TheBudgetGraph.com just released their 2008 poster that brilliantly shows where taxpayer dollars are spent in the Federal government. Not surprisingly, over one-third of the poster is made up of defense spending. The office/agency checking in with the lowest budget is also not surprising – the Office of Government Ethics with $12 million. See more numbers below or click through to check out the poster yourself.

Our intern Rich combed through some of these numbers and came up with some interesting finds:

If I’m not mistaken, it looks like if you’re talking about department as in "secretary of" then Commerce looks the lowest with "only" $6.467 billion.

But other small budget organizations include the National Science Foundation with 5.901 billion, the EPA with 7.200 billion, labor with 10.569 billion, treasury with 12.136 billion, and the Small Business Administration with "only" .463 billion.

You also have the Judicial Branch as a whole with just 6.720 billion and the legislative branch with 4.820 billion and those are increases.

Also the executive office of the president with .340 billion.

Interestingly the corps of engineers gets 4.871 billion which is a 3% increase which mostly goes to operation and maintenance while there
are 19% decreases in construction and 11% decreases in flood control, Mississippi River, and tributaries.

The Budget Graph shows increases and decreases in funding by percentage over the past year for each agency/office/project. The biggest loser over the last year turns out to be in the State Department; development assistance is down 67% from the previous budget to only $1.041 billion. Other agencies/offices/projects taking big hits include the Corporation for Public Broadcasting with a 25% cut, Amtrak with a 28% cut, the Community Development Fund with a 28% cut, Housing for the Elderly with a 23% cut, the Safe and Drug Free Schools program with a 38% cut, and the Economic Development Administration with a 22% cut.

Take a spin around this map of the Budget, it is fascinating to look at.