Federal Programs With Over $10 Billion in Outlays in FY2006
Order Code RS22426
Updated March 7, 2007
Federal Programs With Over $10 Billion in
Outlays in FY2006
Philip D. Winters
Analyst in Government Finance
Government and Finance Division
The government spent $2,655 billion in fiscal year 2006, the most recent fiscal year
with complete budget data. Mandatory spending ($1,412 billion) accounted for 53.2%
and discretionary spending ($1,017 billion) accounted for 38.3% of total outlays that year.
Outlays for net interest ($227 billion) accounted for the remaining 8.5%. This fact sheet,
using data from the Administration’s FY2008 budget (The Budget of the United States
Government for Fiscal Year 2008, Office of Management and Budget — OMB, February
2007), lists, from largest to smallest, federal programs that generated outlays over $10
billion in FY2006.
Federal spending is often divided into two types of spending listed above:
mandatory and discretionary. Mandatory spending (also called direct spending) is
provided by law authorizing the program. Most mandatory programs are funded by
permanent appropriations, but some are funded in annual appropriations acts. However
funded, spending for mandatory programs is based on benefit levels or other factors
established by the substantive laws rather than through the appropriations process. By
contrast, discretionary spending is established in the regular annual appropriations acts
and other appropriations measures (supplemental, emergency) adopted over the course of
a fiscal year.
The table on the next page lists the 33 federal programs with outlays greater than $10
billion in FY2006. Each program is labeled mandatory or discretionary. These programs
generate about 82% of total federal outlays. The 19 largest mandatory programs
represented about 56% of total outlays, while the 14 largest discretionary programs had
about 26% of total outlays.1
1 Many mandatory programs have associated offsetting receipts, which are subtracted from the
programs’ total outlays to produce net outlays. The table displays gross outlays. This accounts
for the sum of the gross outlays of the 19 largest mandatory programs ($1,481.2 billion) being
larger than the net outlays of all mandatory programs ($1,412.1 billion).
CRS-2
Federal Outlays by Spending Programs Over $10 Billion, FY2006
(in millions of dollars and percentage of total outlays)
FY2006
Percent of
Rank
Program or Spending Activity
Typea
Outlays
Total Outlays
1
Social Security-Old-age and survivors insurance (OASI) b
$458,689
17.27%
M
2
DoD-Operation and maintenance
202,704
7.63
D
3
Medicare-Hospital insurance (HI) c
181,973
6.85
M
4
Medicaid grants to States
180,625
6.80
M
5
Medicare-Supplementary medical insurance (SMI) d
158,644
5.97
M
6
DoD-Military personnel
125,199
4.71
D
7
Social Security-Disability insurance (DI) e
91,235
3.44
M
8
DoD-Procurement
89,757
3.38
D
9
DoD-Research, development, test and evaluation
68,629
2.58
D
10
Federal civilian employee retirement and disability
58,572
2.21
M
11
Military retirement
41,145
1.55
M
12
Supplemental security income (SSI)
37,371
1.41
M
13
Earned income tax credit (refundable portion)
36,166
1.36
M
14
Compensation and pensions for veterans
34,680
1.31
M
15
Food stamps (including Puerto Rico) f
34,602
1.30
M
16
Highways
33,111
1.25
D
17
Medicare prescription drug (SMI)
31,718
1.19
M
18
Unemployment insurance (UI) programs
30,520
1.15
M
19
National Institutes of Health
27,609
1.04
D
20
Medical care and hospital services for veterans g
27,558
1.04
D
21
Federal family education loan program
27,132
1.02
M
22
Disaster relief
24,069
0.91
D
23
Section 8 rental assistance
23,534
0.89
D
24
Temporary assistance for needy families (TANF) and
16,974
0.64
M
related programs
25
Commodity Credit Corporation
16,818
0.63
M
26
National flood insurance fund
16,519
0.62
M
27
Child tax credit (refundable portion)
15,473
0.58
M
28
Education for the disadvantaged
14,696
0.55
D
29
Student financial assistance
14,690
0.55
D
30
Airports and airways (FAA)
14,371
0.54
D
31
State child nutrition programs
12,430
0.47
M
32
Special education
11,836
0.45
D
33
Border and transportation security directorate activities
11,049
0.42
D
Mandatory subtotal greater than $10 billion
1,481,286
55.78
Discretionary subtotal greater than $10 billion
688,812
25.94
Total greater than $10 billion
2,170,098
81.72
Total outlays
2,655,435
100.00
Source: Office of Management and Budget, Budget of the U. S. Government, Fiscal Year 2008, Analytical
Perspectives, CD-ROM (Washington: GPO, 2007), Budget Authority and Outlays by Function, Category
and Program, Table 27-1, available at [http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2008/pdf/ap_cd_rom/
27_1.pdf].
a. M = mandatory; D = discretionary.
b. Excludes discretionary outlays for administrative expenses ($2,324 million in FY2006).
c. Excludes both premiums and collections ($2,652 million in FY2006), and discretionary outlays for
administrative expenses ($1,812 million in FY2006).
d. Excludes both premiums and collections ($41,647 million in FY2006), and discretionary outlays for
administrative expenses ($2,637 million in FY2006).
e. Excludes discretionary outlays for administrative expenses ($2,007 million in FY2006).
f. The food stamp program is defined as direct spending by Section 250(c)(8) of the Balanced Budget and
Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985 (2 U.S.C. 900), as amended, rather than by its substantive
legislation.
g. Deduction made for medical care collections ($1,897 million in FY2006).