Interest payments to surpass Medicare spending
The U.S. national debt has alarmingly exceeded $34 trillion, leading to significant interest payment obligations.
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reported a sharp increase in net interest payments on the debt over the years, escalating from $223 billion in fiscal year 2015 to $659 billion in fiscal year 2023.
For fiscal year 2024, the CBO projects that the U.S. government will spend $870 billion on net interest payments, surpassing expenditures on national defense ($822 billion) and Medicare ($851 billion). This would make net interest payments the second-largest budget item, trailing only behind Social Security, noted the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (CRFB)
The non-partisan think tank emphasized the need for "thoughtful deficit reduction" to mitigate interest costs and warned that without such action, debt will “represent a growing threat to our economy, our health care system, and our national security.”
In fiscal year 2023, which ended Sept. 30, 2023, the federal government spent $6.13 trillion and collected $4.44 trillion in revenue, resulting in a deficit of $1.7 trillion.
This pattern of deficit spending, where expenditures exceed revenue, has continued into fiscal year 2024. The federal budget deficit has already exceeded $531 billion as of Feb. 2024.
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