But this claim simply is not true. 

In less than four years, federal spending has increased above projections by the equivalent of $36,100 per household, tax revenues increased by $17,100 per household, and debt increased by $29,700 per household. 

In the Economic Policy Innovation Center’s new report, we evaluate the Biden-Harris fiscal record using the U.S. Treasury Department’s data through fiscal 2024, which recently concluded on Sept. 30, and compare it to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office’s baseline projections from February 2021 under the laws that were in effect just prior to the inauguration of Biden and Harris. 

Federal spending skyrocketed by $4.7 trillion higher than projected, a staggering 22% above the CBO’s pre-Biden-Harris estimate. While tax revenues rose by $2.2 trillion above projections, 14%, they failed to match the spending spree. Consequently, the national debt has swollen to $35.5 trillion, $3.9 trillion more than the pre-Biden-Harris baseline.

The Biden-Harris spending binge was driven by repeated, deliberate decisions to grow spending, as well as autopilot increases in programs that are sensitive to inflation, which was caused by the irresponsible policies of the administration.

A key goal of Biden-Kamala-nomics is to expand the size and scope of the federal government, all at the expense of the taxpayers. 

The $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act was followed by the misnamed Inflation Reduction Act, infrastructure spending, aid to Ukraine, enlarged veterans’ benefits, and other initiatives that added trillions in new spending. 

The Biden-Harris administration also abused the regulatory process to expand government. The House Budget Committee reports that the administration has proposed and implemented executive actions with costs exceeding $2 trillion, including the transfer of student loan debt from borrowers to taxpayers, unilaterally increasing food stamp benefit payments, and weakening Medicaid eligibility rules. 

Rising interest on the national debt is the single largest contributor to increased spending. As the deficit expanded and interest rates rose, interest payments to finance the debt shot up more than $1.2 trillion beyond what the CBO originally projected between fiscal 2021 and 2024. That is an astonishing 106% increase above the pre-Biden-Harris baseline projection. 

Net interest outlays totaled $882 billion in fiscal 2024, making it the second-largest line item in the budget, exceeding even national defense or Medicare. Unlike those programs, taxpayers get nothing in return for interest payments other than the hangover from past borrowing. 

Interest rates on 10-year Treasury notes are now more than 2 percentage points higher than what the CBO projected in 2021 they would be today. According to the CBO’s rule of thumb, interest rates 1 percentage point higher than projected each year add more than $3.2 trillion to 10-year spending totals. That means interest spending is only going to consume more of the federal budget in the near future. 

Another primary driver of the spending binge was a massive expansion of welfare programs that discourage work and trap families in dependency.

The Biden-Harris administration has expanded benefits and eligibility for Medicaid, food stamps, the child tax credit, and Obamacare subsidies. Outlays for these four welfare programs totaled around $3.5 trillion between fiscal 2021 and 2024, a 16% increase above the pre-Biden-Harris CBO baseline. 

The consequences of these irresponsible policies are evident. 

There are now 2.9 million missing workers compared to the pre-pandemic workforce, as able-bodied adults have dropped out of the labor force. 

The surge of government spending led to the highest rates of inflation in four decades, leading to higher prices and lower real wages. 

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Inflation has grown nearly 20% since January 2021, but wages have not kept up with rising prices. That means the average worker has seen the purchasing power of his or her take-home pay fall by about $2,230 since the Biden-Harris administration’s policies began.

Government spending is on an unsustainable trajectory, threatening the value of the dollar. The policies of the Biden-Harris administration have only made families worse off today than they were four years ago. 

Matthew D. Dickerson is the director of budget policy at the Economic Policy Innovation Center. Amelia Kuntzman, a research assistant at EPIC, contributed to this article.