Report: Annual Deficits Worse Than Obama Projected

Posted by: Staff in Fiscal Responsibility on Print 

Hot Air takes a look at today's Congressional Budget Office report that analyzes President Obama's proposed budget:

To put these numbers in context, bear in mind that last year's deficit of $459 billion was the largest on record.

In a new report that provides the first independent analysis of President Obama's budget request, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office predicted that the administration's agenda would generate deficits averaging nearly $1 trillion a year over the next decade -- $2.3 trillion more than the president predicted when he unveiled his spending plan just one month ago.

And while Obama would come close to meeting his goal of cutting the deficit in half by the end of his first term, the CBO predicts that the nation's annual operating deficit would never drop below 4 percent of the overall economy over the next decade, a level administration officials have said is unsustainable because the national debt would grow too rapidly.

By the CBO's estimate, for example, the nation's debt would grow to 82 percent of the overall economy by 2019 under Obama's policies, compared with a pre-recession average of 40 percent...

Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad (N-N.D.) has said the gloomier CBO forecast would require "adjustments" to Obama's budget, though he declined to specify what changes would be necessary.

The Congressional Budget Office's blog adds:

Our analysis of the President's budget proposals indicates that:

  • As estimated by CBO and the Joint Committee on Taxation, the President's proposals would add $4.8 trillion to the baseline deficits over the 2010–2019 period. CBO projects that if those proposals were enacted, the deficit would total $1.8 trillion (13 percent of GDP) in 2009 and $1.4 trillion (10 percent of GDP) in 2010. It would decline to about 4 percent of GDP by 2012 and remain between 4 percent and 6 percent of GDP through 2019.

Read the complete Congressional Budget Office report.