Obama administration: Budget deficit increases to $587 billion

October 14, 2016 at 5:07 p.m. | Updated October 14, 2016 at 5:07 p.m.

by Associated Press

In this Feb. 9, 2016, file photo, copies of President Barack Obama's fiscal 2017 federal budget are displayed by the Senate Budget Committee, on Capitol Hill in Washington. The government ran a $587 billion budget deficit for the just-completed fiscal year, a 34 percent spike over last year after significant improvement from the record deficits of President Barack Obama's first years in office.
In this Feb. 9, 2016, file photo, copies of President Barack Obama's fiscal 2017 federal budget are displayed by the Senate Budget Committee, on Capitol Hill in Washington. The government ran a $587 billion budget deficit for the just-completed fiscal year, a 34 percent spike over last year after significant improvement from the record deficits of President Barack Obama's first years in office.

WASHINGTON - The government says it ran a $587 billion budget deficit for the just-completed fiscal year, a 34 percent spike over last year after significant improvement from the record deficits of President Barack Obama's first years in office.

The deficit news, while sobering, does not appear bad enough to jolt a gridlocked Washington into action to stem the flow of red ink.

And in the presidential campaign, intractable budget deficits and growing debt have been mostly neglected by Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump.

The latest figures show that the government is borrowing 15 cents of every dollar it spends. Government spending went up almost 5 percent to $3.9 trillion in fiscal 2016, but revenues stayed flat at $3.3 trillion.

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