State and Local Finances for 2023

On September 11, 2025 we updated the state and local spending and revenue for FY 2023 using the new Census Bureau State and Local Government Finances summaries for FY 2023 released on July 31, 2025.  (See also Annual Survey of State and Local Government Finances). The release includes state and local spending for the United States as a whole and the 50 individual states and the District of Columbia.

State and local spending and revenue for FY2023 are now actual historical spending as reported by the Census Bureau. In addition, the Census Bureau published updated tables for 2021 and 2022.

We have updated the "guesstimated" state and local finances for FY2024-30 as indicated in our "guesstimate" blog entries.

We have also updated data for individual local government units with data for 2023. 

Beginning in 2022 the Census Bureau has changed the value for Line 56 Direct Expenditure and Line 7 General Revenue from own sources, as follows:

We have decided to end our publication of non-insurance trust cash and security holdings.

However, to keep the time series at usgovernmentspending.com consistent, we have decided to add insurance-trust values back into Line 56 and Line 7 values. 

State Spending for 2023

In March 2025 the US Census Bureau released data on state finances for FY 2023 here and here, including spending and revenue for each individual state and for all states combined.

On June 26, 2025 we updated state and local spending and revenue data for FY2023 through FY2029 as follows:

1. We replaced "guesstimated" state spending and revenue data for FY2023 using the new FY2022 data from the Census Bureau.
2. We replaced "guesstimated" local spending and revenue data for FY 2021 with estimates for each spending and revenue category using the trends in state finances between FY 2021 and FY 2022.
3. We replaced "guesstimated" state revenue data for FY 2023 with data from the Census Bureau's quarterly state tax summary here.
4. We replaced "guesstimated" local revenue data for FY 2023 with estimates for each category using trends for each category of state revenue between FY 2021 and FY 2022.
5. We replaced "guesstimated" state and local spending and revenue for FY 2023 thru FY2029 with new guesstimates based on the latest Census Bureau data for FY 2022 state finances and FY 2023 quarterly tax data.

But there is a problem.

In recent years the Census Bureau has reported Medicaid Vendor Payments to States under item code E74 and other welfare payments under E75 and E79. But now they are all combined under item code E79. This is a problem because usgovernmentspending.com reports Medicaid and the rest of Welfare separately. For now, we are  "guesstimating" E74, E75 and E79 pending release of the combined state and local finances later this year.

We expect the Census Bureau to release local spending and revenue data for FY 2022 not earlier than Summer 2024.

Agency Debt Update for 2024

On June 24, 2025, usgovernmentspending.com updated its data for agency debt from the Federal Reserve Board database. Data is now available for the period 1945-2024. You can see our Agency Debt page here, and a comparison with the official "on-the-books" debt here.

For the period 2024 to 2029 usgovernmentspending.com has "guesstimated" the agency debt, assuming that it increases at the same rate as it did in 2022 to 2023.

See "Federal 'Agency Debt' Added" for explanation of  data derivation.

Data is downloaded from the FRB data download page for "Financial Accounts of the United States (Z.1)" as follows.

1. Select a preformatted data package: "L.211 (A) Agency- and GSE-Backed Securities, n.s.a."
2. Click: Format package.
3. Select: Last 100 years.
4. Click: Go to Download.
5. Click: Download File.