CBO Estimates $383 Billion Deficit For First Two Months of Fiscal Year

The United States borrowed $383 billion in the first two months of fiscal year 2024, including $317 billion in November, according to the latest Monthly Budget Review from the Congressional Budget Office.

The following is a statement from Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget: 

There’s no way around it: Congress has a sleigh full of problems this holiday season. Not least of which is the fact we just borrowed $383 billion in the first two months of the fiscal year – $6 billion borrowed each day – without even doing anything differently in that time.  

Credit where it’s due, lawmakers have so far managed to break a yearslong stretch of deficit increases by working together to reduce ten-year deficit projections by $1.3 trillion. It’s real progress worthy of real praise. But the road ahead is daunting: we have two funding deadlines in the next two months, a possible year-end tax package threatening to balloon deficits, ongoing negotiations over an emergency supplemental, and the looming insolvency of the trust funds millions of Americans rely upon.  

Much more needs to be done to put the national debt on a sustainable path, and the best thing Washington can do to make that happen is to build momentum on the rare progress we’ve seen this year. At the very least, they should offset new spending or tax cuts. But we’ve also seen bipartisan, bicameral support for a fiscal commission in recent weeks; this is an opportunity for essential conversations on all parts of the budget that we mustn’t squander.

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For more information, please contact Matt Klucher, Communications Manager, at klucher@crfb.org.