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US Federal Government Long-term Spending Outlook

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Since the mid 1990s the Congressional Budget Office has prepared an occasional long-term outlook for the finances of the federal government. This brief presents the latest CBO Long-Term Outlook, released in June 2011.

Federal Government Spending: the Long-term Outlook

Medicare and Medicaid are going to eat the budget.

Chart 2.91: CBO Estimate - Federal Spending

The CBO Long-term Outlook projects the trends in the major federal spending programs, based on current program rules, and projects the likely spending out to 2084.

The outlook is fairly clear. Social Security will expand from a spending level of about 5 percent of GDP today to about 6 percent by 2050.

But Medicare and Medicaid, the two big federal health care programs, will expand from about 6 percent at present to over 12 percent of GDP by 2050.

The CBO assumes that other programs, including interest on the national debt, will decrease due to the pressure of health care spending from the current 12 percent of GDP to 7.5 percent of GDP by 2050.

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GDP: Measuring Worth - US GDP
Federal: Bicentennial Edition: Historical Statistics of the US, Colonial Times to 1970
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Federal Budget FY 13 Released

On February 13, 2012, we updated usgovernmentspending.com with the numbers from the historical tables in the FY13 federal budget. Actual revenue for FY 2011 and estimated revenue through FY 2017 come from Tables 2.1, 2.4, and 2.5. Actual spending for FY 2011 and estimated spending at the subfunction level through FY 2017 comes from Table 3.2. Federal debt estimates come from Table 7.1 and GDP estimates come from Table 10.1.

You can see you each line item changes from budget to budget here. You can compare budget estimates with actuals here.

Account level spending estimates through FY 2017 come from the outlays table in the Public Budget Database and will be updated in the next few days.

Budget News

FY13 Budget Plan Has Familiar Ring
$3 trillion in deficit reduction over 10 years including $1.5 trillion in tax increases.

FY13 budget due Feb 13
White House to miss budget deadline for third year.

Lew to finish work on 2013 budget before departing OMB
Early February release?

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Revision to State and Local Data for 2001, 2003
We have revised state and local spending and revenue data for 2001 and 2003. For 2001 and 2003 the ...

State and Local Update for 2009
On October 31, 2011 usgovernmentspending.com updated the state and local spending and revenue from F...

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