OTTAWA - The bills are coming in across the country, and they are hefty.

In the last two days, Ontario reported it will suffer a $24.7-billion deficit in the current fiscal year, almost double its March projection, and the federal government said it is already $23.7 billion in the red, only five months into its year.

With Quebec issuing an update next week - expected to be worse than previously thought - the TD Bank is also revisiting a report it issued earlier this week that the total public sector shortfall will be at least $90 billion this year.

It more than likely will be in the $100-$110 billion range.

TD Bank economist Derek Burleton says governments are creating such a debt elephant that they will need to cut spending drastically or even raise taxes to prevent Canada from falling into the deficit nightmare of the 1970s, '80s and '90s.

"There's a case to be made that the era of restraint Canadians are looking at over the next three to five years is going to keep our growth lower than otherwise would be the case," Burleton said.

Bank of Montreal economist Douglas Porter agrees that governments will soon have to shift their attention from how to spend to stimulate the economy to how to kill the monster they created.

On Friday, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty told a business audience near Toronto that the government needed to pump spending in the face of a deep recession.

And he repeated the familiar mantra that Canada is "by far" in the best fiscal position among Group of Seven countries to pay off its mounting debts.

But economists say that distinction is carrying less weight with each new government recalculation of upcoming shortfalls.

"I think we are going to reach an uncomfortable juncture, perhaps as early as next year, when the recovery is still relatively young, and yet deficits will be so large they will cry out for the need for some restraint," Porter said.

The majority of Ottawa's shortfall so far this year is not from ramped up stimulus spending, but the result of the recession's wreckage.