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U.S. Budget Deficit Hits $1.83 Trillion on Higher Interest Costs

US Business News Staff 2 US Business News Staff 2 on September 11, 2026

The U.S. budget deficit widened to $1.833 trillion in fiscal 2024 even as federal receipts reached a record. Final government data show how rising interest costs and higher spending outpaced revenue growth, which agencies drove the increase and why two widely cited measures of federal interest expense produce different totals.

Key Takeaways

  • The fiscal 2024 deficit increased $138 billion, or 8%, from fiscal 2023.
  • Federal receipts rose 11% to $4.919 trillion, while outlays climbed 10% to $6.752 trillion.
  • Gross interest on the public debt reached $1.133 trillion, a 29% annual increase.
  • The deficit equaled 6.4% of gross domestic product, above the 50-year average of 3.8%.
  • Debt held by the public ended the fiscal year at approximately 97.8% of GDP.

The U.S. budget deficit moved closer to $2 trillion during the year ended Sept. 30, 2024, after federal spending increased by $617 billion and revenue rose by $479 billion. The resulting $1.833 trillion gap was the largest annual shortfall outside the pandemic years.

The Congressional Budget Office reported that the deficit rose from $1.695 trillion and increased to 6.4% of GDP from 6.2% one year earlier.

Interest Costs Became a Larger Budget Pressure

Interest was one of the largest contributors to the spending increase. Treasury figures showed gross interest on the public debt rising 29% to $1.133 trillion, an increase of approximately $254 billion.

That gross total includes interest paid to federal trust funds and other government accounts. Because those intragovernmental payments do not increase total federal outlays, the net budget measure was lower at roughly $882 billion.

The CBO reported $949 billion in net interest outlays using a broader presentation in its monthly budget review. Both measures rose sharply as interest rates and debt increased.

As lower-rate Treasury securities matured, refinancing occurred at higher yields, linking the federal trend to higher borrowing costs across the economy.

The effect develops gradually because higher yields apply as securities mature and new debt is issued at prevailing market rates.

Record Revenue Could Not Offset Higher Outlays

Federal receipts reached $4.919 trillion in fiscal 2024, up 10.8% from the previous year. Individual income tax collections increased by about $250 billion, while corporate income taxes rose by approximately $110 billion. Social insurance and retirement receipts added about $95 billion.

Some of that growth reflected payments shifted into fiscal 2024 after tax deadlines were postponed for taxpayers in federally declared disaster areas. The timing effect strengthened the year-over-year comparison and means the increase did not come from underlying economic activity alone.

Receipts equaled 17.1% of GDP, near the 50-year average cited by the CBO. Outlays reached 23.4% of GDP, leaving a difference large enough to keep the U.S. budget deficit above 6% of national output.

Interest-rate expectations also influence Treasury yields and the rates applied when federal debt is refinanced. Changes in the Federal Reserve rate outlook can therefore affect future financing conditions without changing the fiscal 2024 result already recorded.

Major Programs Added to Federal Spending Growth

Social Security, health programs and defense also recorded higher spending. CBO data showed Social Security benefits increasing by $106 billion to $1.448 trillion, reflecting cost-of-living adjustments and a larger number of beneficiaries.

Medicare outlays increased as enrollment and payment rates rose. Military spending by the Defense Department reached $826 billion, up from $776 billion in fiscal 2023. Net interest was therefore comparable in scale with other major federal spending categories.

Education spending produced an unusually large year-over-year change because fiscal 2023 included accounting effects from a proposed student loan cancellation plan that was later blocked. Reversing those entries reduced reported 2023 spending and made the fiscal 2024 increase appear larger.

Calendar shifts created another complication. With Oct. 1 falling on a weekend in both years, some scheduled payments moved into the preceding fiscal year. Excluding those shifts, the CBO estimated that the deficit would have grown 13% rather than the reported 8%.

The Fiscal Data Shows a Persistent Financing Gap

The final deficit was lower than official estimates published earlier in 2024. Treasury reported that the total came in $76 billion below the March baseline of $1.91 trillion and $144 billion below the $1.98 trillion estimate released in July.

Even so, the shortfall remained well above the $984 billion deficit recorded in fiscal 2019. That comparison spans major economic disruptions and accounting changes, so it does not identify a single cause. It does show how the scale of annual federal borrowing expanded over five years.

Debt held by the public reached about 97.8% of GDP at the end of fiscal 2024, according to the CBO, up from 96% one year earlier. The measure covers Treasury securities held outside federal government accounts and compares that debt with the economy’s annual output.

The fiscal 2024 U.S. budget deficit reflects two developments moving together. Revenue reached a record, but higher program spending and debt-service costs increased by more, leaving the government dependent on additional borrowing to cover the difference.

Frequently Asked Questions

What was the U.S. budget deficit in fiscal 2024?

The U.S. budget deficit totaled $1.833 trillion in fiscal 2024, which ended Sept. 30, 2024. It increased by $138 billion, or 8%, from fiscal 2023.

Why did the deficit grow when federal revenue increased?

Federal revenue rose by $479 billion, but outlays increased by $617 billion. Higher interest costs and increased spending across several major programs outweighed the revenue gain.

How much did the federal government spend on interest?

Gross interest on the public debt totaled $1.133 trillion. After accounting for intragovernmental payments and other adjustments, the net budget measure was approximately $882 billion.

Why does the CBO report a different interest figure?

The CBO reported $949 billion in net interest outlays under its broader monthly budget presentation. Different accounting treatments explain why that total does not match the approximately $882 billion net figure used in other federal budget summaries.

Thomas R. Fox Examines Grief and Risk Management in Deluge Before Dawn

US Business News Staff US Business News Staff on September 11, 2026

By: Laura Zanky

Thomas R. Fox knows how to write about institutional failure, crisis response, and the gap between what risk management requires and what organizations actually do under pressure. He has spent fifteen years as the Voice of Compliance, producing books and analysis that examine how systems function when they are tested and how accountability works in the aftermath of things going wrong.

None of that experience fully prepared him for writing Deluge Before Dawn.

The Difference Between Analysis and Grief

He describes the experience of writing this book as more emotional than anything he has ever produced. He wrote it through tears, in writing and in rewriting, sitting with the weight of what happened to his community on July 4, 2025, when the Guadalupe River flooded with a ferocity that took lives and shattered the sense of safety that the Hill Country had always carried.

The previous books in his catalog demanded rigor, precision, and the ability to hold institutional complexity clearly enough to explain it to others. This book demanded all of that and something else entirely: the willingness to sit with grief, to honor the people who died without reducing them to data points, and to write about a community’s pain from the inside rather than from any professional distance.

He wrote the book in part to work through his own grief. He also wrote it because he hoped it would help others who were still suffering through theirs. Those two purposes, personal and communal, are woven through every chapter.

What Risk Management Has to Do With Memory

Tom’s professional background does not disappear in the book. It shapes the framework through which he situates the human stories he tells. The basic premises of risk management, assess your risks, formulate a plan, train on the plan, implement it, and then modify it through ongoing monitoring, are not abstract concepts in a book about the Guadalupe River flood. They are the framework that explains why some people survived and why others did not, and what the community and the institutions serving it need to do differently before the next flood arrives.

Because the next flood will arrive. Tom wrote a chapter on the science of why Kerr County is called Flash Flood Alley, and the conclusion of that chapter is unambiguous. This will happen again. The scientific and meteorological conditions that produced the July 4, 2025 event are part of the region’s permanent reality, and climate patterns suggest such events will become more frequent rather than less.

Remembrance, in the framework Tom has built for this book, is not separate from preparedness. It is the reason preparedness matters. You remember so that you do not forget the lessons. You honor the dead so that their loss produces something that outlasts the grief itself.

Four Things This Book Is Trying to Accomplish

Tom identifies four specific purposes he wanted the book to serve. The first is to tell the story of what happened and honor the bravery and professionalism of the first responders who were there. The second is to document both the immediate response and the longer-term recovery that followed. The third is to recognize the essential role that local journalism played in telling the story from day one, when the broader media was still catching up.

The fourth is the most forward-looking: to convey the lessons learned from the science, so that readers and communities understand that this will happen again and that there is a risk management response that can save lives.

Writing this book changed him. Working through the grief in the process of documenting it shifted something in how he carries what happened. He hopes it does the same for others.

A risk management expert’s most personal and most necessary book. Deluge Before Dawn by Thomas R. Fox is available now on Amazon.

Thomas R. Fox Examines Grief and Risk Management in Deluge Before Dawn

US Business News Staff US Business News Staff on September 11, 2026

By: Laura Zanky

Thomas R. Fox knows how to write about institutional failure, crisis response, and the gap between what risk management requires and what organizations actually do under pressure. He has spent fifteen years as the Voice of Compliance, producing books and analysis that examine how systems function when they are tested and how accountability works in the aftermath of things going wrong.

None of that experience fully prepared him for writing Deluge Before Dawn.

The Difference Between Analysis and Grief

He describes the experience of writing this book as more emotional than anything he has ever produced. He wrote it through tears, in writing and in rewriting, sitting with the weight of what happened to his community on July 4, 2025, when the Guadalupe River flooded with a ferocity that took lives and shattered the sense of safety that the Hill Country had always carried.

The previous books in his catalog demanded rigor, precision, and the ability to hold institutional complexity clearly enough to explain it to others. This book demanded all of that and something else entirely: the willingness to sit with grief, to honor the people who died without reducing them to data points, and to write about a community’s pain from the inside rather than from any professional distance.

He wrote the book in part to work through his own grief. He also wrote it because he hoped it would help others who were still suffering through theirs. Those two purposes, personal and communal, are woven through every chapter.

What Risk Management Has to Do With Memory

Tom’s professional background does not disappear in the book. It shapes the framework through which he situates the human stories he tells. The basic premises of risk management, assess your risks, formulate a plan, train on the plan, implement it, and then modify it through ongoing monitoring, are not abstract concepts in a book about the Guadalupe River flood. They are the framework that explains why some people survived and why others did not, and what the community and the institutions serving it need to do differently before the next flood arrives.

Because the next flood will arrive. Tom wrote a chapter on the science of why Kerr County is called Flash Flood Alley, and the conclusion of that chapter is unambiguous. This will happen again. The scientific and meteorological conditions that produced the July 4, 2025 event are part of the region’s permanent reality, and climate patterns suggest such events will become more frequent rather than less.

Remembrance, in the framework Tom has built for this book, is not separate from preparedness. It is the reason preparedness matters. You remember so that you do not forget the lessons. You honor the dead so that their loss produces something that outlasts the grief itself.

Four Things This Book Is Trying to Accomplish

Tom identifies four specific purposes he wanted the book to serve. The first is to tell the story of what happened and honor the bravery and professionalism of the first responders who were there. The second is to document both the immediate response and the longer-term recovery that followed. The third is to recognize the essential role that local journalism played in telling the story from day one, when the broader media was still catching up.

The fourth is the most forward-looking: to convey the lessons learned from the science, so that readers and communities understand that this will happen again and that there is a risk management response that can save lives.

Writing this book changed him. Working through the grief in the process of documenting it shifted something in how he carries what happened. He hopes it does the same for others.

A risk management expert’s most personal and most necessary book. Deluge Before Dawn by Thomas R. Fox is available now on Amazon.