The numbers' cruncher

There's no argument about who is at the top of the marquee for tax matters in the executive branch. The assistant secretary of the Treasury for tax policy is the public face of the Administration when it comes to taxes. Not only must the assistant secretary testify before Congress and face the press on tax issues, but the appointee is also ultimately responsible for drafting legislation, reviewing tax regulations, and negotiating tax treaties. Perhaps most important, he or she is the person who must explain tax policy to the President.

One of the assistant secretary's deputies, however, plays a less visible role that is nearly as important, and could be crucial for President Bush's top priority this year -- his $1.6 trillion tax cut. By tradition, the deputy assistant secretary for tax analysis is the top-ranking tax economist at Treasury. When it comes to the numbers-crunching -- and Treasury's tax people do a lot of it -- the deputy for tax analysis is in charge.

Few outsiders know it, but it is Treasury, and not the Office of Management and Budget, that is responsible for the entire revenue side of the federal budget. The deputy for tax analysis supervises this huge accounting and analytical effort. Ordinarily, the fact that no one has yet been named to fill this job would be a problem, but President Bush didn't issue a detailed budget on Feb. 28 -- only an outline. Treasury officials say they expect to have a deputy for tax analysis in place to help prepare the full budget before its release sometime in April.

The tax deputy represents credibility. "The person in that job is responsible for all the [economic] assumptions," said a key congressional tax staffer. "He's got to have the confidence of the staff on the Hill, and ultimately the members." Perhaps the deputy assistant's most important constituent is the Congressional Budget Office. "When it comes to gauging the economic impact of a proposal, it is really important to have an economist with credibility," said former CBO Director Robert Reischauer. That person's reputation "determines whether the numbers will be laughed at by the top professionals." Among the alumni of this post is R. Glenn Hubbard, a top Bush campaign adviser who was just appointed to be the chairman of Bush's Council of Economic Advisers.

The Brookings Institution's Bob Litan, who was an OMB official under President Clinton, said that the tax deputy may play a lesser role under Bush because of the abundance of tax experts close to the President, including economic czar Larry Lindsey. But one former deputy says that one part of the job never changes. "There's always a conflict with the White House, where the goal is getting out the message, and [Treasury], where the goal is getting it right," said Len Berman, who held the job from 1998 to 2000. "I always felt awkward as a political appointee because you're not supposed to be immune to the political needs of the President, but you also have this obligation to be totally honest." Return to main story