ACFR Project Overview

In an ambitious, first-of-its-kind project, Reason Foundation has collected and parsed the financial statements of all state and local governments across the United States that produce this information and made this data publicly available. Users of this data will be able to assess the fiscal health of state and local governments on an individual basis and in the aggregate.

50 States + DC

with

$2.836 Trillion

in Total Liabilities

2,191 Counties

with

$566.3 Billion

in Total Liabilities

7,224 Municipalities

with

$1.209 Trillion

in Total Liabilities

8,672 School Districts

with

$1.086 Trillion

in Total Liabilities

This collection includes all state governments, and the overwhelming majority of American counties, municipalities and school districts. Broadly speaking, the financial reporting of state and local governments is comparable across jurisdictions because these entities follow a uniform set of accounting standards established by the Government Accounting Standards Board. However, certain exceptions exist wherein state governments have established their own unique (and less comprehensive) accounting standards for local governments to follow. In these cases, Reason Foundation has included notes within its data to indicate that a given entity’s data does not conform to accounting practices generally accepted in the United States. In certain other cases, government entities can become delinquent in financial reporting or, for extremely small entities, may not produce financial reporting at all. Reason Foundation has striven to include all entities with available financial statements and we solicit help in procuring any we may be missing.
This website is a portal into the database we have compiled and allows users to view the data in a variety of ways. For instance, information about government revenues, expenses, or debt may be viewed in total or on a per-capita basis. Figures may be viewed cumulatively, subdivided into a particular grouping of entity types (such as municipalities), or viewed on an individual basis for the reporting entity. The tabs for “State,” “County,” City,” and “School” allow the user to select any individual reporting entity on a map and view basic balance sheet and income statement information for the selected entity. This Overview tab contains information about state and local government finance in the aggregate, along with some narrative explanation of what the charts and terms mean.

Dimensions Collected

States, Counties, & Municipalities

Balance Sheet

  1. Net Pension Assets
  2. Net OPEB Assets
  3. Current Liabilities
  4. Loans Outstanding
  5. Notes Outstanding
  6. Bonds Outstanding
  7. Leases
  8. Net Pension Liability
  9. Net OPEB Liability
  10. Total Liabilities
  11. Capital Contributions

Income Statement

  1. General Revenue
  2. Operating Grants
  3. Total Operating Revenues
  4. Non-Operating Revenues
  5. Revenues
  6. Compensated Absences
  7. Expenses
  8. Change in Net Position

School Districts

Balance Sheet

  1. Net Pension Liability
  2. Net OPEB Liability
  3. Total Liabilities

Income Statement

  1. Revenues
  2. Expenses
PLACEHOLDER TEXT...EXPLAIN VARIABLES COLLECTED AND BIT OF BACKGROUND ON STATE AGGREGATION CHART BELOW

State Aggregation

Total Liabilities
$0.00$2.00k$4.00k$6.00k$8.00k$10.0k$12.0k$14.0k$16.0k$18.0k$20.0k$22.0k$24.0k$26.0k$28.0kPer CapitaStateCountyCity
PLACEHOLDER TEXT...SCHOOL DISTRICT BACKGROUND
Total Liabilities
$0.00$5.00k$10.0k$15.0k$20.0k$25.0k$30.0k$35.0k$40.0k$45.0k$50.0k$55.0k$60.0kPer StudentSchool District

Total Liabilities

$0.0$5.0k$10k$15k$20k$25kStateCountyCitySchool $8,553 $NaN $NaN $NaN Per Student $NaN $2,121 $NaN $NaN Per Student $NaN $NaN $6,959 $NaN Per Student $NaN $NaN $NaN $26,909 Per Student
Liabilities are monies currently owed for services already rendered or products already purchased. The liabilities reported here therefore reflect the accumulation of debt-financed spending by state and local governments. In general, liabilities result from spending in excess of revenues. In some cases, however, liabilities may be fully or partially offset by assets, such as an accumulation of cash deposited into a restricted debt services fund to pay off a bond when it comes due.
It can be misleading, however, to compare total liabilities directly to the total assets reported by a state or local government. That’s because liabilities represent financial obligations that the government is required to pay while a sizable portion of reported assets may be nonfinancial in nature because they reflect the value of physical infrastructure like public roads or bridges. For instance, the City of Los Angeles in 2021 reported holding $18.987 billion in liabilities versus $18.448 billion in assets. However, only $9.813 billion of those assets were financial in nature, meaning the city’s accumulated liabilities were roughly twice as large as its financial assets.

Revenues

$0.0$2.0k$4.0k$6.0k$8.0k$10k$12k$14k$16kStateCountyCitySchool $9,889 $NaN $NaN $NaN Per Student $NaN $1,523 $NaN $NaN Per Student $NaN $NaN $3,234 $NaN Per Student $NaN $NaN $NaN $16,474 Per Student

Expenses

$0.0$2.0k$4.0k$6.0k$8.0k$10k$12k$14kStateCountyCitySchool $9,317 $NaN $NaN $NaN Per Student $NaN $1,350 $NaN $NaN Per Student $NaN $NaN $2,836 $NaN Per Student $NaN $NaN $NaN $15,580 Per Student
During years in which spending exceeds revenues, liabilities generally can be expected to grow. Debt financing costs, such as interest on a bond, are recognized as expenses and, as these financing costs grow, they can crowd out a government’s ability to spend on other items. However, the repayment of liabilities, such as the principal amount of a bond, are not accounted for as an expense. Instead, repayment of liabilities is reflected on the balance sheet only as a reduction in cash assets that were used to pay off the liability.
Since repayment of debt still reflects a use of cash even though it is not technically an expense, highly indebted governments will need to devote a greater share of their revenues toward debt than spending on public programs. Governments report the amount of debt that will fall due within any given year as a “Current Liability.”

Current Liabilities

$0.0$200$400$600$800$1.0k$1.2k$1.4k$1.6kStateCountyCity $1,697 $NaN $NaN $NaN $257 $NaN $NaN $NaN $635
A government’s ability repay its debts on time can be approximated by determining whether revenues exceed the sum of expenses and current liabilities. If:
Revenues – (Expenses + Current Liabilities) > 0,
then a government will be able to timely repay its debts. Practically, however, many governments roll over their debts, such as by issuing new bonds to help them pay off bonds falling due. As a government’s fiscal position deteriorates, so too will its ability to secure new debt on favorable terms. In other words, if spending routinely exceeds revenues and a government continues to roll over its debt, bond purchasers may charge higher effective interest rates or may even refuse to provide any new financing.

Modified Revenues

−$1.2k−$1.0k−$800−$600−$400−$200$0.0StateCountyCity −$1,126 $NaN $NaN $NaN −$84 $NaN $NaN $NaN −$237

Sources of Debt

County data produces negative values for Other Liabilities [ { "name": "United States", "Current Liabilities": 68681686914, "Loans Outstanding": 5934686026, "Notes Outstanding": 9233951765, "Leases": 5299116109, "Net OPEB Liability": 110563650195, "Net Pension Liabiltiy": 129568199387, "Other Liabilities": -329281290396, "type": "County" } ]
  • United States
Current Liabilities: 19.8% Loans Outstanding: 1.7% Notes Outstanding: 3.4% Leases: 0.4% Net OPEB Liability: 20.3% Net Pension Liabiltiy: 26.2% Other Liabilities: 28.3%
$0.0$100B$200B$300B$400B$500B$600B$700B$800BCurrent LiabilitiesLoans OutstandingNotes OutstandingLeasesNet OPEB LiabilityNet Pension LiabiltiyOther Liabilities $562.7B $46.82B $97.80B $10.19B $574.7B $742.2B $801.2B
State and local governments can accrue various types of debt. Reason Foundation has broken the components of government debt into the following broad categories:
  • Current Liabilities signify the amount of accrued debt that must be paid within 12 months of the issue date of financial statements. This includes any long-term obligations like bonds that will fall due within the next financial year, but also includes items like accrued employee payroll and vendor obligations that have not yet been paid at the time the financial statements were issued.
  • Loans Outstanding signifies the balance due on loans from a bank or other financial institution.
  • Notes Outstanding signifies the bonds the reporting entity has issued and which are held by the investing public, including through financial intermediaries such as a pension fund, wealth fund, or hedge fund.
  • Leases signifies the remaining amount of lease obligations for buildings and equipment remaining across the lifetime of existing lease contracts.
  • Net OPEB Liability signifies the difference between the obligations a government has already accrued for Other Post-Employment Benefits for employees (such as retiree health care) and the money it has set aside to pay these benefits. As a net value, it is not the total obligation toward Other Post-Employment Benefits—it is simply the unfunded portion of this liability. Importantly, this value represents the contractual benefits that employees have already earned as of the date of the financial statements and not the total amount that a government will ultimately pay out in Other Post-Employment Benefits because employees continue to accrue new benefits each year.
  • New Pension Liability signifies the difference between the obligations a government has already accrued to offer pensions to existing pool of current and retired employees and the money it has set aside to finance those pensions. Public-sector pension plans may or may not include a cost-sharing component, in which a portion of employee pay is withheld to make contributions to the pension fund. In jurisdictions without cost-sharing, the government makes the entire contribution to the pension fund and pension fund assets grow over time as they are invested. However, most governments are contractually obligated to pay out defined liabilities regardless of amounts contributed or the earnings on investment within a pension fund. The difference between the total assets held in a pension fund and the future payments that fund will make to retired employees (discounted to the present) is the net pension liability. As with the Net OPEB Liability, this value represents the amounts employees have already accrued at the time of the financial statements, although employees in jurisdictions with defined-benefit pensions will continue to accrue new pension benefits each year.