Deficit shrinks

[Old Man]

<table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr class="standard"><td>Quote </td></tr><tr class="standard"><td class="QUOTE"> WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. posted a smaller than expected $52.79 billion budget deficit in July as revenues swelled, a Treasury Department report showed on Wednesday.

Wall Street analysts had expected the government to post a $57 billion budget gap in July, following a $69.16 billion deficit in the same month in 2004.[/QUOTE]July budget deficit narrows to $52.79 billion (http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?typ e=domesticNews&storyID=2005-08-10T180727Z_01_N10387 573_RTRIDST_0_USREPO RT-ECONOMY-USA-BUDGET-DC.XML)

Keep the economy going and we could have surpluses by the 08 election and that would really make the Dems mad.

But, I think the chances of that are still pretty slim. If the housing markets stumbles much, it will affect the economy big time.

[pRIMrose]

Or if oil continues to soar. http://www.gopusa.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes2.gif

&quot;Forecasting federal budgets alone is tremendously complex. That's partly a math problem. The deficit is the difference between two huge numbers - federal revenues and federal outlays. A small shift in either one (both exceed $2 trillion) can cause a sharp deficit change.&quot; - David R. Francis, Economic journalist with the Christian Science Monitor.

US deficit shrinks: a vindication for tax cuts? (http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0620/p17s01-cogn.html)

It will be interesting to see who prevails. The Keynesians or Hayek and von Mises. http://www.gopusa.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

One thing we already know, we are on our way to socialism and socialism grows and grows until it stops. Sometimes abruptly. http://www.gopusa.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin2.gif

[Terri]

Moving this one over to Business and Economy.