The Association of Government Accountants [1] published a report entitled "Public Attitudes Toward Government Accountability and Transparency 2008" [2], based on their first annual survey of public attitudes toward government financial information transparency and accountability.

It is a part of AGI's "Advancing Government Accountability" campaign, which they hope will educate the government and the public on the benefits of government transparency, particularly in reporting government financial information. Not a big surprise here...the survey findings show that people are deeply dissatisfied with the availability of government financial information and how it is delivered to the public:

"...among those who do receive information about governments’ generation and spending of money, there is a strong dissatisfaction with the information that they receive. The strongest dissatisfaction is with the information about the federal government’s financial management (Federal, 60%; State, 46%; Local, 38%). Only 5% are satisfied with what they receive from the federal government".

To view more of the survey's findings, view or download the PowerPoint [3] file.

Librarians can learn from this...know where to retrieve government financial information and make this known to your patrons and your community!