The U.S. government ended fiscal year 2016 with a record high $19.57 trillion national debt, up $1.42 trillion from the end of the prior fiscal year.
At the end of the prior fiscal year, the total national debt was $18.15 trillion, according to the Treasury Department website that tracks the debt.
The annual budget deficit has been about $500 billion in recent years. One key reason the actual national debt rose by more than that over the last fiscal year is that the U.S. hit the debt ceiling in 2015, $18.15 trillion, and the debt remained at that level for much of 2015.
Once the debt ceiling was suspended in October 2015, the national debt quickly soared. It jumped more than $700 billion in November 2015 alone, reflecting pent up borrowing needs of the federal government that had gone unfulfilled for months.
The national debt hit $19.5 trillion for the first time in late August. It totaled $10.63 trillion when President Obama first took office.
