Mark Zandi Quotes

It's clear that the medium and long-run fiscal challenges facing the country have to do with the rise of entitlement spending, they have to do with the longer run imbalances that we've created in the structure of the system.

Trillions of dollars in out-of-control entitlement spending cannot be remedied by cuts in NASA, or even in the entire discretionary budget, defense included. Rather, the financial bleeding needs to be staunched where the hole is and nowhere else.

The Missourians I hear from just don't buy the idea that the only way to tackle the national debt is to drastically alter Medicare and Social Security.

When you talk about entitlement programs, it's not just about - it's not about cutting those programs. It is about saving those programs. Those programs are on a path of fiscal unsustainability.

I'd love to see lower spending levels, and in absence of lower spending levels, I'd love to see us reallocate where some of that spending is and really address the entitlements that continue growing.

When you're talking about long-term deficit reduction, $4 trillion worth, entitlement reform needs to be part of it.

The most important area for spending restraint is entitlement reform.

In order to truly get deficit spending and federal debt under control, the Trump administration is going to have to eventually address entitlement reform. If not, Trump will not only become part of the Washington status quo on the issue, but will leave burdensome and expensive problems for future generations.

It is foolish for Republicans to continue opening the door to job-killing tax hikes while Democrats refuse to explain how they propose to reform mandatory spending - mostly entitlements - that makes up almost two-thirds of the federal budget.

You cannot tackle Britain's debts without tackling the unreformed welfare system.

If we don't change the way Washington operates we're going to bankrupt our children and grandchildren.

Most of the major increases in the debt ceiling have been accompanied by structural changes in the way we raise and spend money.

Paul Ryan has been a responsible legislator and public servant, almost alone among members of Congress in his belief that we need to strengthen and save our social entitlements.

The political gridlock in Washington leads us to conclude that policymakers don't have the ability to put the public finances of the U.S. on a sustainable footing.

The need to change our country's fiscal trajectory, including reforming entitlement programs, is an unassailable reality that will define our time.

The true enemies of Social Security and Medicare are those who defend an imploding status quo.

Actually, as president of the Conference of Mayors, we passed the Simpson-Bowles plan as a template, as a template, as a frame work for moving forward and the president has done the same.

The mortal enemies of Social Security and Medicare are those who, in contempt of the plain arithmetic, continue to mislead Americans that we should change nothing.

We can have tax cuts, but when we have tax cuts and do not have a surplus, the amount of the tax cut goes straight to the bottom line, adds to the deficit, and the deficit adds to the national debt, and sooner or later, the debt has to be paid.

We are worried about the size of the deficit, which is why the president is pleased that the House and Senate have followed his lead in cutting the deficit in half over the next five years.

We have to deal with two issues. Spending and taxes.

Mitt Romney and I know the difference between protecting a program, and raiding it. Ladies and gentlemen, our nation needs this debate. We want this debate. We will win this debate.

We do ourselves a disservice when some of us cave to the myth that Social Security somehow drives the deficit.

People try to live within their income so they can afford to pay taxes to a government that can't live within its income.

I think there is a shared sense of urgency in Washington on fiscal issues.