Accession Number:

AD1013794

Title:

Fiscal Year 2015 U.S. Government Financial Statements: Need to Address the Governments Remaining Financial Management Challenges and Long Term Fiscal Path

Descriptive Note:

Technical Report

Corporate Author:

U.S. Government Accountability Office Washington United States

Personal Author(s):

• Dodaro,Gene L.

Report Date:

2016-04-06

Pagination or Media Count:

45.0

Abstract:

The Financial Report of the U.S. Government Financial Report provides important information to the Congress, federal agencies, and the public, including the governments financial condition and the reliability of data used to help support budget and financial decisions. While significant progress has been made in improving federal financial management over the past 20 years, material weaknesses in internal control over financial reporting and other limitations continued to prevent GAO from expressing an opinion on the governments accrual-based financial statements. Three major impediments are 1 serious financial management problems at DOD, which represented 30 percent and 15 percent of the governments reported total assets and net costs, respectively 2 the governments inability to adequately account for and reconcile a significant amount of intragovernmental activity and balances between federal entities, which resulted in hundreds of billions of dollars in differences and 3 the governments ineffective process for preparing the U.S. governments consolidated financial statements governmentwide financial statements.

Descriptors:

• federal budgets
• financial management
• fiscal policies
• united states government

Subject Categories:

Distribution Statement:

APPROVED FOR PUBLIC RELEASE