Tag: Budget Deficit

Budget Deficit Jumped 17 Percent in 2018

Buck Banks

$779 billion

“The federal budget deficit swelled to $779 billion in fiscal year 2018, the Treasury Department said on Monday, driven in large part by a sharp decline in corporate tax revenues after the Trump tax cuts took effect,” the New York Times reports. “The deficit rose nearly 17 percent year over year, from $666 billion in 2017. It is now on pace to top $1 trillion a year before the next presidential election.”

Trump Administration’s Deficit Forecast Is Waaaaay Off

Buck Banks

$9.5 trillion

“The Congressional Budget Office estimates the government will take in $1.9 trillion less in revenue and spend $300 billion more over the next decade than the White House estimated under its latest budget proposal if the plan were enacted,” the Wall Street Journal reports. “Deficits would total $9.5 trillion over the coming decade, or $2.3 trillion more than the White House estimates.”

Senate Tax Bill to Add $1 Trillion to Deficit

Buck Banks

$1 trillion

“Congress’ nonpartisan tax analysts have concluded the Senate Republicans’ tax plan would add $1 trillion to the deficit over 10 years, contradicting White House promises the bill would pay for itself and complicating GOP leaders’ efforts to find the support they need to pass the bill through a closely divided Senate,” the Washington Post reports.

The Trump Tax Plan’s Deficit Problem

Buck Banks

$1.7 trillion

CNBC: “The GOP bill including some changes would increase federal budget deficits by $1.7 trillion over 10 years, according to Joint Committee on Taxation estimates shared by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. That includes money for additional debt service payments due to the bill. … Under budget rules congressional Republicans are using to pass a tax plan, the bill can only increase deficits by $1.5 trillion over 10 years, before growth is taken into account.”

The Price of Ducks

Buck Banks

$415,000

Amount in tax breaks allowed for every episode of “Duck Dynasty” taped in Louisiana, even as Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) tries to close a $1.6 billion budget hole, the Baton Rouge Advocate reports. “The A&E television reality show takes part in the nation’s most generous entertainment-tax credit program. Jindal is proposing no changes, arguing that reducing such breaks is tantamount to raising taxes.”

2013 Budget Deficit Drops Dramatically

Buck Banks

$680 billion

The fiscal year’s federal budget deficit, which fell more sharply than in any year since the end of World War II. The Treasury Department reported Thursday that the “deficit for 2013 dropped to $680 billion, from about $1.1 trillion the previous year,” the New York Times reports. “In nominal terms, that is the smallest deficit since 2008, and signals the end of a five-year stretch beginning with the onset of the recession when the country’s fiscal gap came in at more than $1 trillion each year. As a share of the nation’s economy, the budget deficit fell to about 4.1 percent, from a high of more than 10 percent during the depths of the Great Recession.”