The federal surplus or deficit in Canada, 1926 to 2025

This issue covers the federal government's surplus or deficit each year from 1926 to 2025, as a share of the economy (GDP). It comes in three images: the chart, the Party Scoreboard (Liberal vs Conservative / PC) and the PM Scoreboard (the average under each Prime Minister).

On the chart, each year is shaded by the federal party in office for most of that year: red for Liberal, blue for Conservative and Progressive Conservative (PC). Diagonal stripes mark minority governments.

A surplus means the federal government took in more than it spent in a year; a deficit means it spent more. The largest swings coincide with wars, recessions and the pandemic, so this issue also tests the party comparison several ways.

In brief. In 2025 the federal government ran a deficit of $36.7 billion, 1.1% of GDP, on Statistics Canada's national accounts basis (the calendar year, not the Public Accounts deficit the government announces for its April-to-March fiscal year). The balance (the surplus or deficit) ranged from a deficit of 22.4% of GDP in 1944, during the Second World War, to a surplus of 4.9% in 1947. Over the century there were 33 surplus years: 28 of the 69 Liberal years (41%) and 5 of the 31 Conservative and PC years (16%). On average, Liberal years ran a smaller deficit: 1.7% of GDP against 2.4% in Conservative and PC years, a gap of 0.7 percentage points of GDP (points) that is well within what chance could produce. Leaving out the war years widens the gap to 1.7 points; leaving out the Depression and recession years under either party (1930 to 1935, 1981, 1982, 1991, 1992, 2009 and 2010) instead narrows it to 0.4 points. Crediting each year to the government in office a year earlier narrows the gap to 0.6 points, and two years earlier to 0.3 points: the result depends on how the years around each change of government are assigned. Shading and ranks show who was in office, not who caused the result.

The numbered markers give context, not credit or blame:

We marked 13 of the many events that federal budget documents, statutes, the Library of Parliament or Statistics Canada tie to the federal balance: six world events or recessions and seven federal measures. Three of the seven measures were taken by Liberal governments and four by Conservative and PC governments. The November 1984 economic statement, by Finance Minister Michael Wilson of the new Progressive Conservative government, falls in a year counted as Liberal, because Liberals held office for most of it. Liberals held office in 69 of the 100 years. The measures include budgets, an economic statement, two laws and a fiscal goal; the 2023 Fall Economic Statement set three fiscal objectives, including a deficit below 1% of GDP from 2026-27. They are targets without the force of law, set on the Public Accounts basis rather than the basis charted. We considered other events and did not mark them, because we found no official source that ties them to the balance or because they sit too close to another marker to read.

The chart shows the federal surplus or deficit in Statistics Canada's national accounts: the international system used to measure every government on the same basis, by calendar year. It is not the deficit the government announces. That figure comes from the Public Accounts, audited by the Auditor General, for fiscal years that run from April to March, under Canadian public sector accounting standards. The two differ. For example, the national accounts put the 2024 calendar-year deficit at $75.3 billion, while the Public Accounts put the deficit for April 2024 to March 2025 at $36.3 billion. Most of that gap is timing: calendar 2024 includes January to March 2024, a quarter with a deficit of $57.9 billion in the national accounts that belongs to the previous fiscal year, and adding up the national accounts quarters for April 2024 to March 2025 gives $33.5 billion. We found no current official table that reconciles the two yearly balances. We use the national accounts because they are the only series that runs every year from 1926 to 2025 on one calendar basis, and because they include 2025. The 2025 deficit of $36.7 billion and the 2024-25 Public Accounts deficit of $36.3 billion are different measures that happen to be close.

From 1926 to 1960 the figure is federal net lending (what the government took in less what it spent, including on buildings and other capital) in Statistics Canada's older national accounts; from 1961 it is the federal surplus or deficit in the current national accounts. The two overlap from 1961 to 1986, and the current figures are used wherever they exist. In those overlap years the older figures show a balance about half a point of GDP higher than the current ones in every year but 1961, so the years before 1961 may look somewhat better than they would on the current basis. On the older basis for 1961 to 1986, the party result is almost the same (see below). The balance is divided by GDP, the same GDP figures as the total tax burden issue.

The notes below describe the main moves, with the reasons official sources give where they give one.

The Party Scoreboard counts the years 1926 to 2025: 100 years, 69 Liberal and 31 Conservative and PC. The average balance was a deficit of 1.9% of GDP across all years, 1.7% in Liberal years and 2.4% in Conservative and PC years. The median, the middle year when the years are lined up from lowest to highest, was a deficit of 0.7%, 0.3% and 2.2%. A few extreme years, such as the war deficits, pull an average a long way; the median is less affected.

The board adds two test rows. Without the Second World War (1939 to 1945), all of which fall in Liberal years, Liberal years average a deficit of 0.7% and Conservative and PC years 2.4%. Since 1946, the averages are 0.8% and 2.3%.

It also counts the years in surplus and in deficit. Of the 100 years, 33 were surpluses and 67 deficits: 28 surpluses and 41 deficits in Liberal years, 5 surpluses and 26 deficits in Conservative and PC years. A count treats a tiny surplus and a large one alike, so it says nothing about size; the averages above do. The smallest surplus, 1964's, was $2 million, close to zero.

The gap between the parties' averages is 0.7 percentage points of GDP. We tested it several ways.

Chance. To see how large a gap chance alone produces, we shuffled the party labels across the years 100,000 times. Half of the shuffles gave a gap of about 0.6 points or more, and one in ten about 1.5 or more. Gaps at least as large as the board's 0.7 came up in 43% of the shuffles. Neighbouring years resemble each other, so we also kept each party's unbroken stretches in office together and tried all 462 ways of assigning the parties to those 11 stretches: a gap as large came up in 223 of them (48%). Both say the gap is within what chance could easily produce.

The war. Leaving out 1939 to 1945 widens the gap to 1.7 points (Liberal years a deficit of 0.7%, Conservative and PC years 2.4%). That came up in 0.2% of the shuffles but in 22% of the stretch arrangements. Leaving out the war and the pandemic years 2020 and 2021 as well: 0.5% against 2.4%, a gap of 1.9 points (0.03% of the shuffles, 17% of the stretch arrangements).

Decades. Compared with each decade's own average, Liberal years ran a deficit 0.4 percentage points smaller than their decade's average and Conservative and PC years 0.9 points larger, a gap of 1.2 points (figures rounded). A gap that large came up in 10% of the shuffles but in only one of the 462 stretch arrangements, the actual one: not unusual when years are shuffled one by one, unusual once each party's stretches in office are kept together. Decades are also a rough way to allow for wars and recessions.

Recessions. Leaving out instead the Depression years 1930 to 1935 (all but 1930 under Conservative governments) and the years during and just after the 1990-92 and 2008-09 recessions (1991, 1992, 2009 and 2010) narrows the gap to 0.4 points (Liberal years a deficit of 1.67%, Conservative and PC years 2.04%), a gap that came up in 74% of the shuffles and 73% of the stretch arrangements. Leaving out the 1981 and 1982 recession years, in Liberal years, as well also gives 0.4 points (1.60% against 2.04%; 69% of the shuffles, 67% of the stretch arrangements).

Surplus years. The gap in the share of surplus years, 41% of Liberal years against 16% of Conservative and PC years, came up in 2% of the shuffles but in 82 of the 462 stretch arrangements (18%): unusual when years are shuffled one by one, not unusual once each party's stretches in office are kept together.

Eras. The order is not the same in every era:

Policy takes time. A budget passed in one year can shape the balance of the next. Crediting each year to the party in office the year before narrows the gap to 0.6 points (1.7% against 2.3%); with a two-year delay, to 0.3 points (1.8% against 2.1%).

The older national accounts. On the older basis for 1961 to 1986, the gap in those years is 1.8 points instead of 1.6, and the full-period gap 0.8 points instead of 0.7.

Volatility. The balance moved 1.9 points of GDP a year on average in Liberal years and 0.8 in Conservative and PC years, mostly because the war and pandemic swings fall in Liberal years.

What is left: Liberal years had a smaller average deficit than Conservative and PC years, and the gap widens without the war years. But the gap on the full span is within chance, the order reverses in the Depression and war years, and crediting each year to the government in office two years earlier shrinks the gap to 0.3 points (a one-year delay to 0.6), because the years around changes of government move between the parties. The balance also depends on wars, recessions, interest rates and the economy, and the comparison cannot separate those from who held office. That describes who was in office when the balance moved. It does not show that either party caused it.

The PM Scoreboard sorts each term by its average surplus or deficit as a share of GDP over the whole term, from the largest surplus to the largest deficit. Rank 1 is the largest surplus, not the best or worst result: each term's balance reflects wars, recessions and policy. Years before 1961 are scored on the older figures, so the ranks of terms before then, against later terms, partly reflect the basis.

Most rows are a term: one unbroken stretch as Prime Minister, however many elections it spans. Each year counts in proportion to the days in office that year, so 1957 counts partly for Louis St-Laurent and partly for John Diefenbaker. The "Years counted" column adds up those shares. The board starts in 1926, the first year of data. The 15 ranked rows are 13 terms and 2 combined rows. A combined row repeats terms already listed; it is not another government.

Louis St-Laurent's term ranks first, with an average surplus of 1.8% of GDP (1948 to 1957), then Mackenzie King's second term (a surplus of 0.8%, 1926 to 1930) and Paul Martin (a surplus of 0.4%). The largest average deficits are Mackenzie King's third term (5.3%, 1935 to 1948, which includes the war), Brian Mulroney (5.0%, 1984 to 1993, which includes the 1985 peak and the 1990 to 1992 recession) and Pierre Trudeau's second term (4.8%, which includes the 1981 to 1982 recession). Among the terms since 1993, Paul Martin's is the only average surplus; Jean Chrétien's averages a deficit of 0.5%, Stephen Harper's 0.6% and Justin Trudeau's 1.8%.

Two Prime Ministers have a combined row, shaded grey, which weights each term by its years counted: Mackenzie King (all three terms, a deficit of 3.8%) and Pierre Trudeau (both terms, 2.5%). Arthur Meighen has no combined row because his first term falls before the data begin.

Six rows are listed below the ranking without a rank: Mackenzie King's first term (a surplus of 1.3%, only 1926 counted), Arthur Meighen's second term (1.3%), Joe Clark (a deficit of 3.9%), John Turner (6.8%), Kim Campbell (5.2%) and Mark Carney (1.1%). Each rests on less than one year of data, and the yearly figures they draw on also cover months when someone else was in office. Mark Carney took office in March 2025 and was in office for 0.8 of 2025, the latest full year of data.

The right-hand column of the PM Scoreboard names federal laws enacted to set a fiscal rule or a legal limit on federal program spending, counted in the term in which they were enacted. Two pass that test: the Spending Control Act (Brian Mulroney, 1992), which set legal limits on program spending (spending other than debt charges and a few listed items) for 1991-92 to 1995-96, and the Federal Balanced Budget Act (Stephen Harper, 2015), repealed in 2016 and deemed never to have come into force. Under this test both entries are Conservative and PC terms; we found no law of this kind under a Liberal government. Budgets, including deficit-cutting ones such as the 1995 budget, are left out for every term. The same test applies to every Prime Minister, so most rows are blank.

Left out for every term:

Comments give context. They do not assign credit or blame. Sources for every comment are in the source list at the end of the web version of this issue.

The balance for 1926 to 1960 is federal net lending in Statistics Canada's archived national accounts (table 36-10-0177-01); from 1961 it is the federal general government surplus or deficit (table 36-10-0477-01), the four quarters of each year added together. We do not adjust the older figures to match the newer ones, because the difference between the two bases varies from year to year. GDP is measured in current dollars, the same series as the total tax burden issue (tables 36-10-0202-01, 36-10-0104-01 and 36-10-0699-01). The share is the balance divided by GDP, times 100.

More on the method: How the charts work

Who we are: About Gov Scoreboard

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Adapted from Statistics Canada, Tables 36-10-0177-01, 36-10-0477-01, 36-10-0202-01, 36-10-0104-01 and 36-10-0699-01 (retrieved 2026-10-25). This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product.

Dates in office: House of Commons, Procedure and Practice (4th ed., 2025), Appendix 6.

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