CNBC
Treasury posts unexpected surplus in June as tariff receipts surge
Key Points
With government red ink swelling throughout the year, June saw a surplus of just over $27 billion, following a $316 billion deficit in May.
Customs duties totaled about $27 billion for the month, up from $23 billion in May and a 301% gain from June 2024.
The U.S. government posted a surplus in June as tariffs gave an extra bump to a sharp increase in receipts, the Treasury Department said Friday.
With government red ink swelling throughout the year, last month saw a surplus of just over $27 billion, following a $316 billion deficit in May.
That brought the fiscal year-to-date deficit to $1.34 trillion, up 5% from a year ago. However, with calendar adjustment, the deficit actually edged lower by 1%. There are three months left in the current fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30.
A 13% increase in receipts from the same month a year ago helped bridge the gap, with outlays down 7%. For the year, receipts are up 7% while spending has risen 6%.
The government last posted a June surplus in 2017, during President Donald Trump’s first term. . . .
What I’ve got to say for myself is that 27B in new taxes is an odd thing to brag about and not enough to make a singular slice of meaningful difference in the deficit. Meanwhile those same tariffs are reducing consumer choice in the US while harming relationships with our most critical trade partners.
Also, as noted:
“The Treasury Department noted that the month benefited from calendar adjustments, without which the deficit would have been $70 billion.”
I suspect it is the beinning of something.
It appears that the president is also doing eveything in his power to make sure thejobs created by tariffs go to legal and tax-paying residents
Employment since Ttump took office
FOREIGN-BORN — Minus 543,000
NATIVE-BORN ---- Plus 2,000,000
(There are only 171 million people of any status in the US labor force so … plus 2 million is pretty significant . . . if it sticks.)
I don’t think the 14.5%ish of the population that is foreign-born is other than “legal and tax paying”. If they were not legal or tax-paying their employers wouldn’t be reporting them in establishment surveys or UI administrative records in the first place.
We have this same conversation every 2 months or so.
(Does smoking marijuana causememory loss?)
About half the time I go and dig up the number of people who entered on marriage vias, H1-b visas etc
them we compare it to the number of foreignn born residents.
Here is one exmaple from Aug 2024
Here is one from April 2024
Here is one that you and I had on June 6th 2025 (I thought you read it then)
What it shows is that the number of foreign-born workers working here
is way way way in excess of those counted by H1-B visas, marriage visas etc…
Thus the obvious implication, when a president shows that he is rounding up and eporting the illegals ones, is that his progress is reflected in thsie numbers.
A Populatoon consists of
65.000 people of one type
225,000 peopl of another type
millions and million of peopl of a third type.
That number drops by 543,000.
Obviously a lot of that drop came from type 3 and the fact that I typed this does NOT imply I don’t know the difference, nor does it mean I am a nazi and I hate types 1 and 2.
What surprises me is that I so often need to explain to liberals,
that corporations mark-up products A LOT from wholesale to retail.
The mark-ups on many many products are very high, like 500%.
But once I explain that thing-which-should-no-explaination
they can easily be taught that tariffs (which are on the wholesale cost)
frequently do not have much influence on the retail cost.
