By coinnews 
00:00 Speaker A
A Moody’s downgrade of the US credit score reverberated through financial markets Monday, but the response from Republicans crafting a bill that could add trillions in new red ink was to immediately try to minimize the news. For more, let’s welcome in Yahoo Finance’s very own Ben Worschel. Ben.
00:16 Ben Worschel
Yes, hey Josh. So yes, so it was a remarkable kind of story today that you guys had a really exciting day in the markets in response to this Moody’s downgrade, but here in Washington, especially amongst lawmakers and amongst the White House, there was sort of an overall attempt to downplay the news and appear unfazed by it. Even as this Moody’s statement did call out the White House Republican bill directly. It estimates that just extending the 2017 tax cuts and jobs Act, which is only one piece of this bill, would add $4 trillion in deficits in the decade ahead. So the White House dismissed it and lawmakers even rushed ahead to try and they they they advanced the bill on Sunday night, late Sunday night, out of the budget committee. They have another hearing, believe it or not, at 1:00 a.m. on Wednesday morning in the Rules Committee to advance it further, and this is all as they sort of march as quickly as they can to try and get this out before the Memorial Day recess. A final vote in the house is expected on Thursday to do this, and this is a bill that could add trillions of dollars in deficits in the years ahead, based on a whole bunch of analysis.
01:55 Speaker A
Well, let’s dig into that that part of it for just a moment here, Ben, because President Trump’s economic advisor is making the case that the bill is going to save a trillion dollars. What are we hearing from outside analysts about this?
02:15 Ben Worschel
Yeah. So so the White House case, which is which is contained in a new report from the Council of Economic Advisors this afternoon, is that it’s the opposite story in terms of what this bill will do. Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, said it will save $1.6 trillion. That’s a five $5 trillion gap from a range of other analysis. You heard the Moody’s one was $4 trillion, the Committee on Responsible Federal Budget, the Joint Committee on Taxation, and we had another one this afternoon from the Penn Wharton Budget Model. They all find a sort of $3 to $4 trillion debt increase in red ink from this. So it’s a huge gap, and the White House tries to explain the difference basically by saying that economic growth will be so supercharged from this that it will it’ll make up the difference, that the economy will boom to such an extent that the revenues will outmatch that. I’ll say there’s not a lot of evidence for that, considering a lot of this bill is an extension of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, and we sort of know how much that grew the economy, and it wasn’t at the levels they’re talking about. The White House also says other things like tariff revenues, deregulation, all these things should be factored in and will make the fiscal picture much better. But again, it’s a it’s an analysis not a lot of economists agree with, and it sort of sets up a time ahead where we have this huge gap. I mean, $5 trillion is a pretty whopping number to have, and it’s that I think we’re going to hear from both sides as we go forward.
04:25 Speaker A
Ben, great to see you. Thank you, sir.
04:28 Ben Worschel
Good thing.