Obama Spending Trends Charted

• Posted May 12th, 2009 at 6.33pm in Entitlements.

So, would President Obama’s budget plan really increase deficit spending much more than other modern presidents? Well, yeah, to the tune of seven times more, measured as a percentage of economic output, than under President Kennedy over 45 years ago — as you can see in this chart.


http://blog.heritage.org/2009/05/12/...rends-charted/

Bush Deficit vs. Obama Deficit in Pictures

• Posted March 24th, 2009 at 10.20am in Ongoing Priorities.

President Barack Obama has repeatedly claimed that his budget would cut the deficit by half by the end of his term. But as Heritage analyst Brian Riedl has pointed out, given that Obama has already helped quadruple the deficit with his stimulus package, pledging to halve it by 2013 is hardly ambitious.

The Washington Post has a great graphic which helps put President Obama’s budget deficits in context of President Bush’s.
What’s driving Obama’s unprecedented massive deficits? Spending. Riedl details:

• President Bush expanded the federal budget by a historic $700 billion through 2008. President Obama would add another $1 trillion.
• President Bush began a string of expensive finan­cial bailouts. President Obama is accelerating that course.
• President Bush created a Medicare drug entitle­ment that will cost an estimated $800 billion in its first decade. President Obama has proposed a $634 billion down payment on a new govern­ment health care fund.
• President Bush increased federal education spending 58 percent faster than inflation. Presi­dent Obama would double it.
• President Bush became the first President to spend 3 percent of GDP on federal antipoverty programs. President Obama has already in­creased this spending by 20 percent.
• President Bush tilted the income tax burden more toward upper-income taxpayers. President Obama would continue that trend.
• President Bush presided over a $2.5 trillion increase in the public debt through 2008. Setting aside 2009 (for which Presidents Bush and Obama share responsibility for an additional $2.6 trillion in public debt), President Obama’s budget would add $4.9 trillion in public debt from the beginning of 2010 through 2016.

UPDATE: Many Obama defenders in the comments are claiming that the numbers above do not include spending on Iraq and Afghanistan during the Bush years. They most certainly do. While Bush did fund the wars through emergency supplementals (not the regular budget process), that spending did not simply vanish. It is included in the numbers above. Also, some Obama defenders are claiming the graphic above represents biased Heritage Foundation numbers. While we stand behind the numbers we put out 100%, the numbers, and the graphic itself, above are from the Washington Post. We originally left out the link to WaPo. It has been now been added.

CLARIFICATION: Of course, this Washington Post graphic does not perfectly delineate budget surpluses and deficits by administration. President Bush took office in January 2001, and therefore played a lead role in crafting the FY 2002-2008 budgets. Presidents Bush and Obama share responsibility for the FY 2009 budget deficit that overlaps their administrations, before President Obama assumes full budgetary responsibility beginning in FY 2010. Overall, President Obama’s budget would add twice as much debt as President Bush over the same number of years.

http://blog.heritage.org/2009/03/24/...t-in-pictures/


George, Lititz, PA writes:
I reject the two bars that indicate a surplus for 2000 and 2001. This is rewritten history by friends of the Clinton administration. It never happened. The U.S. federal debt went up every year including those two. Those data points are fictitious.
See for yourself” by going here:
http://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/reports/pd/histdebt/histdebt_histo4.htm
and here:
http://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/reports/pd/histdebt/histdebt_histo5.htm
The debt went up each year. There was no $236.2 billion surplus. NEVER HAPPENED.

So, the numbers you posted are inaccurate and unreliable?

It's the WaPo's chart

They were inaccurate for those two years according to that poster. I did go to the links and the US treasury reports deficits instead of surpluses for those two years

halving the deficit is not halving the debt.
The debt will grow geometrically even if the deficit were to shrink, which it probably wont.

Obama's numbers are based on YOY growth that was not even sustained during the boom years.

__________________
"At the moment that the whole world has accepted that government will centrally plan all of the economy, take care of its citizens from cradle to grave, and rule a worldwide military empire –all with money that comes from nowhere - at that very moment the age of government will end. "

looks like Reagan was just a big government farce after all.

__________________
"At the moment that the whole world has accepted that government will centrally plan all of the economy, take care of its citizens from cradle to grave, and rule a worldwide military empire –all with money that comes from nowhere - at that very moment the age of government will end. "

How in the...even if you approve of his policies, how did he rank higher than Thomas Jefferson?!

__________________
"I believe that my next 100 days will be so successful, I will be able to complete them in 72 days. And on the 73rd day I will rest." -President Obama


"There is nothing I dread so much as a division of the Republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader and converting measures in opposition to each other." - John Adams

Do you want equality AND small government? Join the Democratic Freedom Caucus!

http://www.democraticfreedomcaucus.org/

There was a cold war on, with a declared winner, and he was hobbled with an opposition congress

Throw stones at Bush 43 who controlled all three houses for a while and still spent like a sailor in bangkok.

Judging from the chart you are citing as evidence, it looks like you're saying Obama's biggest problem is that he spends money like he's a Republican.

Imagine what reagan could have spent if he had GWB's congress ?

__________________
"At the moment that the whole world has accepted that government will centrally plan all of the economy, take care of its citizens from cradle to grave, and rule a worldwide military empire –all with money that comes from nowhere - at that very moment the age of government will end. "