This chart compares the size of government in America to that of Germany, France, and the European Union (EU) since 2001. This chart shows that the size of government in the U.S. in recent years has been steadily catching up to the size of government in these European countries. For example, Germany has reduced the size of its government since 2001 while the size of our government has increased. In 2009, the size of government in the U.S. will be just slightly behind the size of government in Germany. Even when you look at the size of government for the combined EU or France the U.S. is not far behind. This is a dramatic shift.
Under the Obama Administration’s budget plan the size of the U.S. government starts coming down after 2009. However, as I have stated in previous posts, I believe the projections in this budget plan are optimistic (predicting just a small recession in 2009 followed by strong growth over the next decade). For now, what is sure, is that government in the U.S. is getting bigger.
Data Sources:
> Office of Management and Budget, A New Era of Responsibility Renewing America’s Promise, Table S-1.
> European Commission, Directorate General for Economic and Financial Affairs, Economic Forecast Autumn 2008, Table 35.
>Bureau of Economic Analysis, Tables 1.1.5. Gross Domestic Product, and 3.1 Government Current Receipts and Expenditures.
> The estimate for 2009 cuts state and local government expenditures by 2% from 2008 levels.
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Recommend you try to remove defense spending from each country’s data. US war spending over last 5 years may distort data, and the premise that a welfare state is in the offing.
Comment by howard — March 18, 2009 @ 9:34 pm
Hi,
Could I use your Size of Government Chart for a column I am writing for the TheAlaskaStandard.com. Should I just use your web address as attribution?
The tables at http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy10/hist.html from http://usgovernmentspending.com/ show the federal outlays as at much higher % of GDP that you do for the Fed state totals. For example they show 43.6 % in 1943 and 1944 while your graph reads about 33 and 34%. Can you explain?
Cheers,
Don
Comment by Donald N Anderson — July 2, 2009 @ 8:46 pm
Thanks for asking. Yes, feel free to use the charts. Just site the web address.
Thanks for the question on the difference between my numbers and the tables you reference. Here is what I think is going on: I am using current government expenditures when coming up with my numbers. The tables from the link you site must be using what is called “total government expenditures” which includes: current expenditures + gross government investments + Capital transfer payments + Purchases of non produced assets - Consumption of fixed capital. I used the current expenditures (or outlays) because I was trying to stay consistent with the Obama budget for 2009 (which from what I could tell was showing current outlays).
Comment by admin — July 3, 2009 @ 9:02 am