FIRST ON FOX: A new initiative is tracking government agency spending in comparison to growth, and a conservative fiscal watchdog group has discovered what it deems to be an alarming trend.
According to OpenTheBooks, staff levels at the Department of Education have decreased since 2000, but the agency’s spending grew by 749%. OpenTheBooks says the calculation is “even more galling” after recent statistics from the National Assessment of Educational Progress showed that student achievement has still not recovered since it saw big drops during the COVID-19 pandemic.
OpenTheBooks’ data on the Department of Education is part of a wider initiative being unveiled by the group on Thursday to chart agency outlays versus agency spending in an effort to provide the public with “a clearer picture of the government as it stands.” As OpenTheBooks tracked agency spending versus size, it found that federal agency spending has far outpaced the rate at which these agencies have grown over time.
In a report announcing the new initiative, the fiscal watchdog group cited complaints about purported cost-saving efforts by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and its leader, tech billionaire Elon Musk, questioning the need for spending cuts in the face of a federal workforce that has largely remained static in terms of size.
In some cases, such as with the Department of Education, the group found as much as a sevenfold increase in spending while staff headcounts remained relatively static or even went down. At the National Institutes of Health, for example, staff levels appreciated by 21.5%, but spending grew 301%.
Savannah Newhouse, a Department of Education spokesperson, slammed past administrations for “frivolously spending taxpayer dollars on priorities that do nothing to help our students learn.”
Newhouse cited programs such as “DEI training in teacher prep programs and ‘Equity Assistance Centers,’” at the department, adding that the agency’s lack of focus on student outcomes was evidenced by recent data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress.
“Under President Trump, the department is aggressively auditing our spending to ensure maximum impact for students and responsible stewardship of taxpayer dollars,” she said.
In addition to tracking outlays versus agency growth, OpenTheBooks also found that at least 75 federal agencies listed in the Federal Register are effectively “defunct or obsolete,” as they have become subsumed by other entities, renamed or in some cases no longer even exist. The group noted that records of these “defunct” agencies are frequently out of date, making it hard for the public to ascertain a complete picture of the federal government.
“In many federal agencies, spending has outpaced not just inflation but also growing headcounts – often many times over. This begs an important question: Where is the money going?” OpenTheBooks CEO John Hart said in a statement to Fox News Digital. “Taxpayers deserve to see the growth in spending in each agency so they can decide how many we need … If the excessive waste and fraud we’ve uncovered over the years — and DOGE is highlighting — is any guide, taxpayers may be better served by far fewer than 441 agencies, including the ones that are defunct.”
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So far, OpenTheBooks has charted 50 federal agencies as far back as the data goes, and the group has created an accessible database that gives the public “a clearer picture of the government as it stands.” As the group charts more agencies, it will periodically release their findings.
Other notable examples the fiscal watchdog group highlighted include the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the Agency for International Development (USAID). At FEMA, staffing levels grew roughly 290% over the last quarter-century, but spending ballooned more than seven times faster at a rate of 2,096%. At USAID, staffing levels grew roughly 218% while spending grew about 468%.
