The federal government collected a record amount of taxes in fiscal year 2015, totaling $3.25 trillion in revenue, according to the latest monthly Treasury Department statement. The federal government ran a deficit of $438 billion despite the record revenue.
Treasury receipts include tax revenue from individual income taxes, corporate income taxes, social insurance and retirement taxes, unemployment insurance taxes, excise taxes, estate and gift taxes, customs duties, and other miscellaneous items.
The amount of taxes collected by the federal government in fiscal year 2015 outpaced all previous fiscal years, even after adjusting for inflation. The 2015 fiscal year begins on Oct. 1, 2014, and runs through Sept. 30, 2015.
The federal government collected $3,248,723,000,000 from October through September in fiscal year 2015. Most of the $3.25 trillion came from individual income taxes, which comprised almost half of that total at $1.5 trillion.
The Treasury Department has been tracking this data on its website since 1998. In that fiscal year, the federal government collected $2.5 trillion in inflation-adjusted revenue. This means that since 1998, tax revenues have increased 30 percent.
Although the federal government brought in approximately $3.25 trillion in revenue in fiscal 2015, according to the Treasury, it also spent approximately $3.69 trillion, leaving a deficit of approximately $438 billion.