Mark Cuban’s BailoutSleuth.com Foundation has launched JunketSleuth.com to track the spending of government agencies on travel and the like. The first database is Health and Human Services, with a budget that accounts for 20% of the federal budget.
According to the press release out today, they will have 25 such databases, all searchable, as well as stories analyzing the data.
3 comments
Curious about the 20% number — the biggest part of the budget — current and past military is 54%. Wonder why those who keep talking about cutting government, never think to start there.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:U.S._Federal_Spending_-_FY_2007.png
military spending is more like 23%
HHS is 20% of discretionary budget I believe.
Nope, I think Bethany is right. The 2011 fiscal budget is $3.69 trillion. HHS (mandatory and discretionary) accounts for $901 billion — which represents 24.4% of the total budget. (Defense is $719 billion.)
But this is all smoke and mirrors. Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid are apparently not included in the budget numbers (because they are presumably separately funded). Also, I did not see war spending or interest on the national debt (which at $13.7 trillion, has got to be at least $300 billion in interest per year).
Someone with more time on his or her hands want to step in here?