Tipsheet

October 2012 Deficit Bigger Than October 2011

The October 2012 U.S. budget deficit has increased compared to the budget deficit of October 2011. In October 2011, we saw a deficit of $98.5 billion and October 2012 shows a $120 billion deficit according to the Treasury Department.  This number comes more than 2000 days since Senate Democrats introduced a budget.

To put this into perspective, let's look at President Obama's most recent argument for raising taxes on those making more than $250,000 per year.

Democrats countered that the one-year savings from ending the cuts for the rich may not be much, but that those savings would grow over time, bringing more than $800 billion into the U.S. Treasury by the end of the decade.

$800 billion by the end of the decade (10 years) = $80 billion per year = $6.6 billion per month. At this rate of spending, the tax increase does zero to help reduce the deficit. Washington has a spending problem, not a revenue problem. The only way to even start reducing the deficit is to get 23 million unemployed people working and paying taxes again.