Budget Deficit Nears $1.5 Trillion

No wonder President Obama didn’t mention this in his State of the Union address: A new estimate from the Congressional Budget Office places the U.S.’s soaring budget deficit at $1.5 trillion in 2011—meaning that the government is borrowing 40 cents for every dollar it spends. The analysis also predicts that the economy will grow at a rate of 3.1 percent in 2011, but that the unemployment rate will stubbornly stick above 9 percent. The new deficit figure is $400 billion more than last year’s record figure, which was set at $1.4 trillion.