PF Exclusive: Debt increase in FY2015 lowest in 14 years

Discussion in 'Budget & Taxes' started by Iriemon, Nov 13, 2015.

  1. Iriemon

    Iriemon Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    A little factoid I noted looking at some figures. Not reported in the media that I've seen so we have a PF exclusive.

    According to the Treasury Department, the total US government debt increased $326.5 billion in FY2015.

    That is the lowest level of annual debt increase in 14 years, or since FY 2001:

    Year ----------- Total Debt
    09/30/2015 18,150,604,277,750.63
    09/30/2014 17,824,071,380,733.82
    09/30/2013 16,738,183,526,697.32
    09/30/2012 16,066,241,407,385.89
    09/30/2011 14,790,340,328,557.15
    09/30/2010 13,561,623,030,891.79
    09/30/2009 11,909,829,003,511.75
    09/30/2008 10,024,724,896,912.49
    09/30/2007 9,007,653,372,262.48
    09/30/2006 8,506,973,899,215.23
    09/30/2005 7,932,709,661,723.50
    09/30/2004 7,379,052,696,330.32
    09/30/2003 6,783,231,062,743.62
    09/30/2002 6,228,235,965,597.16
    09/30/2001 5,807,463,412,200.06
    09/30/2000 5,674,178,209,886.86

    Source: http://treasurydirect.gov/govt/reports/pd/histdebt/histdebt_histo5.htm

    More importantly, given the estimated GDP for 2015, that means, also for the first time in 14 years, the total debt relative to GDP will have decreased:

    Year - tot debt - % GDP
    1995 4,974 64.9%
    1996 5,225 64.5%
    1997 5,413 62.9%
    1998 5,526 60.8%
    1999 5,656 58.5%
    2000 5,674 55.2%
    2001 5,807 54.7%
    2002 6,228 56.7%
    2003 6,783 58.9%
    2004 7,379 60.1%
    2005 7,932 60.6%
    2006 8,507 61.4%
    2007 9,008 62.2%
    2008 10,025 68.1%
    2009 11,910 82.6%
    2010 13,561 90.6%
    2011 14,790 95.3%
    2012 16,066 99.4%
    2013 16,738 100.4%
    2014 17,824 102.3%
    2015 18,151 101.0%

    This is great news for anyone who is concerned about the growth of the debt, that it has been turned around. But we need to continue this trend. Unfortunately, with boomers retiring, spending pressure will continue. Much will depend on who wins the national election in 2016. If history is any portend, and a Republican takes office slashing tax revenues, we will see this trend reversed.
     
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  2. Bluesguy

    Bluesguy Well-Known Member Donor

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    The deficits exploded under Democrat budgets resulting in the explosion of the debt and the more the Republicans gained control the more that was reversed.

    So did you support sequester or not? Did you vote for Republican candidates to reverse the Democrga policies?
     
  3. Iriemon

    Iriemon Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Take it up with your friends in the conservative media.


    The truth is that the nearly 18 percent spike in spending in fiscal 2009 — for which the president is sometimes blamed entirely — was mostly due to appropriations and policies that were already in place when Obama took office. ... Since pictures can convey information more efficiently than words, we’ll sum up the official spending figures in this chart. It also reflects our finding that Obama increased fiscal 2009 spending by at most $203 billion, accounting for well under half the huge increase that year. ... So by our calculations, Obama can fairly be assigned responsibility for — at most — 5.8 percent of the $3.5 trillion that the federal government actually spent in fiscal 2009, which was 17.9 percent higher than fiscal 2008.

    http://www.factcheck.org/2012/06/obamas-spending-inferno-or-not/

    When Obama took the oath of office, the $789 billion bank bailout had already been approved. Federal spending on unemployment benefits, food stamps and Medicare was already surging to meet the dire unemployment crisis that was well underway. See the CBO’s January 2009 budget outlook.

    Obama is not responsible for that increase, though he is responsible (along with the Congress) for about $140 billion in extra spending in the 2009 fiscal year from the stimulus bill, from the expansion of the children’s health-care program and from other appropriations bills passed in the spring of 2009.


    http://www.marketwatch.com/story/obama-spending-binge-never-happened-2012-05-22?pagenumber=2

    Listening to a talk radio program yesterday, the host asserted that Obama tripled the budget deficit in his first year. This assertion is understandable, since the deficit jumped from about $450 billion in 2008 to $1.4 trillion in 2009. As this chart illustrates, with the Bush years in green, it appears as if Obama’s policies have led to an explosion of debt. But there is one rather important detail that makes a big difference. The chart is based on the assumption that the current administration should be blamed for the 2009 fiscal year. While this makes sense to a casual observer, it is largely untrue. The 2009 fiscal year began October 1, 2008, nearly four months before Obama took office. The budget for the entire fiscal year was largely set in place while Bush was in the White House.

    http://www.cato.org/blog/dont-blame-obama-bushs-2009-deficit


    Having said that, it is impossible to look at the chart and not to see a large ramp up in outlays under George W. Bush — the president who reversed the direction of federal outlays, which had been falling. Indeed, it is perfectly reasonable to argue that much of the responsibility for 2009’s 25.2 percent rests with President Bush, and not with President Obama; in January 2009, before President Obama took office, the CBO released its forecast that fiscal year 2009 would see outlays of 24.9 percent of GDP based on pre-Obama policies.

    http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2012/09/03/yep-obamas-a-big-spender-just-like-his-predecessors/

    On Jan. 7, 2009, two weeks before Obama took office, the Congressional Budget Office reported that the deficit for fiscal year 2009 was projected to be $1.2 trillion.

    http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-m...obama-inherited-deficits-bush-administration/
     
  4. Bluesguy

    Bluesguy Well-Known Member Donor

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    Bolded parts mine

    Take it up with history including liberals

    "In FY2009, Congress did not complete work by September 30, 2008. President Bush did sign some appropriations bills and a continuing resolution to keep the government running into President Obama’s first term, yet a Democrat controlled Congress purposely held off on the big spending portions of the appropriations bills until Obama took office. They did so for the purposes of jacking up spending. President Obama signed the final FY2009 spending bills on March 11, 2009.

    Congressional Quarterly (subscription required) maps out a history of the FY 2009 final appropriations bills (H.R. 1105 and PL 111-, that would lead one to attribute most of the accelerated spending in FY 2009 to President Obama in a piece titled “2009 Legislative Summary: Fiscal 2009 Omnibus.” From CQ, “the omnibus provided a total of $1.05 trillion — $410 billion of it for discretionary programs — and included many of the domestic spending increases Democrats were unable to get enacted while George W. Bush was president.”
    http://dailysignal.com/2012/05/24/the-truth-about-president-obamas-skyrocketing-spending/

    Unlike last year, when Bush forced Democrats to accept lower spending figures, this year could prove more difficult for the president. The fiscal year begins Oct. 1, less than four months before he leaves office.

    "He doesn't have us over a barrel this year, because either a President Clinton or a President Obama will have to deal with us next year," said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. "We are not going to be held hostage to the unreasonableness of this president."

    Much of the president's plan has little chance of passage, lawmakers and budget experts say. Nearly $200 billion in Medicare and Medicaid savings need congressional approval, which Democrats are unlikely to provide. "Dead on arrival," vowed Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., chairman of the Senate Finance Committee.
    http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/washington/2008-02-03-bush-budget_N.htm

    The facts about the growth of spending under Obama

    The spokesman’s words caught our attention because here at The Fact Checker we try to root out “BS” wherever it occurs.

    Carney made his comments while berating reporters for not realizing that “the rate of spending — federal spending — increase is lower under President Obama than all of his predecessors since Dwight Eisenhower, including all of his Republican predecessors.” He cited as his source an article by Rex Nutting, of MarketWatch, titled, “Obama spending binge never happened,” which has been the subject of lots of buzz in the liberal blogosphere.

    But we are talking about the federal budget here. That means lots of numbers — numbers that are easily manipulated. Let’s take a look.



    The Facts

    First of all, there are a few methodological problems with Nutting’s analysis — especially the beginning and the end point.

    Nutting basically takes much of 2009 out of Obama’s column, saying it was the “the last [year] of George W. Bush’s presidency.” Of course, with the recession crashing down, that’s when federal spending ramped up. The federal fiscal year starts on Oct. 1, so the 2009 fiscal year accounts for about four months of Bush’s presidency and eight of Obama’s.

    In theory, one could claim that the budget was already locked in when Obama took office, but that’s not really the case. Most of the appropriations bills had not been passed, and certainly the stimulus bill was only signed into law after Obama took office.

    Bush had rescued Fannie and Freddie Mac and launched the Troubled Asset Relief Program, which depending on how you do the math, was a one-time expense of $250 billion to $400 billion in the final months of his presidency. (The federal government ultimately recouped most of the TARP money.) So if you really want to be fair, perhaps $250 billion of that money should be taken out of the equation — on the theory that it would have been spent no matter who was president.

    Nutting acknowledges that Obama is responsible for some 2009 spending but only assigns $140 billion for reasons he does not fully explain. (Update: in an email Nutting says he attributed $120 billion to stimulus spending in 2009, $5 billion for an expansion of children’s health care and $16 billion to an increase in appropriations bills over 2008 levels.)

    On the other end of his calculations, Nutting says that Obama plans to spend $3.58 trillion in 2013, citing the Congressional Budget Office budget outlook. But this figure is CBO’s baseline budget, which assumes no laws are changed, so this figure gives Obama credit for automatic spending cuts that he wants to halt.

    The correct figure to use is the CBO’s analysis of the president’s 2013 budget, which clocks in at $3.72 trillion.

    So this is what we end up with:

    2008: $2.98 trillion

    2009: $3.27 trillion

    2010: $3.46 trillion

    2011: $3.60 trillion

    2012: $3.65 trillion

    2013: $3.72 trillion

    Under these figures, and using this calculator, with 2008 as the base year and ending with 2012, the compound annual growth rate for Obama’s spending starting in 2009 is 5.2 percent. Starting in 2010 — Nutting’s first year — and ending with 2013, the annual growth rate is 3.3 percent. (Nutting had calculated the result as 1.4 percent.)

    Of course, it takes two to tangle — a president and a Congress. Obama’s numbers get even higher if you look at what he proposed to spend, using CBO’s estimates of his budgets:

    2012: $3.71 trillion (versus $3.65 trillion enacted)

    2011: $3.80 trillion (versus $3.60 trillion enacted)

    2010: $3.67 trillion (versus $3.46 trillion enacted)

    So in every case, the president wanted to spend more money than he ended up getting. Nutting suggests that federal spending flattened under Obama, but another way to look at it is that it flattened at a much higher, post-emergency level — thanks in part to the efforts of lawmakers, not Obama.

    Another problem with Nutting’s analysis is that the figures are viewed in isolation. Even 5.5 percent growth would put Obama between Bill Clinton and George W. Bush in terms of spending growth, but that does not take into account either inflation or the relative size of the U.S. economy. At 5.2 percent growth, Obama’s increase in spending would be nearly three times the rate of inflation. Meanwhile, Nutting pegs Ronald Reagan with 8.7 percent growth in his first term — we get 12.5 percent CAGR — but inflation then was running at 6.5 percent.

    One common way to measure federal spending is to compare it to the size of the overall U.S. economy. That at least puts the level into context, helping account for population growth, inflation and other factors that affect spending. Here’s what the White House’s own budget documents show about spending as a percentage of the U.S. economy (gross domestic product):

    2008: 20.8 percent

    2009: 25.2 percent

    2010: 24.1 percent

    2011: 24.1 percent

    2012: 24.3 percent

    2013: 23.3 percent

    In the post-war era, federal spending as a percentage of the U.S. economy has hovered around 20 percent, give or take a couple of percentage points. Under Obama, it has hit highs not seen since the end of World War II — completely the opposite of the point asserted by Carney. Part of this, of course, is a consequence of the recession, but it is also the result of a sustained higher level of spending.

    We sent our analysis to Carney but did not get a response. (For another take, Daniel Mitchell of the Cato Institute has an interesting tour through the numbers, isolating various spending categories. For instance, he says debt payments should be excluded from the analysis because that is the result of earlier spending decisions by other presidents.)

    UPDATE: The Associated Press also dug into the numbers and came to the same conclusion as we did. “The problem with that rosy claim is that the Wall Street bailout is part of the calculation. The bailout ballooned the 2009 budget just before Obama took office, making Obama’s 2010 results look smaller in comparison. And as almost $150 billion of the bailout was paid back during Obama’s watch, the [Nutting] analysis counted them as government spending cuts,” the AP said. “It also assumes Obama had less of a role setting the budget for 2009 than he really did.”



    The Pinocchio Test

    Carney suggested the media were guilty of “sloth and laziness,” but he might do better next time than cite an article he plucked off the Web, no matter how much it might advance his political interests. The data in the article are flawed, and the analysis lacks context — context that could easily could be found in the budget documents released by the White House.

    The White House might have a case that some of the rhetoric concerning Obama’s spending patterns has been overblown, but the spokesman should do a better job of checking his facts before accusing reporters of failing to do so. The picture is not as rosy as he portrayed it when accurate numbers, taken in context, are used.

    Three Pinocchios

    [​IMG]


    Are you really still trying to pretend that the Democrats, including Senator Obama, passed the Bush budget submissions in 2008 and 2009? Why do you ignore the fact the Demcrats PROUDLY declared Bush was out of the loop in 2009 and that the budget was held up so it would have his spending priorities and he signed it into law after fully supporting that 2008 budget of which you fallacious try to divorce him.?
     
  5. Bluesguy

    Bluesguy Well-Known Member Donor

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    Democrat control of the budget
    09/30/2015 18,150,604,277,750.63
    09/30/2014 17,824,071,380,733.82
    09/30/2013 16,738,183,526,697.32
    09/30/2012 16,066,241,407,385.89
    09/30/2011 14,790,340,328,557.15
    09/30/2010 13,561,623,030,891.79
    09/30/2009 11,909,829,003,511.75
    09/30/2008 10,024,724,896,912.49

    9,142,950,905,488.00 increase

    Republican control of the budget
    09/30/2007 9,007,653,372,262.48
    09/30/2006 8,506,973,899,215.23
    09/30/2005 7,932,709,661,723.50
    09/30/2004 7,379,052,696,330.32
    09/30/2003 6,783,231,062,743.62
    09/30/2002 6,228,235,965,597.16
    09/30/2001 5,807,463,412,200.06
    09/30/2000 5,674,178,209,886.86
    09/30/1999 5,656,271,000,000.00

    3,351,382,000,000.00 increase

    3 times the increase under Democrat control
     
  6. Battle3

    Battle3 Well-Known Member

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    LOL, good news? That's a joke.

    Under obama the debt went from $10T to $18 Trillion, more than any President ever. And its still going up. And the debt will accelerate as soon as obama leaves office, that's what's called kicking the can down the road.

    obama will go down in history as the "President" that broke the nation.
     
  7. Iriemon

    Iriemon Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I apologize for not being clear.

    It is good news for those who are concerned about the level of debt.

    It would not be good news for those invested in failure for political purposes.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Obama wasn't president in 2007 or 2008 nor was he responsible for the debt in 2009.

    Facts have never been your strong point.

    - - - Updated - - -

    From your source:



    From *your* source:

    Bush issued a veto threat on the bloated spending bills pending in Congress in late 2008. CQ estimated that the final spending bill “provided about $31 billion more in discretionary funding than was included in the fiscal 2008 versions of the nine bills” which is “about $19 billion more than Bush sought.” I would argue that Obama gets credit for the whole $31 billion in new spending. The most damning fact from the CQ piece is that “Bush had threatened to veto spending bills that exceeded his request.”

    Sure. I'll agree that $31 billion in FY 2009 spending was attributed to Obama. That leaves the other 3.5 trillion he inherited. That is completely consistent with what Cato, Forbes, Marketwatch and Politifact say.

    But I appreciate it's convenient for you to pass the buck and blame it on Obaaaaaaama.
     
  8. Battle3

    Battle3 Well-Known Member

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    I understand now, its important to people that think its good news that the nation is going bankrupt a little tiny bit slower. Got it.
     
  9. Phoebe Bump

    Phoebe Bump New Member

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    What is it about these words that you are having trouble understanding and how may be help?
     
  10. An Old Guy

    An Old Guy Well-Known Member

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    Actually, it is a positive sign. The great recession was devastating to so many and affected so much, including government revenues. FY 2015 was the first year federal government revenue got above 18% of GDP in years, not since the "good years" of the Clinton administration - ending with FY 2001. Outlays have dropped from the peak of 24.4% of GDP in FY 2009 and hopefully will continue to drop as a percentage of GDP.

    Both the Bush tax cuts and the terrible recession knocked the stuffing out of revenues, the result has been devastating to annual fiscal performance. We've gone from the annual surpluses of the latter Clinton years to another string of deficits beginning in FY 2002 - the first year revenue went under 18% of GDP in quite some time.

    During the GW Bush "good years" revenue as a percentage of GDP dropped to levels not seen since the 1950's. During the great recession years it went even lower. Yes, the string of deficits has been bad, matching the times, so to speak but things may be turning around somewhat. I still think more could be done on the revenue side though....I'm not entirely sure of what or how though.
     
  11. Battle3

    Battle3 Well-Known Member

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    There was no surplus during the Clinton years. Here is the historical national debt from https://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/reports/pd/histdebt/histdebt_histo5.htm

    09/30/2002 6,228,235,965,597.16
    09/30/2001 5,807,463,412,200.06
    09/30/2000 5,674,178,209,886.86
    09/30/1999 5,656,270,901,615.43
    09/30/1998 5,526,193,008,897.62
    09/30/1997 5,413,146,011,397.34
    09/30/1996 5,224,810,939,135.73
    09/29/1995 4,973,982,900,709.39
    09/30/1994 4,692,749,910,013.32
    09/30/1993 4,411,488,883,139.38
    09/30/1992 4,064,620,655,521.66

    Clinton was in office from 1993 to 2001. Do you see any reduction in debt in any of those years? No. And the decrease in the size of the annual deficit was due to the booming recovery due to the post-Cold War boom as intellectual and industrial assets were redirected from military applications to more productive civilian applications, and due to the tech revolution. But there was no surplus.
     
  12. An Old Guy

    An Old Guy Well-Known Member

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    Perhaps it's all about the accounting and accrual methods used, particularly where the treatment of Social Security contributions and how they are accounted for (by law). There was certainly a reduction of the debt held by the public portion of the overall debt during the Clinton years however the intra government portion of overall debt grew due to Social Security proceeds and how they had to be treated, by law. Maybe this is one of those situations where both sides have a point. The CBO certainly states there were surpluses and you have a site which shows the debt growing. It must be about accounting methods (it is)....
     
  13. An Old Guy

    An Old Guy Well-Known Member

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    Just a follow up to my post regarding accounting methods. The total of the 8 deficits during the Bush years (FY 2002 thru FY 2009) was $3.543.9 trillion. Total debt during these 8 years grew from $6.228 trillion end Sept 2002 to $11.909 trillion end Sept 2009 - total is a growth of debt of $5.681 trillion. This exceeds the Bush accumulated deficits by $2.137 trillion. In other words, total debt exceeded the official CBO 8 years of deficits during the Bush years by 60%.

    Like I mentioned, it's about the accounting methods but the Clinton years are looking pretty good by comparison....
     
  14. An Old Guy

    An Old Guy Well-Known Member

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    Sorry, got my numbers wrong, left out a year.

    Total debt on Sept 30, 2001 - $5.807 trillion (FY 2001 ended Sept 30, 2001 and was Clinton's last year of involvement).
    Total debt on Sept 30, 2009 - $11.909 trillion (FY 2009 ended Sept 30, 2009 and was Bush's last year of involvement).

    Total debt growth during Bush years - $6.102 trillion (105% debt growth)

    Official government deficits during Bush years:

    FY 2002 - $157.8 billion
    FY 2003 - $375.3 billion
    FY 2004 - $412 billion
    FY 2005 - $318.3 billion
    FY 2006 - $248.2 billion
    FY 2007 - $160.7 billion
    FY 2008 - $458.6 billion
    FY 2009 - $1.413 trillion

    Total of deficits - $3.543.9 trillion. Total debt grew by $6.102 trillion. This is a bit of a gap which is what Battle3 was getting at with the Clinton years. The total debt accumulated during the Bush years was actually 72.2% higher than the reported deficits during the Bush years - if I'm reading the data correctly.
     
  15. Bluesguy

    Bluesguy Well-Known Member Donor

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    So you agree sequester and the Republicans getting control of Congress us a good thing?

    He and his fellow Democrats were in control of Congress and those were Democrats budgets with Bush cut out of 2009 so it included Obama spending which PRESIDENT Obama signed into law.

    Facts have never been your strong point.

    The Congressional DEMOCRATS including Obama. The Democrats who bragged about cutting Bush out and they were able to raise spending to where THEY wanted it unlike in 2008 when Bush had veto power.
     
  16. Bluesguy

    Bluesguy Well-Known Member Donor

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    The budget deficit is different from the total debt. Gingrich and Kaisch while in control of Congress produced BUDGET surpluses.

    - - - Updated - - -

    The budget deficit is different from the total debt. Gingrich and Kaisch while in control of Congress produced BUDGET surpluses.

    - - - Updated - - -

    The budget deficit is different from the total debt. Gingrich and Kaisch while in control of Congress produced BUDGET surpluses.

    - - - Updated - - -

    The budget deficit is different from the total debt. Gingrich and Kaisch while in control of Congress produced BUDGET surpluses.
     
  17. Bluesguy

    Bluesguy Well-Known Member Donor

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    That the government is taking a bigger share of GDP is not necessarily a good thing, the goal should be we grow the economy faster than the government so the government takes a smaller share of GDP.

    Tax revenues soared after the Bush tax rate cuts went into effect just as they did after the Gingrich/Kasich tax rate cute.

    That was due tto the Democrat 9% spending increase in 2008 and the 18% in 2009.

    Bush and the Republicans had the deficit down to a paltry $161B by 2007. Then the Democrats took control if the budget.
     
  18. Bluesguy

    Bluesguy Well-Known Member Donor

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    Presidents do not singularly control spending and the budget. In fact they have the least input. CONGRESS controls the budget and spending. 2008 and 2009 were DEMOCRAT budgets why do you attribute the deficit and debt increases to Bush?
     
  19. An Old Guy

    An Old Guy Well-Known Member

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    Yes, I understand it is a team effort - The Administration submits budget requests usually in the first week of February for the next FY, which begins Oct of that year - to say they have the least input isn't quite accurate? By law the Administration is the government branch submitting the budget proposal - it's up to Congress to approve whatever has been negotiated and then pass it in the House of Representatives.

    This is probably why we see descriptions like "requested" and "actual" concerning revenues, expenditures & surplus or deficit once the fiscal year is in the books, perhaps the results of negotiations as well as unexpected or unaccounted for "events" which can affect the outcome of a budget. A classic example of this just might be the Bush Administration budget request for FY 2009 where the request was for $2.7 trillion (which was $38 billion more than requested for FY 2008) in revenue yet the actual number achieved was only $2.105 trillion - a big miss but I'm not entirely blaming the Bush Admin for this. The recession was already underway at the time they submitted their budget proposal though. The request for FY 2009 was submitted in Feb 2008 for the new FY beginning Oct 1 2008.

    Partisans usually take the opportunity to assign blame or give the credit to the Administration or Congress, depending on their party of choice. If one person's guy is in the White House and things are going good - he gets the credit. If the President is not "your guy" but the party in control of Congress is yours - they get the credit. Just human nature...
     
  20. Ndividual

    Ndividual Well-Known Member

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    Just curious, but less than a month later, how much has the debt grown?
    Based on the 'good news' exclaimed by the OP I would assume the debt as of the end of this month (November 2015) would be about $18,177,812,611,084. That would be a sign showing the growing debt trend has been slowed. Turning around in my way of thinking would be showing the debt reducing, not simply a lower percentage of the GDP, which is becoming more related to spending than actual production.
     
  21. Ndividual

    Ndividual Well-Known Member

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    Correction to previous post:

    Just curious, but less than two months later, how much has the debt grown?
    Based on the 'good news' exclaimed by the OP I would assume the debt as of the end of this month (November 2015) would be about $18,205,026,427,253.43. That would be a sign showing the growing debt trend has been slowed.
    Turning around in my way of thinking would be showing the debt reducing, not simply a lower percentage of the GDP, which is becoming more related to spending than actual production.
     
  22. Battle3

    Battle3 Well-Known Member

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    You are correct. The total debt is split into the public debt and intragovernment debt. During the 2000 fiscal year, Clinton shifted SS and some other revenue into the public debt which looked like a reduction in the public debt but increased the intergovernmental debt. People that claim Clinton had a surplus only cite the public debt, not the total debt. Its a creative accounting scam.
     
  23. Ndividual

    Ndividual Well-Known Member

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    Actually the link referred to in the OP holds the answer to my question.

    Year ----------- Total Debt
    11/19/2015 18,718,208,593,840.77
    09/30/2015 18,150,604,277,750.63

    http://treasurydirect.gov/govt/reports/pd/pd_debttothepenny.htm

    Fifty days later the FY2016 debt has grown by $567,604,316,090.14, more than the entire FY2015 growth of $326.5 billion.
     
  24. Battle3

    Battle3 Well-Known Member

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    The budget does not encompass all spending and is a total scam, how often do you hear of "off budget expenditures"? I believe under Bush the war on terror was an off budget item for a long time.

    The debt figures represent the net revenue spending and is one of the few objective measures of federal financial health.
     
  25. Ndividual

    Ndividual Well-Known Member

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    The difference between on budget and off budget spending is that the on budget spending requires government to borrow while the off budget does not.
    Social Security, for example is off budget and should the incoming revenue stream be insufficient to provide the payments, the difference can only come from the 'trust fund' and while that may require borrowing to replace the existing IOU's held by the fund when there are no remaining IOU's to cash in the payments must by law be reduced or the tax on income raised to provide what is necessary.

    All spending in excess of the governments acquired revenue is added to the total debt. The debt is made up of past and present deficits which remain unpaid and since WW II ended, I'm unaware of any principal payments being made, simply interest alone.
     

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