How They Did by the Numbers

These numbers are from Budget of the United States Government: Historical Tables Fiscal Year 2008, specifically Table 1.3 — Summary of Receipts, Outlays, and Surpluses or Deficits (-) in Current Dollars, Constant (FY 2000) Dollars, and as Percentages of GDP: 1940–2012

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The conditional formatting and president names were my additions. The blue formatting shows the trend of budget surpluses and deficits for the past 5 presidents. The green formatting shows the top 10% and red the bottom 10% in the list.

A word of caution to the wise: these are mere statistics. As Disraeli once said, there are lies, damned lies and statistics. So look at this as one view; one piece of a jigsaw and no more.