President-elect Barack Obama's choice to run the White House Budget office is predicting bruising deficits over the next decade.

Peter Orszag told the Senate Budget Committee to expect budget deficits equaling 5 percent of the size of the economy for the next five or ten years. That would mean deficits of $750 billion or so over the next couple of years and steadily exceeding $1 trillion by the end of the next decade.

Orszag says a long-term goal of the incoming administration is fiscal restraint to prevent even worse deficits.

Current projections see a deficit for the ongoing budget year exceeding $1 trillion -- and that's before enactment of Obama's $800 billion or so economy recovery plan. The Congressional Budget Office predicts a $1.2 trillion deficit for 2009, about 8 percent of gross domestic product.