as ridiculous as it sounds
i i really that's not a question for me
i had a feeling you would say that i
just wanted to start there um
madam secretary uh please tell me that
this is not a legitimate policy proposal
and that this is not something that
we're considering
i believe that the only way to handle
the debt ceiling is for congress to
raise it and
show the world the financial markets and
the public that we're a country that
will pay our bills when we incur them i
really appreciate that
more than you can possibly know thank
you so much
that cuts some of the next few things i
was going to say short
we are not going to print to mint a
trillion dollar coin
we're not really these are not serious
policy proposals speaking of serious
policy proposals um
i want to talk about what uh congressman
kustoff and congressman hollingsworth
touched on the idea of
well i guess it's changed because as the
bite administration proposed it was
originally all transaction histories of
any account with more than 600 in or out
of it so you you testified not 15
minutes ago that it now in
reconciliation
is not being considered it is just the
account balance so
it's changed i never said
that the administration ever proposed
collecting detailed transaction data
from individuals that is never anything
that the biden administration
contemplated so you just said it's
changed since the original proposal to
what is now being considered how did it
change a little a few additional pieces
of information were com contemplated for
businesses um those are no longer being
so it's getting better it's moving in
the right direction because i've had a
number of uh banks and credit unions
reach out to me it's remarkable
generally they do not agree they are in
agreement that this is a terrible
proposal so i know that we're trying to
figure out how to pay for five trillion
dollars of spending
but this is not
just as meant the coin is not a serious
policy proposal this is not a serious
policy proposal this is a very serious
policy proposal we have a seven trillion
dollar estimated tax gap that we have a
great deal of tax avoidance by
individuals and businesses
typically very high net worth high
income individuals and businesses
that have opaque sources of income that
are not paying the taxes
what does that have to do with 600
accounts that's every single account of
oh is that 99 of americans
well listen
banks already report interest amounting
to over ten dollars to the irs on every
account in the country and
this proposal involves
two additional pieces of information
that are not at the level of individual
transactions and this will help um
low-income individuals who now are
disproportionately subject to audits by
the irs
this will do is let the irs focus it's
complete
secretary and those individuals
avoiding paying the taxes spending my
time
out of secretary please um we had a
hearing just yesterday in this very room
about the underbanked and the unbanked
and one of the biggest concerns is about
privacy and so for us to make it
far more challenging uh for people to
trust the very system that that we're
hoping that people use the banking
system the backbone of our economy it's
we're moving in the wrong direction here
and i appreciate that we have changed
the expectation from the original
proposal to now it's being considered
reconciliation but the american people
don't want this they don't think it's
reasonable and i'll go ahead and
this is what's going to happen it's
going to get pulled out because there's
no support on
from the american public and it's just
not going to happen with that i yield
back thank you
thank you very much
i'd like to thank
secretary yellen and chair powell for
their testimony today without objection
all members will have five legislative
days within which to submit additional
written questions for the witnesses to
the chair
which will be forwarded to the witnesses
for their response
i ask our witnesses to please respond as
promptly as you're able without
objection all members will have five
legislative days within which
to submit extraneous materials to the
chair for inclusion in the record
this hearing is adjourned and i thank
our witnesses so very much for being
here
we have the heart stop
now right at 12 15. we're on time thank
you very much
foreign
you

indeed helping the machinery of local

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irresponsibleness::noun | Spocien Dictionary

irresponsibleness

noun

/,ɪrɪ'spɑnsəbəlnɛs/

a form of untrustworthiness; the trait of lacking a sense of responsibility and not feeling accountable for your actions

Type	Words
Synonyms	irresponsibility
Type of	untrustworthiness, untrustiness
Has types	carefreeness, flightiness, undependability, undependableness, unreliability, unreliableness, whimsey, whimsicality, arbitrariness, whimsy, capriciousness
Derivation	irresponsible

Examples of irresponsibleness

irresponsibleness

Claiming Apple machines are immune is just irresponsibleness.

From the independent.co.uk

How to pronounce irresponsibleness in English?

irresponsibleness::noun | Spocien Dictionary

abandonment

Related words

Examples of irresponsibleness

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