WASHINGTON – As the first of approximately 70 million baby boomers retires next year, two senior U.S. senators are attempting to fix what they cite as "a fiscal challenge of unprecedented proportions."

New Hampshire Republican Sen. Judd Gregg announced yesterday that he had joined Democratic Sen. Kent Conrad of North Dakota on legislation that would create a bipartisan task force to recommend ways to resolve the nation's spending and revenue imbalance.

"The retirement of the baby boomers will seriously exacerbate a problem that has been building for years," Gregg said at a news conference. "Now is the time to address the unsustainable shortfall between our expected revenues and the trillions we know we will be spending for federal health and retirement programs."

If action is not taken soon, Gregg said in a floor speech yesterday, the country will face $62 trillion of "unfunded liability" to pay for the benefits under Medicare and Social Security by 2025, when the population of retired baby boomers reaches its peak.

Conrad is the chairman and Gregg the senior minority member of the Senate Budget Committee.

The task force would be made up of seven senators and seven House members, the Secretary of the Treasury (who would chair the panel) and one other designated by the President. In each chamber, four of the panel's members would be chosen by the majority party and three by the minority.

The task force would submit long-term policy recommendations by Dec. 9, 2008, and Congress would be given just five legislative days to accept or reject the proposals without change and on a three-fifths vote of approval in each chamber.

The proposed legislation has received a surprising amount of support from the usually critical Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a bipartisan, nonprofit organization of budget experts.

"This is precisely the type of bipartisan collaboration we need to jump-start the discussion of how to confront the nation's fiscal challenges," said Maya MacGuineas, the group's president.

The task force would review all areas of the budget, including Social Security, Medicare and taxes. It is based on a bill Gregg had introduced earlier in the year that dealt with similar issues.

"It's the most significant fiscal issue this country faces," he said. "And it's an issue of such importance that it exceeds anything else this country is going to have to deal with other than fighting Islamic terrorism over the next 20 years."

David Walker, the U.S. comptroller general, said he was in favor of the proposed legislation because it attempts to address Americans' need for "truth and leadership."

"Our nation is on an imprudent and unsustainable fiscal path," he said at the news conference. "Tough choices are required in order to help ensure that our future is better than our past."

The comptroller general heads the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, which Gregg and Conrad consulted in drafting the legislation.

Establishing a task force instead of a piece of policy to deal with the nation's financial problems, Gregg explained, has "a better shot at doing something" and not getting wiped out by interest groups.

With a bipartisan structure, the task force guards itself against the partisan politics that so often cause a stalemate on long-term fiscal policies, he said in an interview.

"The longer we wait, the harder the choices become," Conrad said in a separate statement. "We refuse to hand this problem off to yet another 'outside' commission. The time for action is now."

Jordy Yager is an intern with the Boston University Washington News Service.