Federal Government Continues to Spend More Than It Takes In

Posted on October 18, 2017

For the first 11 months of fiscal 2017, the Congressional Budget Office estimates that the federal budget deficit was $675 billion, $56 billion more than the shortfall recorded for the same period last year.

Although receipts were higher than last year, the amount of money spent by the government was also higher than last year. Individual income tax and Social Security taxes were higher than last year by $80 billion and the amount withheld from workers’ paychecks was higher by $103 billion.

However, individual income tax refunds increased by $10 billion over the last year. Payments for Social Security benefits, Medicare benefits and Medicaid benefits rose by $26 billion, $16 billion and $6 billion over last year, respectively. Interestingly, fees and fines rose by $8 billion over last year because of larger than usual penalty payments.

Although we know that it takes money to run the country, spending more money than one earns can only happen for so long. How long can you run your household at a deficit without running out of money? We fear that that is going to happen to the federal government at some point in the future. What do you think?

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