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A new infographic from the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) examines the more than $586 billion spent on Fiscal Year 2019 government contracts.
Last fiscal year, the government spent nearly 40 percent of its discretionary spending on contracts for goods and services, an increase of $20 billion from the previous fiscal year. The GAO snapshot reveals this increase is largely driven by spending on services for national defense, with the Department of Defense spending a total of $381.2 billion. The Department of Energy, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, and the Department of Health and Human Services are the top three spenders of civilian federal agencies.
GAO’s infographic details how contracting dollars are spent across the federal government—including which agencies spent the most funds and whether the contracts were completed.
NTEU has a long track record of fighting to keep inherently governmental work, and work closely associated with it, in the hands of trained, accountable federal workers. For the past several years, NTEU helped secure a moratorium on A-76 competitions, which determine whether private contractors may bid on work currently performed by federal employees. NTEU also continues its legislative fight against an Internal Revenue Service program using commission-driven private debt collectors to go after tax debts.
Read more from GAO’s blog here.