Statement by the President Reviewing the Progress Made Toward a Balanced Budget.

THE GOVERNMENT made a better showing than expected in fiscal 1954 by $245 million. This improvement is shown today in the monthly budget statement for June, which reports a $3.029 billion year-end deficit, $245 million less than the $3.274 billion estimated in the January budget.

We reduced the budget proposed by the previous administration by more than $10 billion, and we cut actual spending by more than $6 ½ billion under the amount spent in fiscal 1953.

We have come over two-thirds of the way toward balancing the budget. And we have done this while putting into effect a tax program which will return nearly $7 ½ billion to the people.

These fiscal achievements mean a great deal to the American people:

(I) We have made possible a program of tax cuts totaling $7 ½ billion.

(2) We have halted inflation. The purchasing power of the dollar has varied only one half of one cent in the past 18 months.

(3) Our people have new confidence. We are laying a firm base for a healthy and expanding economy for better national security, and for more jobs for more people.

The progressive reduction in estimated budget expenditures and deficits is shown in the following table (in rounded hundreds of millions):

1954

1953 In January In January Figures at

Actual 1953 Budget 1954 Budget Year-end

Budget receipts $64.8 $68.0 $67.6 $64.6

Budget expenditures 74.3 77.9 70.9 67.6

Deficit 9.4 9.9 3.274 3.029