In the news this week, we learned that the Congressional Budget Office had come up with new estimates for this year’s federal deficit.

Here’s the upshot of the report:

Largely as a result of the enactment of recent legislation and the continuing turmoil in financial markets, CBO’s baseline projections of the deficit have risen by more than $400 billion in both 2009 and 2010 and by smaller amounts thereafter. . . . CBO now estimates that the deficit would total almost $1.7 trillion (11.9 percent of gross domestic product, or GDP) this year and $1.1 trillion (7.9 percent of GDP) next year—the largest deficits as a share of GDP since 1945.

Let’s translate that $1.7 trillion number: It’s about $17,400 per U.S. family, or $5,500 per person.

That’s right, even if you’re paying all your debts, you and each and every other person in the country is running up $5,500 in debt just for living in the United States this year. And there’s no chance of paying off that debt anytime soon. This is what happens when spending exceeds revenue, when the government spends more than it brings in.

Which brings us to a handy lesson in financial management that Congress might want to consider.