A recent article by The Wall Street Journal outlines how, as stimulus money flowed to states and taxpayers, the U.S. budget gap widened to a record $1.7 trillion in March, 454% deficit growth.
The spending, well-intentioned to help the economy during the disastrous pandemic, sent the federal debt sky high to levels unheard of since the end of World War II as a proportion of the economy.
The budget gap is now more than double what it was for the same period last year, the U.S. Treasury Department said.
While revenue rose 13% to $268 billion, the WSJ reported, spending increased 161% to $927 billion, making it the third-highest total on record, only after June and April of 2020.
And President Joseph Biden just proposed another $2.3 trillion in spending on infrastructure and other plans.
The spending plan has been criticized by Republicans, who are hoping to get a much narrower infrastructure bill that does not include tax increases on corporations and additional spending, which could further damage the country’s deficit.
“While much of the borrowing of the past year was unquestionably warranted, we are now becoming dangerously numb to the trillions in debt that are piling up,” Maya MacGuineas, president of the bipartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, told WSJ. “We need to start paying for what we spend. We need a plan to bring down the debt.”
Spending our way out of an economic downturn only sounds like a decent plan until the bills come due.
The #WasteOfTheDay is presented by the forensic auditors at OpenTheBooks.com.