美国国家公共电台 NPR Despite Strong Economy, Federal Deficit Soars

 

NOEL KING, HOST:

All right. This morning, the Labor¹ Department reported another month of strong job growth. Employers added 157,000 jobs in July, and the unemployment rate ticked down to 3.9 percent. And of course, we had news last week that the U.S. economy grew in the second quarter at the fastest pace in nearly four years. But all this positive economic news is not helping² the government's finances. The deficit³ is expected to top a trillion dollars next year. NPR's Scott Horsley has the story.

SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE⁴: On a muggy⁵ morning earlier this week, a group of bankers and investment managers met at the Hay-Adams Hotel here in Washington. They got an update from the Treasury⁶ Department about government cash flows. And according to minutes of the meeting, the picture was not pretty. Corporate⁷ tax receipts are down for the year while government spending is up. The Treasury expects to borrow more than $750 billion to pay its bills in the last six months of the year.

STAN COLLENDER: The federal budget deficit is ballooning, skyrocketing, soaring - whichever way you want to describe it.

HORSLEY: Stan Collender writes "The Budget Guy" blog about federal finances.

COLLENDER: You've got a kind of perfect storm here. You've got more spending. You've got less revenue. And the deficit is just getting bigger and bigger, to the point where it will be at least a trillion dollars every year during the Trump⁸ administration and beyond.

HORSLEY: Even the White House's own rosy⁹ forecast acknowledges the deficit will exceed 5 percent of the overall economy next year, a level it's previously¹⁰ reached only after deep recessions, when unemployment topped 10 percent. Today, the economy is near full employment. But Collender says the government is still acting¹¹ like a spendthrift family, piling up credit card bills even though times are good.

COLLENDER: It's close to unprecedented¹². When the economy's doing well, which it's obviously doing and has done for a decade, you would want a fiscal¹³ policy that would get the deficit to go down, not up.

HORSLEY: But policymakers in Washington have gone in precisely¹⁴ the opposite direction. Earlier this year, Congress boosted spending on both the military and domestic programs. And then there are the tax cuts, which the president bragged¹⁵ about at a campaign rally this week.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We passed the biggest tax cuts and reform in American history - biggest cuts in history.

HORSLEY: In fact, these were not the biggest tax cuts ever. But they are cutting into government revenues despite repeated promises that the cuts would pay for themselves.

MAYA MACGUINEAS: Let me be a hundred percent clear about one thing. The tax cuts are never going to pay for themselves.

HORSLEY: Maya MacGuineas heads the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. She blames an outbreak of fiscal free-lunchism for the growing mountain of government debt.

MACGUINEAS: If you want to spend more, you have to pay more in taxes. And if you want to cut taxes, you have to be willing to cut spending, also. And right now, it seems to be this period where no politician is willing to do any of those.

HORSLEY: And like a family that's maxed out its credit cards, MacGuineas warns the government may have less room to maneuver¹⁶ the next time it's confronted with an actual crisis.

MACGUINEAS: Last time we had a recession, our debt was half the level it is today relative to the economy. And that meant we had a lot of fiscal tools to help respond. But as the debt gets higher, our ability to respond to a recession or another kind of crisis is definitely much more difficult.

HORSLEY: The growing deficit also means higher borrowing costs. So far this fiscal year, growth in Social Security, Medicare and defense¹⁷ spending have all been eclipsed by rising interest on the debt. Scott Horsley, NPR News, Washington.

1 labor   

n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦

参考例句：

• We are never late in satisfying him for his labor.我们从不延误付给他劳动报酬。
• He was completely spent after two weeks of hard labor.艰苦劳动两周后，他已经疲惫不堪了。

2 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

3 deficit   

n.亏空，亏损；赤字，逆差

参考例句：

• The directors have reported a deficit of 2.5 million dollars.董事们报告赤字为250万美元。
• We have a great deficit this year.我们今年有很大亏损。

4 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

5 muggy   

adj.闷热的；adv.（天气）闷热而潮湿地；n.（天气）闷热而潮湿

参考例句：

• We may expect muggy weather when the rainy season begins.雨季开始时，我们预料有闷热的天气。
• It was muggy and overcast.天气闷热潮湿，而且天色阴沉。

6 treasury   

n.宝库；国库，金库；文库

参考例句：

• The Treasury was opposed in principle to the proposals.财政部原则上反对这些提案。
• This book is a treasury of useful information.这本书是有价值的信息宝库。

7 corporate   

adj.共同的，全体的；公司的，企业的

参考例句：

• This is our corporate responsibility.这是我们共同的责任。
• His corporate's life will be as short as a rabbit's tail.他的公司的寿命是兔子尾巴长不了。

8 trump   

n.王牌，法宝；v.打出王牌，吹喇叭

参考例句：

• He was never able to trump up the courage to have a showdown.他始终鼓不起勇气摊牌。
• The coach saved his star player for a trump card.教练保留他的明星选手，作为他的王牌。

9 rosy   

adj.美好的，乐观的，玫瑰色的

参考例句：

• She got a new job and her life looks rosy.她找到一份新工作，生活看上去很美好。
• She always takes a rosy view of life.她总是对生活持乐观态度。

10 previously   

adv.以前，先前（地）

参考例句：

• The bicycle tyre blew out at a previously damaged point.自行车胎在以前损坏过的地方又爆开了。
• Let me digress for a moment and explain what had happened previously.让我岔开一会儿，解释原先发生了什么。

11 acting   

n.演戏，行为，假装；adj.代理的，临时的，演出用的

参考例句：

• Ignore her,she's just acting.别理她，她只是假装的。
• During the seventies,her acting career was in eclipse.在七十年代，她的表演生涯黯然失色。

12 unprecedented   

adj.无前例的，新奇的

参考例句：

• The air crash caused an unprecedented number of deaths.这次空难的死亡人数是空前的。
• A flood of this sort is really unprecedented.这样大的洪水真是十年九不遇。

13 fiscal   

adj.财政的，会计的，国库的，国库岁入的

参考例句：

• The increase of taxation is an important fiscal policy.增税是一项重要的财政政策。
• The government has two basic strategies of fiscal policy available.政府有两个可行的财政政策基本战略。

14 precisely   

adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地

参考例句：

• It's precisely that sort of slick sales-talk that I mistrust.我不相信的正是那种油腔滑调的推销宣传。
• The man adjusted very precisely.那个人调得很准。

15 bragged   

v.自夸，吹嘘( brag的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• He bragged to his friends about the crime. 他向朋友炫耀他的罪行。
• Mary bragged that she could run faster than Jack. 玛丽夸口说她比杰克跑得快。 来自《简明英汉词典》

16 maneuver   

n.策略[pl.]演习；v.(巧妙)控制；用策略

参考例句：

• All the fighters landed safely on the airport after the military maneuver.在军事演习后，所有战斗机都安全降落在机场上。
• I did get her attention with this maneuver.我用这个策略确实引起了她的注意。

17 defense   

n.防御，保卫；[pl.]防务工事；辩护，答辩

参考例句：

• The accused has the right to defense.被告人有权获得辩护。
• The war has impacted the area with military and defense workers.战争使那个地区挤满了军队和防御工程人员。