What’s key to fixing our long-term fiscal crisis?
Health care costs. The Affordable Care Act is not perfect, but it acknowledges the problem of increasing costs and tries to take steps to address them. The sooner we address costs, the better we can spread out some of the burden.
You’ve said choosing between stimulating the economy and fixing our fiscal issues is a “false choice.” Meaning?
If we can get back to robust economic growth, it will have a huge impact on the deficit. The biggest cause of our deficit the last three years has been a lack of revenue, partly [due to] the recession itself.
Your view of extending unemployment benefits?
Extend [them] while recognizing the need for changes to our long-term fiscal health. We have more than 4 unemployed workers per job opening. It seems mal-timed to cut off about one-third of household income for households with an unemployed worker.
Tax collections would rise, you say, if more students graduated from high school.
Because of increased income, these new high school graduates would pay more in income taxes than dropouts. There would also be savings. High school graduates are also less likely to end up in prison.
Biggest lesson you learned from working in the Obama administration?
I learned a certain humility: You do the very best you can with what you know at the time. It’s easy to look back and say, ‘Coulda, woulda, shoulda.’ I learned to just do my best with the information I had.