I seem to remember the Bush Administration consistently over-estimating deficits, etc, so that when the numbers came back they could claim progress and that the budget shortfalls were half what was projected...

Is that what is happening here?

The MSM demands an answer: "Mr. Obama. Have you stopped beating your wife?"

Also, it seems to me that the spending on the war(s) is now categorized as part of the deficit, while it was not so categorized earlier. Isn't that a part of that 'increase'?

I wish there was an American politician with the guts to ask any voter who bleats about the deficit "What will YOU give up? What government program you get money from do want to see cut? How much more in taxes will you pay?" And when the answers none and nothing are forthcoming, that voter is told to sit down and shut up.

The largest surplus arose through the combination of Social Security (off-budget) excess cash flow and individual tax collections from people bailing out of the NASDAQ as that index fell several thousand points.
That said, the Newt and his broken intellect (i.e. the Contract with America) contributed mightily to the deficit under GwB. The Cato Institute (!) noted that while GwB presided over the largest growth in government, in terms of both number of employees and dollars, the CwA programs slated for extinction grew faster than others.
In simple terms, what took 220 years to accumulate, GwB and his familiars in Congress doubled in just 8 years.
Of course, those facts lead to only one conclusion: To the Tea Bags!

One other thing to note, this deficit figure is for FY2009, which ended 10/1/09. We were under the last Bush budget, therefore Obama is only responsible for any spending legislation he signed, such as the Recovery Act. How much was spent under that legislation goes to Obama. The rest belongs to the Bush budget.

JMG, on a smaller scale I've been there and done that. I used to be on the board of a condominium association, and at one meeting, after we had gone over the year's budget, determined what we needed to spend on lawn care, pool maintenance, etc., one newly elected member started whining about how "the members want lower condo fees." So the chair asked her which of the services we had just agreed on and asked her what she would cut. She brushed the question aside and went on about how "we need to find some way to save money." This exchange repeated itself about three or four times, until I finally handed her the list of contracts and just told her to start crossing out lines till she got the total to the level she wanted, whereupon she lost her temper and screamed at me for "not listening" to her and the voice of the co-owners. Shortly thereafter I sold my unit and moved the hell out, and not a minute too soon, since their property values had already started plummeting six years before the housing bubble burst. Last I heard, townhouse units in that complex were selling, if they sold at all, for about $30,000, and the place was headed for receivership.

The tea-party crowd is hell bent on doing the same thing to this country, and it's up to us to keep them from succeeding.

The MSM and the oligarchy who own and control them have a meme that they want to push, possibly because they see that HCR is going to pass, as will climate change legislation and a host of other changes (e.g., real regulation of industry) that will cost them dearly, so they need to harp about the deficit. And blame it all on Obama.

"See what's going on, here? Our deficit is skyrocketing. We just can't have Obama doing all of these things that will cost us lots of money."

...and off the Halperins of the nation went, to dutifully scribe stories pushing the meme, following the dictates of their masters.

Besides, didn't Cheney say a long time ago that "Reagan proved that deficits don't matter"?

Before anyone blasts the president for the mess, perhaps they ought to grab a mop.
==================================

You're implying that they care about the mess itself, though, but in fact they only care about blasting this particular president. Cleaning up the mess would deprive them of a handy subject to scream about. It's as though they work from a hate-filled psychotic MadLibs book. "The [program or event] is an absolute atrocity and it's all Obama's fault! In a just world, Obama would be [horrible fate]!"

There are two aspects of the deficit that bother me a lot. People on this site seem more inclined to say "so what?" and/or "no problem", so perhaps one or more of you with an economics bent can help me over these nagging concerns. If so, thanks in advance... I will sleep better.

(1) Don't the demographics of the US now (vis a vis past scenarios) make spiraling deficits virtually unavoidable far out into the future without MAJOR revision of the so-called "entitlements". Is there anyone in a position of responsibility (advisory or otherwise) who has the countervailing view on this?

(2) As we fund our government obligations by borrowing from Non-US sources, isn't it predictable that we will begin to sacrifice our autonomy as a nation and then ultimately our sovereignty? "He who has the money makes the rules" is the idea here.

The projections for the debt with and without the Bush-era tax adjustments* are quite stunning. Letting the cuts expire leads to a far lower debt than keeping them on. I won't hold my breath waiting for the MSM to point this out and call on Congress to let the cuts expire.

* The chart is not 100% correct to call them the "Bush's tax cuts" because Congress had a major role in them too.

Specifically, 40% of the fiscal deterioration we're seeing -- the single largest contributing factor -- can be attributed to Bush policies.

If that's accurate, and I think it is at least defensible, then we'd be in a mess even with better (Clinton's?) policies.

If the Bush tax cuts expire, maybe 40% of the problem might be solved -- or the economy might even get worse because (according to Krugman ?) increasing taxes during low or no growth causes recessions.

yeah, you keep telling yourself this stuff often enough Steve, you might end up believing it.

If that chart is a representation of the deficit, then why doesn't it reflect the surplus (when the deficit would have been less than 0)? Something doesn't add up.

Mr. Furious asks a good question. But the answer still sustains Dean's point.

In August OMB projected a FY09 deficit of $1.8 trillion while CBO projected $1.6. This new estimate is from CBO.

So on an apples to apples basis we have $200 billion less in spending or 12.5% over a two month period. I'd say that is good news period whether or not you think the OMB number was a little high-balled. And God forbid it had been the other way, the Right is still howling because the Obama teams projections of unemployment with and without the stimulus made back in Dec/January were overcome by the events of Jan, Feb, March. On the day Obama got sworn into office unemployment was already at around 7.8% and rising quickly.
http://data.bls.gov/PDQ/servlet/SurveyOutputServlet?data_tool=latest_numbers&series_id=LNS14000000
The idea that his stimulus plan could be enacted, signed and implemented in time to keep that rate below 8% was at that point clearly nonsense. Yet people use that January underestimate of Spring numbers as a club to beat the stimulus package as a failure.

If by August the Obama team had figured out it is better to under promise than over promise then good on 'em. But however you slice it a $1.4 trillion number is good news. Unless of course you are the WaPo which for a newspaper of record seems oddly blind to news it published just a couple of months ago.

Disregard my question. On closer inspetion I found that while chart says "deficit" in multiple places, in the actual title of the chart itself it is clear that it represents "federal debt". Sorry.

MatthewRMarler:
If the Bush tax cuts expire, maybe 40% of the problem might be solved -- or the economy might even get worse because (according to Krugman ?) increasing taxes during low or no growth causes recessions.

You better find a link before you try to attribute that point to Krugman, since he's pretty consistently argued the opposite. And you might want to look at this chart in one of his posts before talking about how great the Bush tax cuts were for the economy. And finally, I don't know if you put yourself in this category, but no one can honestly call themselves a fiscal conservative if they argue for permanent extension of tax cuts that were set to expire specifically because of budget rules to limit their deficit impact. (And whose enactment marked the first that, instead of the country being called upon to pay for a war, taxes were cut instead.)

Terry Ott:
(1) Don't the demographics of the US now (vis a vis past scenarios) make spiraling deficits virtually unavoidable far out into the future without MAJOR revision of the so-called "entitlements". Is there anyone in a position of responsibility (advisory or otherwise) who has the countervailing view on this?

"Entitlements" (aka "Social Security and Medicare") are routinely lumped together by those who would use the spiraling cost of health care spending (which affects Medicare as well as private insurance costs) as an excuse to privatize Social Security.

Social Security is not in any way on a path to cause spiraling deficits. Social Security Taxes were raised in 1983 to create a surplus, which (under the worst-case Social Security Administration projections) will continue to grow until 2017, and not be depleted until 2042. Those worst-case projections are worse than any sustained economic conditions the country has ever experienced; under conditions like we have generally experienced, the trust fund never runs out of money. (And for the countervailing view from those in positions of authority, note that every year the Social Security Administration projects its solvency to last further into the future -- i.e., current projection always being better than previous projection is clear evidence that the statutory required conditions of the projection are always worse than actual conditions.)

So Social Security is not a significant problem by any rational forecast. One of the reasons that the Trust Fund is constantly talked about is that since taxes (regressive payroll taxes) were raised under Reagan to increase it, the federal government has been painlessly borrowing against it to spend more without increasing other taxes. If we reach a point where Social Security has to draw upon the Trust Fund, then that's no longer possible and the bills for past borrowing come due. So the real cause for panic (especially among Republicans) is not that the sky is falling on Social Security, but that the payroll taxes from lower income people they've been spending would have to be replaced with more progressive income taxes on higher income people. (Assuming that we manage to keep resisting attempts to privatize Social Security which would allow them to turn borrowing from the trust fund into essentially stealing it.)

Medicare spending projections are a real problem, but they're a problem that's best addressed by addressing the even higher rate of increase in private health insurance costs, not by "entitlement reform." In other words, the best way to keep "entitlements" from creating spiraling deficits is to pass strong universal health care. (Funny how so-called deficit hawks don't tend to see it that way...)

I think people are laying everything on GWB. I mean really look at the history of our debt:

In 1980 our national debt was around $1 trillion.

Under the Reagan administration out debt ran up to about $3 trillion. Tripling our debt.

Under the George H W Bush administration our debt went up to $5.4 trillion. Doubling (almost) our debt again.

Under Clinton administration our debt ran up to $5.6 trillion, but was headed down at the end. Oh man that Clinton increased our debt by 3.6%

Under the GWB administratio our debt ran up to about $11 trillion. Doubling the debt again.

No, I don't blame it all on GWB. After all hed had a good running start from Reagan and GHWB.

I blame all the Republicans.

In 1980 our national debt was around $1 trillion.

Under the Democrat controlled Congress during the Reagan administration out debt ran up to about $3 trillion. Tripling our debt.

Under the Democrat controlled Congress during the George H W Bush administration our debt went up to $5.4 trillion. Doubling (almost) our debt again.

Under the Republican controlled Congress during the Clinton administration our debt ran up to $5.6 trillion, but was headed down at the end. Oh man that Republican controlled Congress under Clinton increased our debt by 3.6%.

Under the Democrat controlled Congress during the George H W Bush administration our debt went up to $5.4 trillion. Doubling (almost) our debt again.

So you're claiming that the debt didn't go up at all from 2001-2006?

And if it's all the fault of the Democratic Congresses, then that Reagan guy must have been a real wimp, if Jimmy Carter was able to keep his Democratic Congress from massively increasing the national debt and Reagan wasn't.

Idiot.

Halperin is a rightwing hack. Why you give him any credit for being a legitimate newsperson is beyond me. I always think less of you when you seem to think what Halperin or any one at Politico says is important.

"Halperin is a right-wing hack..." Bonnie @ 6:35 PM.

If you're expecting an argument it ain't gonna happen!
There are many, however, who consider Halperin to be sensible and intelligent and a producer of well-written articles.
Silly people!

TomM, since no one corrected you, i will: the last two clinton budgets showed a general fund surplus.

and no, cap gains taxes were not a particularly big source of the swing into positive position, despite the desire of right-wing liars to tell you so.

to move on to algore's clownish remarks: could you possibly be stupider? do you honestly think anyone other than morons is impressed by that line of thought? honest to frickin' god, the right wing isn't even training the little propaganda robots well any more.

fiscal policy is set in the white house, chum, and if you don't understand that, you don't understand anything and really should stfu rather than embarassing your parents.

There is an easier way to say this. This was Bush's last budget year. Obama wasn't even elected when this fiscal year began.

howard dear, the general fund surplus in FY1999 was $1.9 billion on total receipts of $1.8 trillion or 0.1%, rather a rounding error in a budget of the gov't size. For FY 2000, the general fund surplus totaled $86.4 billion vs. a total surplus of $236.2 billion or 36.6% of same. So, in general, one could conclude that the surplus was, in the main, from Social Security excess cash flow.
One could even add the 4 years of Clintonian surplus and find that excess off budget cash accounted for roughly 85% of same.

From FY1999 to FY 2000, the only year of even sizable general fund surplus, $86.4 billion, on budget receipts increased $198 billion. If you could understand variance analysis, you could look to see which category of receipt showed the most increase. Per the OMB's historical tables, that would be individual tax receipts.
Such individual receipts between FY1999 and FY2000 increased $115 billion or 58% of the total surplus. The following year, FY2001, indiv. receipts fell only $10 billion yet the following year FY2001, without passage of the tax cuts (yet), such receipts fell again by $136 billion despite some inflation, increased work force etc., all the reasons one would expect to see an increase in such receipts.

Now, if one were to go to the IRS website, one could find TaxStats, a link to tables detailing tax receipts by year and category. The IRS uses calendar year filings but if one were to compare 1999 receipts from individuals, under e.g. long-term capital gains, one could see that such receipts were $497+ billion but in 2000, that category of receipt increased to $640 billion.

So, no, dear, it's not a right wing talking point, it's analysis, something I did on my own and perhaps you could, too, if your parents had taught you.
Nice try, care to play again?

Redshift: Thanks for the thoughtful reply.

Health care commitments, I agree, are the main issue, not the relatively easily manageable (but highly emotional) Social Security nut.

As much as we might need/want universal health care, I don't get how it, with the combination of demographics (aging, longer life expectancies, life-style related illness, etc, is going to affect deficits except in undesirable ways. Universal health care's bills may be less onerous in other countries, but "they" are not "us" in terms of their population profile, immigration, life-style shortcomings, and their expectations in terms of medical interventions.

Maybe you are saying "we need to be satisfied with 'less' and the medical sector needs also to be less costly in terms of pricing and delivery of services, products, and facilities." Is that the formula? If so, I am dubious. I see SOME of that change happening already in terms of less expensive health care delivery models, but I also have come to appreciate the difficulty of broad-based change, especially when driven by the public sector. Seems it too often ends up with snafus, delay, unanticipated complications and unintended consequences. I've worked a bit in "change management", and man-oh-man it is HARD to do systemic change --- even gradually and in scenarios where there are not SO many diverse interests to be served.

And then there is our huge military outlay, as long we are on the subject of deficits. That's already controlled by the government, and I don't see us making much headway in terms of containing THOSE costs.

Isn't our societal "appetite" for both health care and for military investments (and other government services and programs to boot) just too large to be sustainable? It seems that this appetite is unabated even in light of current spending and deficit projections that tell us we are not even close to living within our means.

I'm not into pissing contests about which party is most to blame, who should be tarred and feathered, etc. I'm old, and I left that stuff behind a long time ago, around the time I decided our national political "leadership" and government focus and discipline isn't much up to the task, no matter who's on point in Washington and our state capitols. I'm more into looking forward and saying, "now what?" because we can't undo the past. Calling people names (as some do here) doesn't go very far toward coming up with solutions or even "proposals" and "blueprints".

I'm also perplexed about the downstream effects of excessive borrowing outside our borders to sustain an unbelievably costly public sector. Is that not going to affect our foreign policy, and maybe our sovereignty and autonomy as a society?

It's been a while since I watched the movie "I.O.U.S.A" but it was a scary experience and I admit to hot having recovered fully. Help!