Justin Fox, Columnist

There’s More to the $1 Trillion Deficit Than Just Tax Cuts

Trump’s bite out of revenue shares responsibility with spending growth that’s out of the ordinary.

January 23, 2020 at 12:00 PM UTC

Justin Fox is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering business, economics and other topics involving charts. A former editorial director of the Harvard Business Review, he is author of “The Myth of the Rational Market.”

Spending money like they print it.
Photographer: Mark Wilson/Getty Images

Provide news feedback or report an error

Site feedback:

Take our Survey

This article is for subscribers only.

In the two years since the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 took effect on Jan. 1, 2018, the annual U.S. federal deficit has grown from $681 billion to a bit over $1 trillion, according to numbers released last week by the Treasury Department.

Did the tax cuts cause the deficit increase? At first glance, no. Federal revenue in calendar year 2019 was $154 billion higher than in calendar year 2017, while spending rose $494 billion.