The U.S. federal budget deficit will drop to $845 billion in the 2013 fiscal year after four consecutive years above $1 trillion, largely because of higher taxes now being paid by wealthy Americans, a new government report predicted Tuesday. The CBO projected that the economy will grow only 1.4 percent this year if the $85 billion in spending cuts take effect, and unemployment would rise slightly to 8 percent. The CBO report predicted the budget deficit would decline to $430 billion by 2015, which would be a relatively low 2.4 percent when measured against the size of the economy.
