ANNUAL SURVEY OF STATE GOVERNMENT FINANCES

U.S. Census Bureau as authorized by Title 13, United States Code, Section 182. All responses are voluntary.

PURPOSE

This recurring survey primarily deals with the finances of the state governments and is also a supplement of the Annual Survey of State and Local Government Finances. The survey covers the fifty state governments as well as all dependent state-level governmental entities.

CONTENT

The Annual Survey of State Government Finances provides a comprehensive summary of the annual survey findings for state governments, as well as data for individual states. The tables contain detail of revenue by type, expenditure by object and function, indebtedness by term, and assets by purpose.

Reporting of government finances by the Census Bureau involves presentation of data in terms of uniform categories. Financial items of the same kind are merged. For example, expenditure amounts for a similar purpose are combined, regardless of the number of government funds involved. To view the most common aggregate finance categories that are used in tables and special tabulations, see Chapter 13 of the Government Finance and Employment Classification Manual, entitled Methodology for Summary Tabulations.

The financial data are limited to coverage of state governments and provide no measure of local government finances as such.

Use caution in attempting to draw conclusions from direct comparisons of financial amounts for individual state governments. Some states directly administer activities that elsewhere are undertaken by local governments, with or without state fiscal aid. The share of government sector financial totals contributed by a state government, therefore, differs materially from one state to another.

Financial amounts presented are statistical in nature and do not represent an accounting statement. Consequently, the Census Bureau statistics on government finance cannot be used as financial statements, or to measure a government’s fiscal condition. For instance, the difference between a government's total revenue and total expenditure cannot be construed to be a 'surplus' or 'deficit'.

The statistics reflect state government fiscal years that end on June 30, except for four states with other ending dates: Alabama and Michigan (September 30), New York (March 31), and Texas (August 31).

FREQUENCY

PRODUCTS

The Annual Survey of State Government Finances provides viewable summary tables for the U.S. and each individual state and a viewable lottery table listing the income and apportionment of state-administered lottery funds. Downloadable spreadsheets of the U.S. and state summary tables, a flat data file providing detailed financial data for each of the 50 state governments, and a pdf version of the lottery table are also available.

HOW THE DATA ARE USED

The U.S. Congress, federal agencies, state and local governments, educational and research organizations, and the general public employ these results. Some major uses include the following:

Additional Information on our Methodology - the population of interest, data collection, data processing, and data quality, are available at How the Data are Collected

RELATED PROGRAMS

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