Year-End Federal Spending and Government Waste
Jason J. Fichtner
Former Senior Research FellowJoe Albanese
At the end of every fiscal year, US government agencies spend large sums of their budgets in a potentially wasteful manner. These year-end spending surges are described by the “use it or lose it” phenomenon, which is driven by a fear that leftover resources will prompt future budget cuts. Every year the media documents examples of wasteful year-end spending, but there has been little empirical research on the phenomenon. This paper examines existing literature on the prevalence, consequences, wastefulness, and causes of year-end spending surges. It reviews previous efforts to examine year-end spending and, using publicly available data, analyzes whether the quality of year-end spending is lower than spending at other points during the year. The paper does not find obvious indicators that year-end spending quality is worse than other spending. Future studies may be able to find more definitive evidence, given further data availability or different methodologies.