2026 chart book examines spending, taxes, and deficits

Debates over federal taxes, spending, and deficits will always be contentious due to deep disagreements over fiscal priorities, ideologies, and values. Yet these debates are often further hampered by an inability to agree on even the most basic underlying budget data. Simply put, standard liberal and conservative fiscal frameworks are often defended with fallacies regarding the current and projected makeup of taxes and spending, the trends in budget deficits and debt, and the fiscal records of recent presidents.

The new 2026 version of this annual chart book once again provides a standard, non-partisan look at the trends in spending, taxes, and deficits in hope of addressing common fallacies and providing a common starting point for fiscal debates.

The 132-page chart book begins by broadly examining the rising budget deficits and national debt and then dives deeper to show the policies driving the $138 trillion in new CBO-projected deficits over the next three decades—and how drastically the picture worsens if interest rates remain elevated. Next, the chart book shows the size of the reforms needed to stabilize the debt, and how the common “easy solutions” would fail to provide sufficient savings towards that goal. Finally, it examines trends in tax revenues and tax progressivity, slays common budget myths, and offers a full accounting of the fiscal records of Presidents Bush, Obama, Trump, and Biden.

These charts—most of which rely on publicly-available data from the Congressional Budget Office, Office of Management and Budget, Census Bureau, and U.S. Treasury—nevertheless defy conventional wisdom about spending, taxes, and deficits.

Examples of charts include:

• Annual Budget Deficits are Projected to Approach $4.4 Trillion Within a Decade (p. 7)
• Interest to Consume 31 percent of Revenues Within a Decade, More Than Half By 2056 (9, 79)
• The U.S. Now Has the OECD’s Largest Budget Deficit and 4^th Largest Debt (21-22)
• How Did Washington Go from Budget Surpluses to Escalating Deficits? (28, 49)
• Rising Social Security & Medicare Shortfalls Drive 2023–36 Deficit Rise (45-47)
• Debt in 30 Years Reaches Between 175 percent–379 percent of GDP, Depending on Baseline (59)
• What is Driving CBO’s Projected $138 Trillion Deficit over 30 Years? (61–67)
• How Much Does Social Security Add to Annual Deficits and the Debt Per Year? (71-72)
• Each 1 percent Interest-Rate Rise Adds $57 Trillion (or 60 percent of GDP) to 30-Year Debt (75-78)
• A Menu of Tax Increase Options With 10-Year and Long-Term Estimates (81)
• Taxing the Rich Could Raise at Most 1 percent or 2 percent of GDP (84)
• Does the U.S. Have the OECD’s Most Progressive Tax Code? (92-93, 102)
• What Really Caused the 1990s Budget Surpluses? (110)
• The Comprehensive Budget Record of Presidents Bush (112-113), Obama (114–121), Trump (122–126), and Biden (127-132).

Download the chart book