Budget Records Biggest Monthly Deficit in 3 Years
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WASHINGTON — The government posted a $35.78-billion budget deficit in March, up 22.2% from the same month last year and the highest monthly shortfall in nearly three years, the Treasury Department reported Friday.
Revenues last month were up 3.9% from March, 1988, to $68.28 billion, while spending of $104.06 billion was up 9.5%.
The last time the monthly budget deficit was higher was in May, 1986, when the shortfall was $39.4 billion.
For the first six months of the 1989 fiscal year, which began Oct. 1, the budget deficit totaled $128.43 billion, 7.4% ahead of the $119.61-billion shortfall posted by the same time last year.
Economist Louis Crandall of R. H. Wrightson & Associates in New York said that last month’s deficit surge was largely due to technical factors related to the timing of government payments for tax refunds and veterans’ and disability benefits.
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