High-Risk Series: Efforts Made to Achieve Progress Need to Be Maintained and Expanded to Fully Address All Areas

What GAO Found

Congress and executive agencies have made substantial progress addressing high-risk issues since the previous High-Risk List update in 2021. Sixteen of 34 high-risk areas improved since 2021. This is the most progress in the 8 years since GAO started rating high-risk areas. Two of the 16 areas are being removed from the list: Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) Insurance Programs and the 2020 Decennial Census. Since our last update, there were approximately $100 billion in financial benefits due to improvements in high-risk areas.

Changes to the High-Risk List Since 2021

The PBGC Insurance Programs area is being removed because Congress provided funding to troubled multiemployer pension plans, which has led to an improved financial position for the PBGC multiemployer insurance program. Additionally, the financial position of the PBGC single-employer insurance program has improved gradually in recent years. PBGC now projects a very low risk of insolvency over the next 15 years for both programs. GAO will continue to monitor the funds.

The 2020 Decennial Census is being removed because the Census Bureau made progress in addressing data quality concerns, chartered a high-level governance group, and implemented priority recommendations. GAO will monitor 2030 Census planning—already underway—for emerging risks and challenges.

GAO is adding one new area to the 2023 High-Risk List: Strengthening Management of the Federal Prison System. This area is being added, in part, due to Bureau of Prisons' (BOP) longstanding challenges managing staff and resources, and planning and evaluating programs that help incarcerated people have a successful return to the community.

In 2022, GAO added two other areas to the High-Risk List. The Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Leadership and Coordination of Public Health Emergencies area was addedbecause, for more than a decade, GAO has found persistent deficiencies in HHS’s leadership role preparing for and responding to public health emergencies and extreme weather events. GAO addedthe Unemployment Insurance System area because administrative and program integrity challenges in the joint federal-state program have affected the system’s ability to meet the needs of unemployed workers. These challenges also expose the system to significant financial losses.

Why GAO Did This Study

The federal government is one of the world’s largest and most complex entities. About $6.3 trillion in outlays in fiscal year 2022 funded a broad array of programs and operations. GAO’s High-Risk Series identifies government operations with vulnerabilities to fraud, waste, abuse, and mismanagement, or in need of transformation.

This biennial update describes the status of high-risk areas, outlines actions that are needed to assure further progress, and identifies new high-risk areas needing attention by the executive branch and Congress.

Lasting solutions to high-risk problems save billions of dollars, improve service to the public, and strengthen government performance and accountability. In the past 17 years, financial benefits totaled $675 billion.

GAO uses five criteria to assess progress in addressing high-risk areas: (1) leadership commitment; (2) agency capacity; (3) an action plan; (4) monitoring efforts; and (5) demonstrated progress.