Watchdog Finds More Than $1T In Misreported Federal Spending

The Department of Health and Human Services tops the list of the agencies most delinquent in reporting spending on USASpending.gov, with nearly $800 billion in unreported funds, according to a watchdog group.

The Sunlight Foundation’s latest "Clearspending" findings reveal discrepancies in what was posted on USASpending.gov about agencies’ grants versus the information available in other bookkeeping records. The analysis is based on the organization’s measurements of grant spending in terms of consistency, completeness and timeliness. The analysis does not include spending on contracts.

The total of $1.55 trillion in misreported funds in 2011 represents 94.5 percent of the total grant spending reported that year -- a spike from 2010’s total of $1.3 trillion. Misreporting includes overreporting, underreporting, nonreporting, late reporting and incomplete reporting...