Published at Open the Books Substack

Last month Open the Books auditors took a closer look at the Federal Register – the official publication of the U.S. government. It publishes every new rule and regulation, every Executive Order and Congressional hearing, and much more. It should be a reliable encyclopedia of government, but we found at least 75 of the 441 entities listed were defunct – defunded, disbanded, renamed, merged with another entity, completed their mission, etc.

 

We all know waste is rampant – but this was more evidence that federal recordkeeping is also a big mess. The scope and complexity of the task before DOGE became even clearer in this context.

 

So we set out to catalog every agency that reports data – not just their current costs, but the size of their staffs and spending stretching back decades. The result will be the clearest picture yet of government’s growth over time.

 

We released the two batches of data in the ensuing weeks, tracking spending and headcounts for big Cabinet-level agencies like the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security, Education, and State; as well as more obscure, independent ones like the Administrative Conference of the United States.

 

At agency after agency, we found spending outstripped growth of the staff and even inflation – often many times over.

 

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