The Federal Budget Outlook, Chapter 11

We present new estimates of the budget outlook, based on the latest projections from the Congressional Budget Office and the Medicare and Social Security Trustee reports. The medium-term budget outlook has not changed appreciably since earlier this year. Under reasonable assumptions, the federal government is likely to face deficits in excess of 6 percent of GDP by late in the decade, with the debt-GDP ratio reaching 90 percent by or before 2020 and passing its previous all-time high of 109 percent by around 2022.