US Budget Gap Widens to $1.2 Trillion in Fiscal Year Through May

[Voluntarist]

All because tax receipts from Anheuser-Busch, Target and Cracker barrel have fallen off. Well, OK, it's probably something else.


US Budget Gap Widens to $1.2 Trillion in Fiscal Year Through May

The US federal government’s budget deficit hit $1.16 trillion for the first eight months of the fiscal year, a 191% increase from a year ago.

The deficit for the month of May was $240 billion, according to data released Monday by the Treasury Department. That’s more than double the deficit in May 2022. Year-on-year comparisons are adjusted to account for calendar differences.

Increasing interest costs remained the biggest driver of higher outlays in the fiscal year so far. Those expenses dropped, however, in May compared with a year ago, due to lower interest payments on inflation-protected Treasury securities.

Higher Medicare and Medicaid expenses, and federal depositor insurance costs related to the failure of a small number of regional banks this spring also contributed to higher outlays.

On the receipts side, non-withheld individual taxes — which include capital-gains levies — dropped by $74 billion in May compared to a year ago, and by $260 billion in the fiscal year to date.

 

[Voluntarist]

The federal deficit nearly tripled, raising concern about the country's finances

The federal government's deficit nearly tripled in the first nine months of the fiscal year, a surge that's bound to raise concerns about the country's rising debt levels.

The Treasury Department said Thursday that the budget gap from October through June was nearly $1.4 trillion — a 170% increase from the same period a year earlier. The federal government operates under a fiscal year that begins October 1.

The shortfall adds to an already large federal debt — estimated at more than $32 trillion. Financing that debt is increasingly expensive as a result of rising interest rates. Interest payments over the last nine months reached $652 billion — 25% more than during a same period a year ago.

"Unfortunately, interest is now the government's fastest growing quote-unquote 'program,'" said Michael Peterson, CEO of the Peter G. Peterson foundation, which promotes fiscal responsibility.

...

"We are projected to spend more on interest payments in the next decade than we will on the entire defense budget," said Maya Macguineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. "How can anyone possibly think this trend is sustainable?"