Current Federal Debt and Deficit
Every month, the U.S. Treasury releases data on the federal budget, including the current deficit or surplus. The following contains budget data for September 2025, the final month of fiscal year (FY) 2025.
Current Federal Deficit
$198B
Federal Budget Surplus for September 2025
$80B
Federal Budget Surplus for September 2024
The federal government reported a surplus of $198 billion in the month of September 2025, an increase of $118 billion from the $80 billion surplus recorded in September 2024. However, September 1 fell on a weekend in 2024 and 2025, causing certain payments to be shifted into the respective previous months. That accounting quirk reduced the reported September outlays for both years. Adjusting for those timing shifts, the September 2025 surplus would have been $110 billion more than the same month in the previous year.
Spending in September 2025 was $101 billion less than in September last year, though adjusting for the timing shifts, outlays were down $92 billion compared to the same month in 2024. Driving that decrease was a $126 billion downward adjustment by the Department of Education stemming from modifications to the federal student loan program. Offsetting that and other decreases were increases by several categories; an $11 billion increase in outlays by the Foreign Military Sales Program; Social Security outlays increased by $9 billion; and Medicare spending was up by $8 billion. Receipts were up by $16 billion in September 2025 compared to the previous year: individual income and payroll taxes increased by $40 billion, and customs duties collections rose by $22 billion, largely due to the increase in tariffs, while corporate income taxes fell by $46 billion.
Cumulative Federal Deficit
$1.8T
Cumulative FY25 Deficit
$1.8T
Cumulative FY24 Deficit
For FY25, the deficit was $41 billion below last year’s level. However, October 1, 2023, fell on a weekend, thereby causing certain federal payments to be shifted into the previous fiscal year (FY23) and artificially reducing the deficit in FY24. Without that effect, the deficit for FY25 would have been $113 billion less than last year’s adjusted total.
For FY25, total outlays were $7 trillion, $275 billion higher than the same period in the previous year. Adjusting for the timing shift, spending was $202 billion above the same period last year. That increase was driven mainly by three categories: Social Security spending was up by $120 billion, stemming from cost-of-living adjustments and some retroactive payments; net interest rose by $89 billion; and Medicare outlays increased by $78 billion (adjusted for timing shifts). Partially offsetting those and other increases was a $235 billion decrease by the Department of Education due to several loan estimation adjustments and a $63 billion decrease in outlays by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation related to the resolution of bank failures that occurred last year.
FY25 revenues were $317 billion above collections from a year ago, driven by a $230 billion increase in individual income taxes. Receipts were boosted last year by deferred collections of payments from taxpayers in locations that suffered natural disasters. If not for those postponed payments (about $35 billion), the difference in revenues in FY25 relative to the prior year would have been larger. In addition, customs duties were higher in 2025 by $118 billion, mostly because of higher tariffs, and payroll taxes were up by $39 billion. These gains were partially offset by a $78 billion decrease in corporate income taxes collected.
National Debt
$30.2T
Debt Held by the Public at the end of FY25
$28.2T
Debt Held by the Public at the end of FY24
At the end of Fiscal Year 2025, the annual deficit of $1.8 trillion is one of the largest the nation has seen in history. This year also saw the passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which is projected to expand future deficits further still and add $4.1 trillion to the national debt over the next ten years. As the national debt continues to rise, and interest costs outpace some of the largest programs in the budget, lawmakers have many good solutions to put the country on a better path now and for future generations.