After 2½ years of budget battles, the U.S. federal government is on pace this year to spend $3.455 trillion.
That figure is down from 2010 — the year that worries about government spending helped bring on a tea party uprising, a Republican takeover in the House of Representatives and then a series of showdowns in Congress.
But it is not down by that much. Back then, the government spent a $3.457 trillion.
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