The federal government collected a record amount of taxes in the first two months of fiscal year 2017, totaling $422 billion in revenue, according to the latest monthly Treasury Department statement. The federal government ran a deficit of $181 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 the first two months of fiscal year 2017 outpaced all previous fiscal years, even after adjusting for inflation. The 2017 fiscal year begins on Oct. 1, 2016, and runs through Sept. 30, 2017.
The federal government collected $421,567,000,000 in October and November in fiscal year 2017. Most of the $422 billion came from individual income taxes, which comprised more than half of that total at $213 billion.
The Treasury Department has been tracking this data on its website since 1998. In the first two months of that fiscal year, the federal government collected $324 billion after adjusting for inflation. This means that since 1998, tax revenues have increased roughly 30 percent.
Although the federal government brought in approximately $422 billion in revenue in the first two months of fiscal 2017, it also spent more than $600 billion, leaving a deficit of approximately $181 billion.