Between FY2021 and FY2025 the deficit fell by a trillion dollars. Almost none of that came from restraint: revenue rose $1.19T while pandemic-era spending worth $1.6T rolled off — and underneath, the permanent core of the budget grew $1.79T. That roll-off is finished, and FY2026 shows what is left: the deficit widened again, by $218B to $1.99T.
Receipts collapsed and rebounded on the 2021–22 inflation and capital-gains surge, dipped in FY2023, and have risen since. Outlays fell from their pandemic peak but flattened at a level about $2.4T above FY2019. The shaded band is the deficit. Measured against GDP — the right frame for comparing years — the gap has been stuck near 6% every year since FY2023, well above the 3.8% fifty-year average. FY2026 came in at $1.99T, or 6.2% of GDP — $140B above CBO’s February baseline, mainly because of the tariff ruling (section 05).
When 1 October falls on a weekend, roughly $70–90B of benefit payments shift into the prior fiscal year. CBO publishes “adjusted” figures that strip this out. On an adjusted basis the FY2025 deficit was 6% smaller than FY2024’s, not 2%. Any model built on raw annual totals should carry this calendar dummy.
Receipts run through FY2026; outlays by program stop at FY2025 until Treasury publishes its September 2026 statement (needed for refundable tax credits). Switch the scale to compare mix (share of total), burden (percent of GDP), or growth (% change since FY2021, to see which items grew fastest). Click a legend entry to hide or show a line.
Agency totals from the Monthly Treasury Statement for September 2025. Lines marked “excl.” have the programs already shown separately above taken out: Medicare and Medicaid from HHS, Social Security benefits from SSA, and net interest and refundable tax credits from Treasury. The rows sum to $1,283B.
Customs duties went from $77B in FY2024 to $195B in FY2025 — a 153% jump, and the largest proportional change anywhere in the budget. It did not last: in February 2026 the Supreme Court struck down the IEEPA tariffs, and about $130B had been refunded by the end of FY2026. Customs receipts fell 11% to $172B in FY2026, instead of the further rise CBO had expected.
Every line item’s four-year dollar change, both panels on one shared scale so the bars are directly comparable. Net interest is the single largest increase anywhere in the budget — it grew more than Social Security did, from a base one third the size.
Split the spending side into two things that behave completely differently. Core — Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, defense, veterans’ benefits and interest on the debt — is demographic and contractual, and it compounds at roughly 10% a year. Everything else is discretionary agencies plus a pile of one-off accounting events, and it has been shrinking as pandemic programs unwound. The two nearly cancelled. They will not cancel again: the roll-off is over, and the core is now 78% of all federal spending.
These lines are accounting revaluations and emergency programs, not run-rates. Under the Federal Credit Reform Act, a change to student-loan terms is booked as a single present-value number in the year the policy changes — which is why the Department of Education spent $639B in FY2022 and negative $41B in FY2023.
| Line item | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unemployment compensation | 397 | 22 | — | — | — |
| Small Business Administration (PPP, disaster loans) | 323 | 23 | 26 | 33 | 1 |
| Coronavirus relief to states and localities | 243 | 106 | — | — | — |
| Dept. of Education (student-loan revaluations) | 260 | 639 | (41) | 268 | 35 |
| FDIC (bank resolutions and recoveries) | — | (9) | 92 | 37 | (31) |
| Spectrum auction proceeds (offsetting receipt) | (9) | (104) | — | — | — |
| Combined swing | 1,214 | 677 | 77 | 338 | 5 |
FY2026 closed on 30 September. Receipts rose $169B (3%) but outlays rose $386B (6%), so the deficit widened by $218B to $1.99T — 6.2% of GDP, and $140B more than CBO projected in February. The figures are CBO’s preliminary year-end estimates.
| Line | FY2025 | FY2026 | Change |
|---|
Changes are as published by CBO and can differ from the two columns beside them by $1–2B of rounding. “All other outlays” is the remainder of total outlays. On the deficit line a negative change means the shortfall widened.
Corporate receipts fell 16% because the 2025 reconciliation act restored large up-front deductions for capital investment. Customs duties fell 11% instead of rising, because the IEEPA tariffs were voided and about $130B was refunded. Net interest, meanwhile, added $115B — more than any program on the spending side.
From the February 2026 Budget and Economic Outlook, which assumes no change in law. It is the standard reference path — and the thing your own model should be scored against.
The primary deficit — everything except interest — actually falls slightly, from 2.6% of GDP in 2026 to 2.1% in 2036. The entire projected deterioration is interest on debt already issued. Three named forces sit behind the revision: the 2025 reconciliation act adds $4.7T to 2026–35 deficits, higher tariffs subtract about $3T, and lower immigration adds $0.5T.
Complete fiscal years, in billions of current dollars. Negative values in parentheses, following Treasury convention. Where two CBO vintages disagree on a revised total, the most recent is used.
| FY2021 | FY2022 | FY2023 | FY2024 | FY2025 |
|---|