The Budget: Bigger Deficit

Dwight Eisenhower’s farewell presidential gift to the nation was the promise of a surplus for fiscal 1961. Reviewing Ike’s tote sheet after his own inauguration, John Kennedy quickly concluded that the Eisenhower black ink was unrealistic.

The fiscal year, he announced, would end with a deficit of more than $2 billion.

Last week. Budget Director David Bell told Congress that Kennedy’s revision had been none too bearish. Despite a one-shot windfall of $587 million in West German debt prepayment, supplemental highway, defense and space spending will increase the deficit to at least $2.169 billion. Next year will be even worse. Originally figured at $2.8 billion, the Administration’s estimated 1962 deficit, in many current estimates, comes out to $4 billion.