{"articles":[{"id":395,"title":"Breakthrough Data Site Pulls Back the Curtain on Gov't Finances","html_content":"

by Causes | 4.18.17

On Tax Day, April 18, the former CEO of Microsoft, Steve Ballmer, unveiled an unprecedented effort to compile and present data about government, USAFacts. The secret start-up, which Ballmer has been working on with a team of economists, professors, and other professionals since he left Microsoft in 2014, went live for the public via the website, USAFacts.org.

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USAFacts is a new data-driven portrait of the American population, our government’s finances, and government’s impact on society. We are a non-partisan, not-for-profit civic initiative and have no political agenda or commercial motive. We provide this information as a free public service and are committed to maintaining and expanding it in the future.
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Using government data, the site provides a comprehensive database of information on federal, state and local governments. The site also provides summarized reports that will be updated as further data becomes available. The 170-page Annual Report is a massive trove of data; it’s also a highly accessible basic civics resource document, detailing government branches, departments and structures.

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Want to know life expectancy for the U.S. population aggregated by race? Social Security revenue versus expenditures going back to 1980? The number of police officers in various localities compared to crime rates over time? The age, title and basic bio for the eight \"key officers\" of the federal government? It’s all in there, and much, much more.

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Ballmer wanted to apply the same expectations of transparency in the business world to assessing government; he wanted citizens to be able to see a government \"10-K\" — the annual financial performance report filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission by all large companies. With those “believable common data sets” Ballmer hopes citizens can form intelligent, informed opinions about what government should do to fulfill its mission.

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But what is the mission of government? USAFacts takes as its guiding governmental mission statement the preamble to the Constitution, organizing their focus around four key points- \"Establish justice, ensure domestic tranquility; provide for the common defense; promote the general welfare; and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.\" Under each heading are summarized graphs and charts, with each category expandable to see the details behind it.

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Using government data, the effort has its limitations. If the government doesn’t collect a specific kind of data, like the number of firearms in the country, then you won’t find that data on the site. There’s other related data, like firearms manufactured or licensed, but the National Rifle Association lobbied hard to curtail government data collection of total numbers.

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Still, using only government data was part of the organization’s commitment to be non-partisan. Ballmer is also funding the project entirely out of his own pocket and the site avoids forecasts or predictions of any kind, focusing entirely on what has already happened.

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Ballmer hopes the site will be useful to government leaders as well, and that someday the government might produce something similar that legislators have to sign off on:

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\"Over time, it would be nice to have government produce something like an annual report itself that every legislator had to sign off on, to at least say, ‘Yes I’ve read this, and this accurately reflects the information, this is what I’m going to do about it, this is the true state of where things are in our country.\"
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Whether or not government follows through on that idea, USAFacts will continue to produce the data with the goal of helping the country and its citizens make, \"good, solid, grounded decisions — bipartisan decisions — in terms of where our country goes forward.\"

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Do you think government data transparency is a public service? What data are you curious about or think the government should be tracking? Use the \"Take Action\" button to let your reps know what you think!

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— Asha Sanaker

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(Photo Credit: Microsoft PDC via Flickr / Creative Commons)

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