Obama’’s 2010 budget deficit soars to record $1.56 trln
WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama on Monday projected the U.S. budget deficit would peak at a fresh record in 2010 before easing as he pushes for fiscal responsibility while battling double-digit unemployment.
Dubbed an old-style liberal tax-and-spender by his Republican opponents, Obama is under pressure to convince investors and big creditors like China that he has a credible plan to control the country’’s deficit and debt over time.
“In the long term, we cannot have sustainable and durable economic growth without getting our fiscal house in order,” Obama said in a statement with the budget’’s formal release.
His budget for the fiscal year to Sept. 30, 2011, a blueprint that is subject to change by the U.S. Congress, forecast a deficit of $1.56 trillion in 2010, or 10.6 percent of the economy measured by gross domestic product (GDP).
The rise was partly due to the $787 billion stimulus package Obama pushed through Congress early last year to fight the recession.
Republicans seized on the grim fiscal forecast to criticize Obama’’s handling of the economy.
Senator Judd Gregg, the leading Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, warned that the country was sinking into a “quagmire” of debt and said Obama’’s stimulus plan had failed to create jobs.
“These circumstances call for a bold, game-changing budget that will turn things around, put in place a plan to restrain spending, reduce the debt and tackle the big entitlement programs that are growing out-of-control,” he said. “Instead, the president has sent us more of the same.”
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