Count Romina Boccia among those who are excited by what the recent tax reform package will mean to the economy — stock market correction or no. 

She’s a leading budget and economics expert with the Heritage Foundation. She spoke to the Iowa Bankers Association at the Embassy Suites on Feb. 7.

“What a time to be alive,” Boccia said right out of the gate. “The economy is booming. This is only the beginning.”

Boccia spoke of several hundred companies that already are sharing their tax savings with employees through raises or bonuses. 

The tax code had been “left to rot for 30 years,” but now is improved, if not perfect, she said. 

“This isn’t the once in a lifetime tax reform that many hoped it would be, but it is a start,” she told the bankers. 

It can be an odd experience following federal spending, Boccia said. For example, payroll taxes are 33 percent for Social Security and Medicare. But those two programs account for 40 percent of the federal budget, “so maybe they aren’t collecting enough.”

But for the most part, she said, the feds are on the right track trying to cut things. “We don’t have a revenue problem. We have a spending problem,” she said. Revenue is running about average these days, but spending as a percentage of gross domestic product is growing, she added. 

She offered this warning, too: “You cannot chase higher spending with higher taxes for long. There is no limit to human wants and desires.”