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The estimated $15 billion total surplus for the first four months of fiscal year 1999 represents a $29 billion improvement over the same period in fiscal year 1998. CBO currently estimates that the total 1999 surplus will be $107 billion.
 

The actual December deficit of $5.4 billion reported by the Treasury Department was almost identical to CBO's preliminary estimate of $5.5 billion, which was based on daily Treasury statements for the month.
 

CBO estimates that total receipts in January were about $8 billion higher than a year ago, even though the month had one fewer collection day this year. Outlays are estimated to be about $36 billion lower than in January 1998 for two major reasons. First, Social Security payments totaling about $30 billion were made in December rather than in January because January 3 fell on a Sunday this year. Second, spending in January 1998 was unusually high because February 1 was a Sunday, so about $9 billion in payments ordinarily made in February were shifted to the end of January. After accounting for those shifts, outlays in January 1999 were about 2 percent more than a year ago.
 

CBO estimates that receipts for the first four months of fiscal year 1999 were almost $35 billion above last year's revenues for the same period. Outlays are estimated to be up by only $5 billion. The cumulative surplus for the four-month period is estimated to be $15 billion, an improvement of $29 billion over last year.
 

Receipts in the first four months of the fiscal year were up 6.3 percent over collections for the same period last year. That rate of increase is about the same as was posted during the last five months of fiscal year 1998, but it is below the 11 percent rate recorded for the first seven months of last year.

CBO anticipates that growth in receipts will diminish during the year as the economy slows and as taxpayers claim child and education tax credits for the first time.

Individual income tax collections during the four months were up by about 6 percent, and receipts from social insurance taxes grew by 7 percent. Corporate income tax collections are running 6 percent below last year's figure, reflecting lower profits.

The unusually rapid rate of growth in other receipts reflects the postponement of some highway and aviation excise tax payments from August and September 1998 to the beginning of fiscal year 1999 and a high level of Federal Reserve payments to the Treasury this year because of the decline of the dollar against the yen.
 

CBO estimates that outlays in the first four months of fiscal year 1999 were up less than 1 percent over the same period last year. But after adjusting for the calendar quirk that advanced spending from February 1998 into January, outlays for fiscal year 1999 are running about 2.6 percent above last year's spending. That growth rate for outlays compares with a 3.2 percent rate during fiscal year 1998.

After accounting for the January 1998 payment shift, defense outlays so far in 1999 are about 1.4 percent below last year's spending, and Medicare spending is also down, by about 3 percent. Net interest payments have fallen by almost 6 percent as both interest rates and federal debt owed to the public have declined.

Outlays for Social Security and Medicaid are up by about 3 percent, and spending for a variety of other federal programs, bolstered by large payments to farmers, has grown by almost 11 percent (after adjusting for the 1998 payment shifts).
 

Both CBO and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) have recently released new budget projections for 1999. CBO is now projecting a total surplus of $107 billion and an on-budget deficit of only $19 billion. CBO is estimating year-over-year increases of 5.5 percent in revenues and 3.4 percent in outlays. (See The Economic and Budget Outlook: Fiscal Years 2000-2009, January 1999.) OMB has estimated slightly lower receipts and higher outlays, resulting in an estimated total surplus of $79 billion.

NOTE: Unless otherwise indicated, the figures in this Monthly Budget Review include Social Security trust funds and the Postal Service fund, which are off-budget.