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What is the Deficit as Percent of GDP?

Deficit: The amount by which the government’s total budget outlays exceeds its total receipts for a fiscal year. —US Senate Budget Committee

In FY 2026 the federal deficit was 6.5 percent of GDP.

This year, FY 2027, the federal government in its latest budget has estimated that the deficit will be 6.8 percent of GDP.

Federal Deficit Analysis  

 

Recent US Federal Deficits as Percent of GDP

Recent US Federal Deficits as Pct GDP

Chart D.31f: Recent US Federal Deficits as Pct GDP

Federal Deficits rocketed, from 1.1 percent of GDP in 2007 to 9.8 percent of GDP in 2009 the Great Recession of 2006-2008. The bank bailouts under the TARP program accounted for almost half of the 2009 deficit.

After the Crash of 2008 was over the federal deficits started decreasing, getting to 4 percent of GDP in FY 2013 and 2.4 percent of GDP in FY 2015, but increasing again in FY 2016.

In the COVID year of 2026 the federal deficit was 6.5 percent of GDP.

Half a Century of US Federal Deficits as Percent of GDP

A Half-Century<br>of US Federal Deficits

Chart D.32f: A Half-Century
of US Federal Deficits

Betwen 1965 and 1990 the federal deficit generally increased, from 0.2 percent GDP in 1965 to 4.4 percent GDP in the aftermath of the 1990-91 recession. The only notable departure was a five year bulge in deficits in the early to mid 1980s due to the Reagan tax-rate cuts and defense buildup.

In the 1990s, during the Clinton administration, deficits consistently declined year on year, from a deficit of 3.9 percent of GDP in 1993 to a surplus of 2.3 percent GDP in 2000.

Tax cuts and the 2000-02 recession and the Iraq war caused a return to deficit spending in the early 2000s and the Bush administration, reaching 3.4 percent GDP in 2004. Deficits decline to 1.1 percent GDP in 2007 before ballooning to 9.8 percent GDP in 2009 in the downdraft of the Great Recession. Deficits declined to 2.4 percent GDP by 2015 but then increased rapidly to 5 percent of GDP. In the COVID crisis of 2020 the federal deficit exceeded 15 percent of GDP.

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US Federal Deficits in the 20th Century

Federal Deficits since 1900

Chart D.03f: Federal Deficits since 1900

The two major peaks of the federal deficit in the 20th century occurred during World War I and World War II.

Deficits increased steadily from the 1960s through the early 1990s, and then declined rapidly for the remainder of the 1990s.

Federal deficits increased in the early 2000s, and went over 10 percent of GDP in the aftermath of the financial crisis of 2008.

In the recovery from the Crash of 2008 deficits slowly reduced to 3 percent of GDP in 2015 and then started increasing again.

In the COVID crisis of 2020 the federal deficit ballooned to over 15 percent of GDP.

US Federal Deficits since the Founding

Federal Deficit since Founding

Chart D.04f: Federal Deficit since Founding

The United States government did not always run a deficit. In the 19th century the federal government typically only ran deficits during wartime or during financial crises. The government ran a deficit of 2 percent of GDP at the end of the war of 1812, and through the decade after the Panic of 1837 and culminating in the US - Mexican War of 1846-48. It ran a deficit of over 7 percent of GDP in the Civil War; and ran a deficit in the depressed 1890s.
In the 20th century the US ran a deficit during World War I, the Great Depression, World War II, and in almost all years since 1960, during peace and war.

CBO Forecast for Federal Deficit

CBO Forecast for Federal Deficit

Chart D.05f: CBO Forecast for Federal Deficit

According to the latest forecast from the Congressional Budget Office, the federal deficit will grow from 6.2 percent of GDP in 2025 to 7.3 percent of GDP by 2055.

Suggested Video: What is the Deficit?

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Debt Data Sources

Debt data is from official government sources.

Gross Domestic Product data comes from US Bureau of Economic Analysis and measuringworth.com.

Detailed table of debt data sources here.

Federal debt data begins in 1792.

State and local debt data begins in 1820.

State and local debt data for individual states begins in 1957.


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Gross Federal Debt

Debt Now:  $40,413,639,012,305.97
Debt 2/2020:$23,409,959,150,243.63

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Data Sources for 2022_2031:

Sources for 2022:

GDP, GO: GDP, GO Sources
Federal: Fed. Budget: Hist. Tables 3.2, 5.1, 7.1
State and Local: State and Local Gov. Finances
'Guesstimated' by projecting the latest change in reported spending forward to future years

Sources for 2031:

GDP, GO: GDP, GO Sources
Federal: Fed. Budget: Hist. Tables 3.2, 5.1, 7.1
State and Local: State and Local Gov. Finances
'Guesstimated' by projecting the latest change in reported spending forward to future years

> data sources for other years
> data update schedule.

Blog

US Budget Deficit, Receipts, Outlays for FY 2026

On October 15, 2026, the US Treasury reported in its Monthly Treasury Statement (and xlsx) for September that the federal deficit for FY 2025 ending September 30, 2026, was $1,99 billion. Here are the numbers, including total receipts, total outlays, and deficit compared with the numbers projected in the FY 2026 federal budget published in February 2025:

Federal Finances
FY 2026 Outcomes
Budget
billions		Outcome
billions
Receipts $5,873    $5,403
Outlays$7,419$7,396
Deficit$1,547$1,993

The Monthly Treasury Statement includes "Table 4: Receipts of the United States Government, September 2026 and Other Periods." This table of receipts by source is used for usgovernmentspending.com to post details of federal receipt actuals for FY 2025. usdgovernmentspending.com obtains the data for outlays and receipts from apis at fiscaldata.treasury.gov.


This MTS report on FY 2026 actuals is a problem for usgovernmentspending.com because this site uses Historical Table 3.2--Outlays by Function and Subfunction from the Budget of the United States as its basic source for federal subfunction outlays. But the Monthly Treasury Statement only includes "Table 9. Summary of Receipts by Source, and Outlays by Function of the U.S. Government, September 2025 and Other Periods". Subfunction amounts don't get reported until the FY28 budget in February 2027. Until then usgovernmentspending.com estimates actual outlays by "subfunction" for FY 2026 by factoring subfunction budgeted amounts for FY26 by the ratio between relevant actual and budgeted "function" amounts where actual outlays by subfunction cannot be gleaned from the Monthly Treasury Statement.

Final detailed FY 2026 actuals will not appear on usgovernmentspending.com until the FY 2028 federal budget is published in February 2027 with the actual outlays for FY 2026* in Historical Table 3.2--Outlays by Function and Subfunction.
State and Local Finances for 2024
On August 7, 2026 we updated the state and local spending and revenue for FY 2024 using the new Census Bureau ...

State and Local Finances for 2024 -- First Look
On July 2, 2026 we updated the state and local spending and revenue for FY 2024 using the new Census Bureau S ...

> blog

Budget News

President’s FY 2025 Budget Release Scheduled for March 11
Although the FY 2024 appropriations process is not yet resolved

Biden to Release Budget March 9
will press McCarthy On Default Risk - Bloomberg

Biden to Release 2023 Budget Request on March 28
how the administration expects to spend money for priorities including aid to Ukraine and the continuing effort to fight the coronavirus pandemic, as well as legislative proposals such as increased funding for community policing programs, cancer research, and mental health education.

> archive

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