01
Know the baseline
Start with official financial statements, realistic economic assumptions, and transparent scoring.
Federal Fiscal Policy
Balancing the Federal Budget
Explore the tradeoffs between federal spending and revenue using the latest completed fiscal year reported by the U.S. Treasury.
Actual Treasury Baseline
The numbers before the proposals
Awaiting Treasury data
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Receipts
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Total federal revenue for the completed fiscal year.
Outlays
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Total federal spending for the same fiscal year.
Revenue–Spending Gap
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The difference between receipts and outlays.
Interactive Fiscal Scenario
Build a balanced budget
This is a transparent arithmetic exercise. The sliders change aggregate fiscal-year receipts and outlays, not individual agencies or real enacted law.
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Hypothetical fiscal-year result
Waiting for official baseline…
Adjusted revenue—
Adjusted spending—
No estimates are calculated without Treasury data.
Spending reduction needed to balance the baseline
—Revenue increase needed to balance the baseline
—Model limitations: Equal percentage adjustments across total receipts and outlays are highly simplified. Taxes affect behavior and growth; spending is governed by laws, entitlements, contracts and interest costs. This tool is educational, not an official forecast or a plan to reduce the national debt by the same amount.
Budget Reform
What real reform requires
02
Evaluate tradeoffs
Study tax policy, mandatory and discretionary spending, debt interest, and the effects on families and businesses.
03
Work with Congress
Federal taxation and appropriations require legislative action. Executive orders cannot rewrite the budget alone.