Federal spending hits record high

The U.S. Treasury Department today announced federal income and expenditure figures for December, showing government spending hit a record high and Washington took in even more than it spent.

The $230.9 billion spent was an all-time high for a single month. That figure represented a 5.6 percent increase over the spending level in December 2004.

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Government receipts increased by an even greater amount from last year, increasing 12.1 percent, the Associated Press reported, to $241.88 billion. Treasury said last month was the first December since 2002 to post a budget surplus.

Also hitting a record high was the amount of corporate taxes received. Last month, $73.5 billion in corporate income taxes were taken in, breaking the record of $72 billion set in September.

Despite the monthly budget surplus, analysts still believe the budget deficit for this fiscal year will likely reach $400 billion, due in part to reconstruction costs in the Gulf Coast region.

The largest budget deficit in history was in 2004 at $413 billion. In 2005, the deficit was $377 billion.

AP reported through the first three months of the current budget year, which began on Oct. 1, government tax receipts have totaled $530.2 billion, up 8.8 percent from the same period a year ago. During the same three months, the federal government has spent $649.52 billion, a 7.2 percent increase from the same period a year ago.

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