The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) on Wednesday said that the U.S. budget deficit will hit $1.28 trillion this year, down slightly from the previous two years. The nonpartisan agency also said that U.S. budget deficits will be reduced by a total of $3.3 trillion over the next decade, largely because of the deficit reduction package passed by Congress earlier this month. The CBO also projected only modest economic growth over the next few years, with the unemployment rate falling only slightly by the end of 2012. The agency projects an unemployment rate of 8.5 percent for the last four months of 2012.
