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Answers to Questions for the Record following a Hearing on the Oversight of the Congressional Budget Office Conducted by the Senate Committee on the Budget 1 (November 18, 2016)

handle is hein.congrec/cbo3273 and id is 1 raw text is: ill/;¢NOVEMB ER 18, 2016 Answers to Questions for the Record Following a Hearing on the Oversight of the Congressional Budget Office Conducted by the Senate Committee on the Budget On September 14, 2016, the Senate Committee on the Budget convened a hearing at which Keith Hall, Director of the Congressional Budget Office, testified about CBO ' work since May 2015 and its plans for the future (www.cbo.gov/Publication/51923). After the hearing, Chairman Enzi, Ranking Member Sanders, and other Members of the Committee submitted questions for the record. This documentprovides CBO ' answers. Chairman Enzi Question. Last week, Deputy CBO Director Mark Hadley testified before the House Budget Committee on the budgetary effects of the Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation (CMMI).1 Significant concerns were raised in that hearing by members of the Committee and by the other witnesses about the assumptions and models used by CBO. One of those witnesses, Joseph Antos, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and former Assistant Director for Health and Human Resources at CBO, highlighted the importance of CBO's decision to account for savings that might be lost for 'initiatives CMMI is undertaking (or is expected to undertake)' in assessing legislative proposals. Mr. Antos testified that, This remarkable decision to score lost savings for demonstration projects that have yet to be announced is a sharp break with past practice. He goes on to suggest, Just as CBO does not score legislative proposals that have not yet been advanced, it seems unreasonable for them to score actions by CMMI that have not yet been advanced. Can you please explain CBO's rationale for making this decision? Please describe the criteria, data sources, and process CBO uses to determine whether CMMI is likely to undertake any future demonstration. Answer: CBO's estimate that CMMI's activities will reduce federal spending over the next decade is based primarily on judgments about the effectiveness of the center's process for conducting demonstrations, not on judgments about the expected results of particular demonstrations that the center is conducting or likely to conduct in the future. On the basis of evidence from earlier periods, CBO expects that a small share of the demonstrations conducted by CMMI will achieve savings, most will have little or no effect on federal spending, and some will increase spending. A crucial feature of the legislation that 1. Testimony of Mark Hadley, Deputy Director, Congressional Budget Office, CBO' Estimates of the Budgetary Effects of the Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation (September 7, 2016), www.cbo.gov/publication/51921.

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