Named of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies of 2023, USAFacts guides you through the maze that is government data. Founded by former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, we’re a team of career researchers, data analysts, statisticians, writers, and communication professionals. We present government metrics in digital offerings like our Annual Report, Government 10-K, and State of the Union in Numbers. We standardize the data, communicate insights through clear visuals, and share the facts without fluff or jargon. Our 2023 goals included a massive increase in organic website traffic and brand acceleration through high-quality content to get the data to as many Americans as possible.
Founder Steve Ballmer, USAFacts President Poppy MacDonald and Chief Research &Advocacy Officer Richard Coffin hand-delivered to Congress an in-depth 101-page report: “America in Facts: A Data-Driven Report to Congress.” Earlier in the year, the team met with representatives to better understand what issues were top of mind, resulting in an eye-opening report into America’s most pressing concerns – immigration, economy, housing, healthcare, education, infrastructure and more. USAFacts met with dozens of lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. The organization aims to make available data easier to access and understand so that Americans can use it to drive policy forward.
As trust in media and institutions erodes and lines blur between trustworthy sources and misinformation, convincing Congress that data and facts should be at the center of policy decisions is no small task. That’s why USAFacts wasted no time speaking with nearly 50 bipartisan Congressional leaders representing both chambers of Congress in the early part of 2023, and devoted six months to exhaustive research and analysis to compile data and information from over 90,000 national, state and local government data sources.
That’s why this project isn’t just about making the data available to Congress and the public - it wants to make government data simple to understand in a format that is both engaging and informative. USAFacts has a track record of providing government officials and the public a single, comprehensive source of information that doesn’t just parrot what other agencies have touted. Its team of researchers digest and translate the information so the average American doesn’t have to, producing a comprehensive presentation and easily digestible facts.
The 2023 America In Facts report is the largest example of this. Despite the heated political environment today, Americans do want to see the future of policy and the political sphere grounded by the most accurate, reliable information possible. That is the bedrock of USAFacts’ foundation and the America in Facts 2023 report - encourage discussion, support debate and depolarize through data.The impact USAFacts aimed to make with this project was to bring more transparency and data accountability to the American people on our country’s most pressing issues. But it’s sometimes not as easy as it sounds.
Of the more than 90,000 governments in the United States, none are required to report data in a timely manner, let alone how accessible to make the information for the average American. As a result, the public is left uninformed and unempowered. USAFacts wants to change that.
The American public deserves to have a democracy where decisions are well informed by data, which helps to paint a clear picture of what is truly happening in America. USAFacts believes that when data is easily available, it becomes a valuable resource for researchers, policymakers, and the general public.
USAFacts is already seeing a significant and positive impact on these efforts. For example, alongside this report, USAFacts’ special data project on the backlog of rape kits across the United States spurred a bill co-sponsored by Representative Nancy Mace (R-SC) and Representative Barbara Lee (D-CA) making rape kit backlog reporting mandatory.
The truth is, government information is often cumbersome and difficult to both come by and interpret for the average citizen. Most Americans are not data analysts or data scientists who can run analyses, and even when data sets are workable, it is incredibly taxing and inefficient for the average American whose time is devoted to work and home life. Data is dense, and often so is government policy. Pick a government source and comb through the depth of data and information they provide. More than likely, you’ll spend more time attempting to understand and decipher the information than actually absorbing it. USAFacts collects, cleans, contextualizes and circulates this data for free.
