Image: Federal Spending - Cause of Change 2001 to 2009

Description: United States Federal spending as % of GDP - Cause of change from 2001 to 2009 Sources The U.S. federal budget was last balanced in FY2001. Spending was 18.2% of GDP. It has since risen to 24.7% of GDP, a change of 6.5%. The major change categories, according to the CBO historical tables:[1] Medicare & Medicaid: +1.7% GDP. Increases were driven by demographic shifts of an aging population and annual healthcare cost increases in the 7-9% range. Defense: +1.6% GDP. Increases were driven by a doubling of defense spending in dollar terms, for both the baseline defense budget and Iraq/Afghanistan Wars.[2] Social Security: +0.6% GDP. Increases are driven by demographic shifts of an aging population creating more beneficiaries and annual cost of living adjustments. Income Security: +1.4% GDP. This includes food stamps, unemployment compensation, foster care, other retirement and disability. This has increased significantly due to the subprime mortgage crisis. Other: +1.2% GDP. This includes non-defense discretionary spending increases (e.g., Cabinet Departments) and other mandatory spending (e.g., stimulus, bailouts) due to the crisis. References ↑ CBO-Historical Tables ↑ DOD-Defense Spending Trend Chart-May 2009
Title: Federal Spending - Cause of Change 2001 to 2009
Credit: I (Farcaster (talk)) created this work entirely by myself using CBO data.
Author: Farcaster at en.wikipedia
Usage Terms: Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0
License: CC BY-SA 3.0
License Link: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0
Attribution Required?: Yes