# Record deficit to surplus in 20 years?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/record-deficit-to-surplus-in-20-years/275445>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [November 18, 2004, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/record-deficit-to-surplus-in-20-years/275445 "2004-11-18T12:55:51Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Earthworm\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f07891/32.png) [@Earthworm\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earthworm_Jim)\
**Post date:** [November 18, 2004, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/record-deficit-to-surplus-in-20-years/275445/1 "2004-11-18T12:55:51Z")

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Over in [this Pit thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=287281) the following roughly paraphrased statements were made (names & invective removed)

> [@](#):
>
> we [the United States] have already shown that multi-billion dollar debts can be paid off in under 20 years…we went from record deficits under Reagan to a surplus under Clinton, which some say is currently being squandered by Bush.

I often see statements that there were record deficits under Reagan, in trillions of dollars. But the “surplus under Clinton” is often bandied about as well.

Does this actually mean the US was completely debt free sometime between 1994 & 2000? If not, what does ‘surplus’ actually mean in this context?

I’m just looking for a factual representation of the US debts between 1980 - 2000. Thanks

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**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\
**Post date:** [November 18, 2004, 1:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/record-deficit-to-surplus-in-20-years/275445/2 "2004-11-18T13:05:51Z")

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The national debt and the annual budget deficit are two different things. Only once in U.S. history have we been without a national debt, and that was for a few years in the 1830s when the federal government was conducting massive western land sales.

The annual budget deficit is the shortfall between our annual revenues and our annual expenditures.

Most instructive when talking about the annual budget deficit is to express it not as a raw number, but in terms of a [percentage of the gross domestic product (GDP)](http://www.cbo.gov/showdoc.cfm?index=1821&sequence=0#table2).

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**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\
**Post date:** [November 18, 2004, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/record-deficit-to-surplus-in-20-years/275445/3 "2004-11-18T13:20:59Z")

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Debt-free, no. The U.S. National Debt is currently around $7.5 trillion and rising.

_Deficit_-free, yes. During the later Clinton years, the federal government was taking in taxes more than it was spending on programs.

[This page](http://www.marktaw.com/culture_and_media/TheNationalDebt.html) gives various charts and graphs on the subject, and it looks like the national debt was levelling off in Clinton’s time (and even diminishing when adjusted for inflation), and started climbing dramatically when Bush43 took office. The website looks pretty damn partisan, though, and you can always pick-and-choose statistics that support your position.