US budget deficit down to USD 680 bn, lowest in 5 years

Washington: For the first time in five years, the US government has run a budget deficit below USD 1 trillion.

The government said on Wednesday that the deficit for the 2013 budget year totalled USD 680.3 billion, down from USD 1.09 trillion in 2012. That's the smallest imbalance since 2008, when the government ran a USD 458.6 billion deficit.

It's still the fifth-largest deficit of all time. The deficit is the gap between the government's tax revenue and its spending. It narrowed for the budget year that ended on Sept. 30 because revenue rose while spending fell.

Revenue jumped 13.3 per cent to USD 2.77 trillion. Government spending declined 2.4 per cent to USD 3.45 trillion.

A stronger economy created more jobs and income over the past year, which generated greater tax revenue. At the same time, the Obama administration and Congress agreed in January to end a temporary cut in Social Security taxes and also to raise income taxes on the wealthy.

And spending fell in part because of across-the-board cuts that took effect in March.

The Obama administration and Republicans in Congress are now engaged in another battle over the budget and Obama's health insurance programme. That led to a 16-day partial government shutdown this month.

And while the parties reached a deal to re-open the government this month, it contained an agreement to only fund government operations until January 15 and suspend the government's borrowing limit until February 7.

A House-Senate conference committee met yesterday for the first time since the shutdown. They are hoping to reach a deal that would remove the threat of another shutdown and ease fears of a debt default.

The Obama administration stressed in announcing the 2013 results that the government is succeeding in reducing the deficit from the record levels that had been hit. "It is now less than half of what it was when the president took office," Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew said in a statement.

The USD 680.3 billion deficit for the just-completed budget year represents 4.1 per cent of the total economy, down from 6.8 per cent last year. In dollar terms and not adjusted for inflation, the deficit is still the fifth-largest in history. It was exceeded only by four straight deficits above USD 1 trillion. The record deficit was USD 1.4 trillion set in 2009, Obama's first year in office.