| Submit your comments on this article | |
| Home Front Economy | |
| CBO: Deficit could be less than $300B | |
| 2006-05-05 | |
| WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. budget deficit this year could dip to as low as $300 billion, well below the White House's estimate, partly because the federal government was enjoying "robust growth" in revenues, the Congressional Budget Office said Thursday. In February, the White House estimated a possible fiscal 2006 budget deficit of $423 billion, a figure that political opponents said was likely inflated. More recently, there have been government estimates of a budget deficit closer to $350 billion this year, down from the fiscal 2005 deficit of $318 billion. The nonpartisan congressional budget analyst said that "robust growth in revenues" accounted for some of the improvement in the deficit picture.
CBO said that during the first seven months of the fiscal year that began on Oct. 1, the federal government ran a budget deficit of $183 billion, $53 billion less than for the same period in fiscal 2005. | |
| Posted by:Steve White |
| #9 I've read a bunch of stories recently about numbers of retirees getting part-time jobs, when they realize that they can't really afford to live off Social Security alone, and are bored just doing as they please. And I b'lieve the earned income limit beyond which one must pay FICA taxes is pretty low. It seems to me that the problem will turn out not to be quite as imminent as calculated. (Not that I have any expectation of receiving anything back of what Mr. Wife and I paid in, but that's ok.) |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-05-05 23:00 |
| #8 Probably... print more money. |
| Posted by: tu3031 2006-05-05 17:06 |
| #7 Inquiring Minds want to know What Krugman has to say... LOL. |
| Posted by: Wheper Pholung4601 2006-05-05 17:04 |
| #6 http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/ Total US federal government debt is about $8.4 trillion dollars. http://inflationdata.com/Inflation/Inflation_Rate/CurrentInflation.asp Annualized inflation rate as of March 2006 is 3.36%. $8.4 trillion x 3.36% = $282 billion So in inflation adjusted dollars the national debt doesn’t seem to be increasing much. http://www.finfacts.com/irelandbusinessnews/publish/article_10005675.shtml “Real US gross domestic product -- the output of goods and services produced by labor and property located in the United States -- increased at an annual rate of 4.8 percent in the first quarter of 2006, according to advance estimates released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. In the fourth quarter, real GDP increased 1.7 percent.” So as a percent of GDP the US debt seems to be decreasing. On the other hand, the unfunded liability for Social Security and Medicaid is growing significantly. My guess is that this problem will be solved by effective advanced biomedicine and raising the age for retirement. |
| Posted by: Slaviling Glomong9311 2006-05-05 16:48 |
| #5 This is good news, in that the debt crisis is reduced. This level of Debt is actually not to bad for a $13,000 Billion economy. The problem is that both taxes and spending are still too high, and without a crisis to hold their feet to the fire...congress will do nothing to change things. |
| Posted by: Omemp Fliting5123 2006-05-05 15:23 |
| #4 Don't know about you, but I think it right and proper that my kids are going to help pay for the John C. Stennis, the Virginia and the Spirit of Missouri. These are capital items that are expensed in 4 or 5 years, crazy. |
| Posted by: 6 2006-05-05 11:45 |
| #3 The experts have been claiming our deficit would destroy us all since the 60s. I still ain't buying it. |
| Posted by: DarthVader 2006-05-05 09:35 |
| #2 So Glenmore, just what is the average American credit card debt? The government is paying interest near prime rate, the American public is paying about three times that. Oh, the sky is so falling. The reason that the deficit is dipping is because both the economy and the taxes it generates are running above projections. So much for experts on projections [they can take a seat next to the population and global warming predictors]. |
| Posted by: Claiter Throth2726 2006-05-05 09:25 |
| #1 Deficit ONLY $300 B!!! That's $1000 per person deficit; money being borrowed from our kids. If only we could get the gov't to SPEND LESS too! But then, it really only represents excess productivity, and it has to be 'spent' somehow, even if that 'spending' is just throwing it away (like paying to not grow crops.) Excess productive capacity today has no value tomorrow (well, unless you count storing cans of food or such.) Ideally, excess productivity today should be invested in things that are likely to produce increased productive capacity at a time in the future when it would be needed. Building infrastructure is an example - even Alaskan bridges to nowhere. Paying salaries to people who do nothing is not. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2006-05-05 08:51 |