1 Despite politicians' hand-wringing about the federal budget, the government ended fiscal 1989 with a $152.08 billion deficit, about the same as the two previous years.
2 Even White House budget director Richard Darman had trouble finding a silver lining in the report. 'I suppose you could say the good news is that the deficits are not heading up,' he said, 'but you can't be satisfied with deficits at this level and we're not.'
3 The federal deficit was $155.15 billion in 1988 and $149.69 billion in 1987.
4 The 1989 deficit would have been nearly $10 billion larger had the government been able to spend as much as Congress intended on cleaning up the thrift industry before the year ended on Sept. 30.
5 Because the Resolution Trust Corp. couldn't spend the money fast enough, the savings-and-loan outlays were pushed into fiscal 1990.
6 Nevertheless, the 1989 deficit still exceeded the $136 billion target set by the Gramm-Rudman deficit-reduction law by $16 billion, a reminder of that law's shortcomings.
7 The law sets a deficit target of $100 billion for fiscal 1990.
8 A partisan fight over cutting capital-gains taxes has slowed the progress of 1990 deficit-reduction legislation almost to a halt, triggering across-the-board spending cuts under the Gramm-Rudman law.
9 The White House and the Democratic leadership in Congress blame each other for turning capital-gains taxes into such a divisive issue this year.
10 Neither side showed any sign of retreating.
11 Meeting with reporters Friday, Mr. Darman again said he would rather live with across-the-board spending cuts than accept a deficit-reduction bill like the one passed by the House, which would increase spending in future years.
12 Underscoring the size of the deficits of the past few years, the Treasury report showed that for the first time interest paid on the public debt -- $240.86 billion -- exceeded spending on Social Security, the single largest government program.
13 In all, federal outlays amounted to $1.143 trillion in 1989, up 7.5% from the previous year, the Treasury said.
14 Federal revenues rose 9% to $990.79 billion.
15 The Treasury said a surge in tax receipts noted earlier in the year didn't turn out to be quite as strong as it first appeared.
16 The Treasury marked up its forecast by $17 million in July, but that proved to be about $5 billion too optimistic.
17 The government ran a deficit of $6.16 billion in September, compared with a surplus of $10.17 billion in September 1988.
18 Outlays for the month totaled $105.39 billion, up from $87.57 billion a year earlier.
19 The increase reflects spending on the S&L rescue as well as payroll and Social Security checks normally issued in October that were issued in September this year because Oct. 1 fell on a Sunday.
20 Revenues were $99.23 billion, up from $97.74 billion a year earlier.

The federal deficit was $ 155 . 15 billion in 1988 and $ 149 . 69 billion in 1987 .
was
How did the deficit drop rise over three billion dollars in a year?