The US government says it ran a $US587 billion ($A772 billion) budget deficit for the just-completed fiscal year, a 34 per cent spike over last year after significant improvement from the record deficits of President Barack Obama's first years in office.
The deficit news, while sobering, does not appear bad enough to jolt a gridlocked Washington into action to stem the flow of red ink.
And in the presidential campaign, intractable budget deficits and growing debt have been mostly neglected by Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump.
The latest figures show that the government is borrowing 15 cents of every dollar it spends. Government spending went up almost 5 per cent to $US3.9 trillion in fiscal 2016, but revenues stayed flat at $US3.3 trillion.
