The U.S. Government Just Spent $168 Billion More Than the Year Before

Lauren Bowman, Romina Boccia

Government,

And the problems are just getting started. 

New numbers on federal spending are in from the Congressional Budget Office, and they’re not pretty.

The federal government spent $3.9 trillion in fiscal 2016, which ended Sept. 30, or $168 billion more than in fiscal 2015. The federal government ran a deficit of $588 billion, an increase of $149 billion. That’s a one-third increase in the deficit since last year.

These preliminary numbers are included in the CBO’s monthly budget review for September. The agency will release actual numbers in January in its annual budget and economic update.

Despite a $19 billion increase in revenues, the deficit continues to rise, adding to the nation’s out-of-control debt. Higher taxes chase higher spending.

The government does not have a revenue problem, it has a spending problem. More specifically, the nation faces a crisis in entitlement spending.

The government spent more than $1.8 trillion in fiscal 2016 on three entitlement programs on autopilot: Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. Outlays for these programs grew by $77 billion since fiscal 2015.

To put this into perspective, military spending totaled $564 billion, or less than one-third of what entitlements swallow.

Spending on Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security will continue to grow as the baby boomers age and retire, putting even more of a strain on taxpayers.

The CBO’s budget review reaffirms what we already knew: Federal government spending is out of control. Only 16 percent of likely voters favor more federal spending, according to a Rasmussen Reports poll, yet spending continues growing year after year.